Hi Del,
Congratulations on your new purchase!!
I could post a novel here about our renovation and experiences living in ours, but I'm up to my ears in work at the moment prior to the holiday weekend, so if you have any additional questions just PM here and I'll get back to ya.
Our body shop contact is:
Rick Spears
Malibu Collision Repair
7741 Maynardville Hwy
Knoxville, Tn 37938
865-922-4700
Tell Rick you were referred by Kristin and Jason Snow, and I'm sure he'll remember us as "those crazy Airstream people." We had ours painted black, but you can ask him to do any color you wish, including silver.
We actually just sold our Airstream (I know, I know - blasphemy) because it wasn't the most practical home for the style of full-timing we discovered ourselves wanting to do once we were out on the road a while. We're a year into full-timing now and learned a lot about ourselves in the process.
We moved around a LOT, 1,000+ miles a week sometimes because we have bad wanderlust, and our vintage baby just wasn't holding up as well as we hoped, despite doing everything by the book in our renovation. We compared it to using a classic car as a daily commuter - while we replaced everything but the shell and frame inside and out, we still had very limited tank sizes, no outside storage, and some other less desirable aspects that we couldn't change.
We didn't have enough ground clearance for the kind of boondocking we wanted to do (we're not big on staying in campgrounds), enough roof space for as much solar as we'd like (we fit one 100w panel up there but there's not room for much more), we lacked a comfortable desk/dinette area for two people working full-time (our backs and necks are paying the price for using our couch as a dual purpose work and living space), and this isn't related to vintage at all, but we got tired of the constant packing/unpacking everything inside and out every few days and playing cargo Tetris in the back of our Jeep. We look forward to having storage bays for our wet and dirty outdoor stuff, an outdoor shower, and to be able to use our living space while underway for us and our dogs. We loved having it though and would still do it if we had it all to do over. We made so many friends and had such lovely experiences being part of the Airstream community - leaving it was the hardest thing about selling!
Not trying to dissuade you - just wanted to be honest before you start your renovation that it can be limiting working with a vintage trailer, which is a foot narrower than newer ones and has differences in the frame depth, windows, the way it tows, etc. We're going to try a 27' motorhome next and a tiny towed (Fiat 500 or similar). Our blog is
The Snowmads | Digital nomads in search of adventure everyday if you want to see all of our Airstream renovation details and travels with it!
Best of luck to you!
Kristin
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