Here's the story. My brother Mark told me about a person in his community that had an old Airstream and she was interested in selling. We both went over in November of 2006 and looked at the Airstream. It was in pretty bad shape. The old lady took us on a tour and told us that she and her husband used to use it all the time. It was in pretty tough shape and I did not know enough about the restoration process, so I did not make her an offer. In the spring, after a bunch of research, I asked my brother if the lady was interested in selling. He said that she passed away a few weeks prior and I then contacted the executor of her estate. It was her cousin and when I contacted him, he was more than willing to sell it to me. It was sitting on 4 flat tires under a tree and had not budged an inch since 92'. After re-inspecting the trailer and assessing what I thought it would need, I made him an offer that I thought was a fair offer for both of us. We shook on it and I then started the process. The first thing I needed to do was to get the thing out of the yard. I went over there with a few floor jacks, jack stands and an air compressor. The tires were shot. 15 years being exposed to weather and UV is too much to ask for tires. I then pulled all 4 tires and threw the rims in the truck and bought 4 new Carlisle trailer tires. A few days later I put the tires back on the trailer and hooked it up to my truck. I had downloaded the wiring diagram for the trailer and made up the connection to the truck. The brake lights did not work, so I went inside the trailer and started to work on the fuse panel. I eventually got the brake lights to work, so I started to pull it out of the yard.

March 24, 2007
My first destination was about 10 miles over to my parents house. I called them to ask if I could drop the trailer in their driveway. They were not home, so I just unhooked it and left the green slime covered crappy trailer in their driveway. Needless to say, my mother was not pleased when she got home. The next day I went over and started the cleaning process. I got the power washer out and started blasting.

Before Cleaning:
This is what it looked like after sitting under a tree for 15 years. It was a nasty green slime. It was a fairly simple process. I power washed the whole trailer and the grime just blasted off and looked great. I took care to power wash over the seams, so as not to disturb the seals between the panels. After I got the trailer power washed, I have to admit that I thought it looked pretty good. Sadly it does not look as good as the picture. You will see later that I have much more work left to do.

First Blog entry

Well its November of 08' and I'm finally going to blog my Airstream makeover. In the next few weeks I plan on documenting all of the work that I have done up to this point. After that, hopefully I can document the completion of this project.

I guess you ask.. "Why would E-Rock start a project like this?" Well, I guess I have to say that its for the family. When I was growing up our family went camping. We never went on fancy vacations to Disney or overseas. We were not rich or poor but my father worked for P&G. Have you ever met someone that worked there that was not cheep? My dad would take 2 weeks every summer to take the family camping. We went camping! Not in a fancy RV, but tent camping! Dad and Mom always said that if you had an RV, Popups or campers, you were not really camping. Jump to the future.

In 97' I was purchasing some equipment for my company and noticed that the dealer had a pop-up camper in the lot. My brother Mark was with me and we both decided on the spot to purchase the used pop-up. It was re-po'ed and we got a serious deal. We both figured that if our wives did not like camping, we could just sell it and still make a few bucks. As it turns out, both of our families like to go camping. My 2 boys can't get enough of camping. They love it. I like the pop-up a lot, but wanted something more. I have always liked the Airstreams. They are considered by everyone in the RV industry to be the best of the best. I like to have the best, so the search started for an Airstream. A new 31' Airstream starts around 80K. I love camping, but I'm not exaclty in a finincial position to spend that kind of money on something that we will use a handful of times a year. So that left me with the possibility of rehabing a used one.

My intention was to buy one, put in a new interior and use it. It has become a bigger project than I had ever imagined. I tear one thing out, just to find newer and bigger problems. Well at this point I'm completely gutted and the belly pan down. Not much more to tear apart. If I get some time, not likely with 2 young boys, I will update my progress as I go.