Visit our Popular Forums

Wabbiteer · 10-20-2010, 08:37 AM

Durham, Ontario has a Latitude of 44°11′ N... .and Saint Paul, Minnesota where I live is at 44°56′38 so I am actually farther North than you.. . Earths tilt is 23.4° so in the peak of summer we are definitely not exempt.

Those little black plastic cups that nursery started plants come in? We had a row of them partially melt last August here setting outside on a concrete sidewalk beside the garden - the Great Plains 'severe clear' sunshine on a windless day had them acting like heat-shrink tubing.

I've blistered the palms of my hand picking up a hot iron digging bar that had lain in full sunshine for 30 minutes while I was installing the above sidewalk, thinking it couldn't possibly be hot enough to hurt me this far North.

Late summer and early fall may be even more worrisome as the sun dives toward the horizon quickly and can get in windows and under shade awnings or trees while it still has enough strength to heat up interior bulkheads.

On well insulated spaces heating up? When demand has been met and pumps shut down, glass insulated solar water heaters regularly go stagnant and can reach 220°F or more easy.

Anyhow - yes, you need to address summer sunlight even on interior bulkheads.

Curtains are great but what if you forget to close them? What if the SOB white box camper parked next to you reflects another 60% extra heat & light towards your trailer? With long unattended periods with the trailer closed up the interior may never have opportunity to completely cool down overnight, the peak temperatures creep up on a long stretch of clear days.

Just clear it with their engineering department...

wasagachris · 10-20-2010, 10:28 AM

Lew (Driftless) I got the trimoff theother side today so here are the pics of it's installation. First pic is top of blue strip, second is bottom of blue strip. The third pic is alittle blurry. It shows the blue strip attached on top of the rear end cap and the gap that is left to fill up with crud. The area has already been cleaned. You could remove the mud with a spoon that's how thick it was.

driftless · 10-20-2010, 04:10 PM

Thanks Chris, for exactly the information I needed.

That's a lot of bucked rivets along the top edge of the blue strip. I'm sure that horizontal joint between upper and lower panels as well as the blue panel is very important to the integrity of the entire body.

I'm not sure I want to disturb that seam so I think I will forgo the removal of the blue panel and use some filler, sand and repaint it. I think the damage is more cosmetic than anything.

It's a nasty gouge that trails off into a couple scratches as can be seen in the photo. (See that shiny rim in the bottom right of the second photo? My DW polished the wheels when I had them off to replace the tires. At least something looks nice!)

wasagachris · 10-20-2010, 04:30 PM

Lew what do you think your Dw would say if I shippied mine to your house to be polished.

newsgauger · 10-20-2010, 04:35 PM

Hi Chris,

WOW! You really have come a long way since I looked in on your thread.

Now that the camp grounds are closed for the season, you can get at her.

I should drop by one day and see your wonderful trailer in real life.

Take care until then,
Chris

driftless · 10-20-2010, 08:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wasagachris

Lew what do you think your Dw would say if I shippied mine to your house to be polished.

I'm not sure, Chris. She wasn't completely satisfied with the result so maybe she would welcome more practice...And, she made me promise to let her use the buffer next time. She's pretty good with tools and when it comes to details and getting it right, she is tenacious..

wasagachris · 10-21-2010, 06:58 AM

Newsgauger(Chris) Thanks for the vote of confidence. Your'e welcome to drop by anytime. I will be here full time working on the A/S.
Lew I was just kidding about the wheels of course.
Well I have bad news and worse news. The forecast is for rain/snow for a couple of days and rain pretty much everyday for the next two weeks. I'm giong to clear out my garage of the insides of the trailer and store them in another building so I can put the trailer in there and keep working. The worse news is that last night we had a very heavy rain and the shell is leaking quite badly in a few spots and a little bit in several more. It looks like I'm going to have to gut the rest of the inner wall panels to find the leaks and seal them. I really didn't want to remove these panels but how else do i find the leak spots. i'm still trying to get the belly insulated and closed in as well. It's getting awfully cool rolling around on the creeper now.

driftless · 10-21-2010, 09:30 AM

The bright side is that you will have all the leaks fixed before you've put any of the previously removed interior parts back in. That rain last night may be a blessing in disguise.
I knew you were kidding about the wheels, but had to take the opportunity to compliment my DW.
Where did you get Removal? I'm having trouble finding it.
And, do you think I should remove and replace or repair the blue strip or am I on the right track with just a cosmetic repair?

wasagachris · 10-21-2010, 10:18 AM

Lew I guess the rain was ablessing. I just don't feel that blessed this morning. It's only 40 F here this morning and very damp rolling around under trailer.
I got the Removal from Vintage Trailer Supply. I haven't done any of mine yet but did a test section on the 75. It works great.
The one advantage to the painted strip is that you can patch and repaint instead of replacing. The only concern I would have is getting bondo to stick to aluminium. Talk to a body shop for the best method of adhesion. You probably need to sand or rough it up so the bondo has something to bite to. you probably need to paint both strips to get the paint to match and then you could also paint the airstream letters at the same time.

driftless · 10-21-2010, 10:53 AM

Good thoughts. I'll talk to the body shop guys here in town before I begin. My plan is to do the blue strip all the way around and also paint the black pin stripe in the trim molding before polishing. I forgot all about the Airstream letters so thanks for the reminder.

wasagachris · 10-21-2010, 11:47 AM

Lew from what i've heard removal takes off paint as well so you may want to strip and polish beofre doing the blue strip over.

Minno · 10-21-2010, 03:41 PM

Hey, Chris
I just looked at the wallcovering page - would that stuff work to rebuild the endcap we need to do, do you suppose? Looks interesting at the least! Thanks for the link!

Kay

wasagachris · 10-21-2010, 04:04 PM

Hi Kay, long time no speak. I'm not sure it could be formed in the compound curves of the end cap. It would impossible to bend it in two directions at once without wrinkles showing.

driftless · 10-21-2010, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wasagachris

Lew from what i've heard removal takes off paint as well so you may want to strip and polish beofre doing the blue strip over.

Right, I forgot about that. Guess it would be easier to remove a little overspray than to redo the paint. Thanks for helping keep my thinking and planning straight!!

wasagachris · 10-22-2010, 06:55 AM

This is the scene I woke up to this morning. I hope it all melts soon. GD weather.

Minno · 10-22-2010, 07:15 AM

Just a little of that 4 letter word! It'll melt soon, Chris. No worries!

Kay

Shacksman · 10-22-2010, 07:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wasagachris

This is the scene I woke up to this morning. I hope it all melts soon. GD weather.

At least it's not 160 - 200 inside today

. We got wet snow here but none stayed on the ground.

wasagachris · 10-22-2010, 07:16 PM

Be nice Doug Wabiteer has some valid concerns. Actually after spending the last few days in between rains rolling around under the trailer through puddles with it drippping all over me I could use a little hot weather.
It's taking a lot longer than I thought. I have insulated the entire centre section between the frame rails and started on the roadside section outside of the rails. Today was the worst with the melting snow constantly dripping in my face as I measured and attached the styrofoam strapping. I finally gave up at 5:30PM when the next round of rain got too heavy.

Aage · 10-22-2010, 08:02 PM

Chris,

You better get to building a shelter and heating source, I hear there'll me more snow before you finish yer TT and the warm winds come once again!

Seriously, you got the space, why work outside in the cold?

wasagachris · 10-22-2010, 08:12 PM

Aage my workshop/garage is full with the insides of the trailer right now. I am going to change my plans and move all the contents into the rec centre that is right next door to the shop. I'm just waiting for a day without rain in order to move everything.
there is one other problem the workshop is a few inches too short to close the door so the only thing I would gain is dry but not warm. Once the real snow flies I need to put the backhoe into the shop to use it as a snow plow. Every task here is plus size. I pick up leaves with a dump truck and plow snow with a backhoe etc etc.