No more APB!

Airstream Pattern Baldness - A.P.B. I just could not wait any longer. A few months ago Vintage Trailer Supply had a sale on the dual Cyclo and the supplies that I would need to polish the Airstream. I was in the process of changing the running lights over to new LED's and I thought this would be a perfect time to test the Nuvite polishing compound and my new Cyclo. I have not stripped the trailer of the clear coat that was installed in 78. Most of the clear coat was gone on the endcaps already, so I just used some lacquer thinner to get rid of the rest of it. It takes some time to get used to the process, but it really was not as bad as I had envisioned. It took a few hours to do 80% of the front Endcap. I will admit that I did not do a very good job, but dont really care. This is just a trial and I will have to go back later and do a proper job. It makes a world of difference. I can't wait to have the whole thing shiny.

New Plumbing and valves

Tonight I stayed late and hooked up the plumbing for the grey and black water tanks. Not too difficult here. I purchased new Valterra valves and all new 3" PVC piping. The old Thetford valves were glued to the pipes and I figured that it was just as easy to make all new fittings. It is just a matter of putting the parts together. I dry fitted the parts first then glued the PVC fittings. It all seems pretty good. I am hoping that I will not have any leaks. I will have to pull the Airstream out of the warehouse to get it to a location where I have water. Cross your fingers!

It was a Fan-Tastic night

Tonight I decided to put one of the two new Fantastic fans in the roof. When I purchased the Airstream it has a leak in the roof vent at the front of the trailer. Originally there was a plastic insert on the lid that allowed light to come in the trailer. A branch fell on it, cracked it, and allowed water to get into the trailer. This resulted in me replacing the floor near the door and having to weld 4 new outriggers to the frame near the door. Since the old fan vent was broken and when you turned the fan on it was noisy, I decided long ago to replace it with a new fan. It seems that the fantastic vent fan is a top choice. The model I chose was the 6000. It has a powered lifter, rain sensor and temperature gauge. What I like about it, is that I can tow the Airstream down the road with the vents open and if it starts to rain, they will automatically shut. Another thing is that if we are camping and it starts to rain the they will shut and no water will pour through the roof. I purchased mine from Vintage Trailer Supply. It was a few dollars more, but the housing above the roof is grey to match the trailer and the interior trim piece is curved to match the curved roof in my trailer. The installation was fairly simple. On the inside, I had to remove the light cover, the light assembly and drill out 4 rivets that attached the ceiling to the vent. I took a putty knife and a hammer to the roof and sheered the rivet heads off with the putty knife. I cleaned up the old Vulkum with lacquer thinner and then enlarged the opening with some tin snips. The opening for the old fan was square, but had rounded corners. The Fantastic vent had square corners. I squared off the corners and fitted the fan in place. I then moved inside and squared off the opening in the ceiling for the interior trim piece. The old vent had 2 sets of 12v wires running to it. One set was for the lighting and the other set was for the electric fan. I used the blue fan wire and wired it to my new fan. Everything worked. I then went back up to the roof and attached the fan. It comes with a closed cell Styrofoam gasket. I then screwed the unit to the roof with the provided screws. After it was screwed down. I ran a bead of Vulkum around the edge and put a dab of vulkum on the top of each screw head. I still need to attach the the interior trim piece, but I am going to wait until the interior is painted. I also moved the 12v lighting wires to a new hole in the ceiling so I can put new lights in the future. As a side note, I used my forklift at work to get on top of the trailer. I put a skid on the forklift to give me a platform to sit on. It worked out great. Much easier than hanging onto a ladder and trying not to put pressure on the top of the aluminum skin.

I've got gas

I think we all know that I have gas, but what I meant to say was that I now got a new gasket on both the exterior door and the interior door. The old gasket on the exterior door did not come off very easy. Lacquer thinner does a good job of dissolving the old glue, but it took a lot of effort to get the gasket material and glue off. Since I could not remove the door and lay it horizontally, the thinner would just run down the door and not soak into the old glue and gasket. The windows were much easier, since I could remove them and lay them flat. After the door was cleaned up. I just had to put the new gasket on. This gasket, purchased from Out of doors Mart, had a peal and stick glue. I pulled off the red strip and ran the gasket all around the door. I trimmed it at the bottom and was done. This was much easier than the gasket on the windows because for them, I had to put glue on both the window and the gasket, wait 10 min and then install. I next turned to the foam gasket that goes around the screen door. Same process here. Cleaned up the old glue and used a peel and stick foam gasket to attach the new seal around the screen door. After this I decided to put some new screen material in the door. The old one was very worn and discollored. Fairly easy process here. Pulled out the cord that attached the screen to the door. One problem that I ran into was that the channel that the cord pushed into was smaller than the roller installation tool that I had. The door looks much better with the new screen material. I used the standard black plastic screen. I think it looks better and makes the windows look tinted.

Window Gaskets

The gasket on my windows was old, hard and did not give a proper seal. I purchased all new gasket material for all the windows and went to work. The windows on my 78' are extremely easily to remove. Open the window a little. Remove the screw at the base of each arm that is attached to the frame, and slide the arm out of the channel in the window frame. Now that the window is free to rotate around the top of the window, you lift the window up so that it is almost perpendicular to the trailer and the window will just come right out. Installation is just the opposite. The window has an extruded channel at the top that "hooks" into the channel on the window frame. After the window was out, I put it on the workbench and removed the old gasket. I used a putty knife and a bunch of lacquer thinner to remove the old gasket and glue. It takes a while to get the frame clean of all the old glue. After it is clean, I applied a 3M gasket adhesive to both the frame and the gasket. I cleaned both with lacquer thinner first to remove any contaminates. I used an old tooth brush to apply the glue. It works like a contact cement. You must put it on both surfaces and let it dry to the touch. After 10 minutes or so you can start to re-attach the gasket to the window. Fairly simple process, but with (6) side windows and a front and rear window it took 2 evenings after work to complete the work. I feel pretty good that all the windows have new rubber and will not cause me further trouble with leaks.

Dam bathroom

Well the Airstream project was put on hold for the past few months. One Saturday I deceided to replace a tile in our master bath. I got all my supplies ready to replace the tile, went upstairs, and started to remove a few loose tiles. One tile turned into 2, that turned into 4, to 8, to 16... after 20 minutes it was determined that I needed to replace all the tile. I was not planning on a bathroom remodel, but that is what happened. It started out with a tile replacement, then moved to "I'll just re-tile the shower, to "lets do the whole bathroom", to "lets re-design the bathroom", to "lets tear down a few walls, re-locate the toilet, move the sink, put in a master closet, rewire the whole bathrrom, install a new subfloor, new tile floor, new tiled shower, new drywall, new insulation, new window, new plumbing, new waste lines, new vanity, new sink, new... " Needless to say 4 months later I have a usable master bath.

Shocking

Today I changed the 12v panel system to an updated one that has blade type fuses. The old one had the glass fuses and the terminals were rusty. I replaced one part of the system with a standard 12v fuse block that I bought at an auto store. This one controls the lights, brakes, and reverse lights. The other panel controls the current from the 12v converter, the 12v battery and the charge line from the truck. Right now I just hooked up the standard wiring. I need to run (3) new 12v lines. My newer refrigerator needs to have 12v to run the circuit board. I also need to have a 12v line run to my new water heater. The old water heater needed to be lit by hand, the new one has electronic ignition and all I have to do is flip a switch. The 3rd new 12v line will run the the electro-hydraulic pump. This is the pump that operates the hydraulic disc brakes.