It has been about a month since we have been out to the Airstream. On this most recent trip we got almost everything done that we had wanted to, and also dealt with some new problems that came up.
We tore up most of the remaining floor since we now have tank heaters that stick to the bottom of the gray, black, and fresh water tanks and it would be impossible to get them on any other way other than accessing them from the top by lifting up the free end of the holding tank then sliding the tank under the tank.
After tearing up the very back section of plywood we found that the last beam had been twisted and broken (apparently the previous owners drove off with the back leveling jack still down and it got ripped out along with the beam).
(Top view of problem child)
First the beam was bent back as far as it would go to its original shape.
The lower half of the beam was too far bent up to restore so it was removed. We replaced the lower half of the beam with a piece of 1 1/4" angle iron. This we set into place until a later date when we could bolt it to the what it left of the original beam.
We started getting wasps coming into the trailer. They started to build a nest in one of the holes for the ventilation pipes, so we had to seal that off from the inside and hope that it will be good enough to discourage them.
Jackson patched up a lot of the holes on the underbelly with sheet aluminum, rivets, and caulking. I went along the side of the trailer and caulked the cracks between where the underbelly and the shell meet.
It looks like we will have to replace the whole last 5ft of the belly sheeting
Most of the beams have all of the rust sanded off of them, but it is a long process since you get tired from it so fast.
We also decided to remove the huge furnace since it was so old, and we did not know if it worked or not. Since we are installing a wood stove as our main heat source, it is not necessary to have. It freed up a lot of room, and we may leave some free space in case we want to install a smaller, newer furnace as a back-up heat source in the future.
The last thing we had to do was measurements. We got measurements of everything that is/will be in the trailer and made a to-scale diagram of what we want our layout to be.
We have also hired Jon Sand to do a sketch showing the materials that we want. This will help us to keep in mind the direction that we want to go in. Thanks Jon!
List of progress
- Ground rust off remaining floor beams
- Cleaned and wiped down last sections of the belly pan (ready for insulation)
- Patched and riveted most of underbelly
- Removed Suburban furnace (need to replace)
- Measured holding tanks-to order Aerogel (Which is what we will encase the holding tanks)
- Measured length of needed rubber LP hoses (which run from steel LP pipe to appliances)
- Measured out floor plan
List of Supplies
- Aluminum tape
- Silicon and caulk gun
- Toolbox
- Hack saw
- Tape measure
- Riveting tool and rivets (3/16, 1/4-3/8 grip range aluminum)
- Dust masks
- Safety glasses
- Ear plugs
- Skill saw
- Shop vac
- Rubber gloves
- Drill with metal brush head
We only had one small car jack so we needed to do some skillful rigging.
It worked and no one died surprisingly.
Inside the trailer we needed to prepare the location of the shower by installing
mmm. beer.
