Hello, I think this is my first forum post here, although I've been mining for information for a while...
I just bought a 1964 Overlander having wanted an Airstream for 10 or 15 years now, even before I moved to the US from England about 7 years ago - they're pretty famous there too. I'm very happy to have it, and of course it needs some work, so here we go. I got it in Texas and drove it back to San Leandro, California last weekend - 1,500 miles or so - and right now it's parked at my friend's house down there, as I live about 20 miles away in Oakland (they are tolerant... for now). I'm planning to move to a place in San Leandro with a driveway & garage so I can work on it at home. I have a driveway at my current place in Oakland, but it's narrow, steeply-sloped, has low tree branches, and my street is also narrow, steeply-sloped, and a dead end. I still act like I live in San Francisco (lived there for 5 years), but as I move further & further from the city it's getting harder to pull that off...
Here's some pictures of the trip back from Texas:
http://flickr.com/photos/jacob-davie...7594332403020/
A few of those that I really like-
Airstream in the dark:
Sunset clouds in California:
Red:
I towed it back with a 15' rental truck, which was cheap ($200) and worked out pretty well - the hitch was a little high, but I think I only scraped the tail of the trailer once and no permanent harm seems to have been done. There was a bit of a shock when my careful research had indicated that the trailer would have a 2" coupler (as the truck had a 2" ball) and then the seller said, oh no, it has a 1 7/8 coupler. I got as far as buying a new 2" coupler and finding somebody to weld it on - not all that easy on a Saturday afternoon in small-town Texas - before we got to the trailer and found out it was a 2" coupler after all. The seller was very apologetic but I was just glad we didn't have to do any cutting & welding before we left. I wired a 7-pin connector to the trailer lights connector on the back and a brake controller I temporarily installed and everything worked great. The wheels are split-rims still, I think, but the tires were pretty good, and the brakes worked fine.
Driving back was really fun, even though the trailer wasn't providing much in the way of amenities, there was no sway control, and we had some exciting moments in high winds on 58 coming across Southern California. Oh yeah, and there was that time we followed a bad sign trying to find a gas station and had to back the truck 1/4 mile down a curving hillside road. In the dark. Hey, it was good practice at backing - I'd never driven with a trailer before, but I think I got the hang of it pretty quickly. (The guy at the gas station said, "Yeah, that sign is confusing. I wonder why only people with big trailers come here and complain about it though?" - the idea that everyone else can just TURN AROUND when they hit the unpaved section had evidently not occurred to him, nor the idea that maybe the sign should be fixed...)
But anyway, every time we stopped for gas (which was regularly...) I got to admire the trailer, and I just loved parking it across 7 spaces at restaurants and so on - somehow everyone loves the Airstream, I think you could get away with murder with one.
The previous owner had it from his grandfather, and the trailer had been in Alamagordo, New Mexico until 2003. The grandfather had kept it polished at least until the 80s, and from what I can tell it was still being kept up until the 90s. The guy selling it was sad to see it go, but he needed to tow some kind of racecar or bike in a trailer and the Airstream wasn't really compatible. So, I'm pretty hopeful that being stored in NM and being kept up by a diligent owner means no serious rust or rot problems being left to get out of control. So far what I'm seeing seems to confirm that.
So, the details; it's a 1964 Overlander,
double-bed layout. The interior is mostly original except that the back fold-out bed has been replaced with a fixed bed. The cooker and refrigerator have been replaced at some point (1970s or 1980s, it looks like to me). The tile floor had carpet laid over it. It had air conditioning either added or replacing the factory system at some point, and a circular TV antenna added on the roof. It has awnings but they're not Zip-Dee. The furnace seems to be gone (assuming there was one) and a gas fireplace put in instead. The water heater was replaced at some point. The rear window has been replaced with plexiglass, now clouded.
Everything else is pretty much original - the bathroom, the front bed/couch, the reading lights, ceiling vents, astradome, the outside TV and radio antenna on the front, all the high cabinets, the kitchen, pantry, wardrobe, dresser, and all of the storage trays are still there, although a few of them have some damage or fiberglass repairs.
The outside skin is near perfect:
There's one large patch behind the door on the curb side:
And another where the new water heater is:
Here's some overview photos of the inside:
I'll post a followup with what I think needs work and my plan for getting it the way I want it...