Dealing With Rotted Rear Botttom Corners

Thanks to all the info on the internet, we knew what to look for when buying an old trailer. We saw some with major damage, some medium damage and one with slight damage (the one we bought) and we were prepared to deal with it.

I opened up the back corners, pealed the skin back and am amazed at how simply the trailers are built (saw the same with the ceiling repairs.) Took a wood chisel and hammer to the rotted wood and chiseled till I go to good wood or removed the whole piece (bottom left quarter panel)

Also - someone in the past had done a quick cheap repair with spray insulation foam. Got it all to a point of ready for repair, splicing and new. I sprayed all old and new exposed to the elements with flat black paint so that another layer of slight protection was added.

A lot of debris form the repairs. 

 Old wood replaced with new KD fir or cabinet grade plywood.

 Views from inside. old and new joined by piece screwed on top.

Views from outside. added a 1/8" luan plywood to strengthen the back.

Put the skin back on moved onto removing the old, old butal tape at all corners and replacement.

Start of Demo and Repairs

Start of the ceiling demo and cook area cabinet.

 

Drawer fronts need to be reglued and painted. We have picked the Rust-Oleum "Colonial Red" as the accent color for the inside and out. Icebox door is for sale. Inside of door is damaged but face is in great shape. Icebox housing cardboard is wet from rain, inside is ok.

Tore out old paneling and carefully cut along wall edge with a sawzall and sheet metal snips.

Exploratory demo of ceiling revealed little damage to be repaired.

Removed moldy styrofoam from icebox area. Will be replacing with a dorm room fridge.

Need to remove propane heater and build a ? of some sort to go in its place. Propane heater is for sale.

Installed new wood paneling and resealed vent on inside, ran new electrical wire.

We will be painting the walls and ceiling a yellow earth tone "straw-hat" so no need to worry about mis-match in panel color.








At back vent it felt pretty strong and very little de-lamination but I went ahead and sanded around the vent and glued a piece of paneling on for a quick fix.



Onto the next phase - bottom rear corners.

August 12, 2012 Found Our MainLiner

 After weeks of searching Oregon craigslist and looking at a few Aristocrats, we found ours.  I am not much of a writer and this is my first attempt at a blog. I am going to try and keep this up to date and will blog what we (wife and me) have done so far.

 There it was in the bushes - used as a hunting trailer for the last 6 years.

 Got it home and set about what and where to start. It is in pretty good shape. Just a little rot in the bottom corners. Reading on the internet about what to look for really paid off. We got ours for $500 (Divorce Sale) seller just wanted to get his x mrs. off his back.

 There was visible signs of water getting in around the ceiling vents and the cook area cabinet had water damage.

Let the fun begin.