Check out my Smoking HOT Deal on a 2009 FB Flying Cloud

[duncans]

Yes, it is true! Our Phoenix has flown the coop! We are not completely free of issues, however. Yet to be addressed: Repairing the plastic spline in the ZipDee awning, shake down on the furnace and water system (we "dry-camped"), caulking the shower door, and probably a bunch of other details.
Dave doesn't want to post pictures until he has the official "Airstream" logo reapplied to front and back. I am amazed that all of the alluminum sheets and rivet holes all lined back up!
Our first trip was a doozy. We were invited along on a trip to the far opposite corner of the State, Lake Owyhee State Park. We wanted to do a short shake out the problems trip before hand, but never had the time. We went with a large tool box, but didn't need a thing out of it. The trailer rolled and performed magnificently. Well, at least the systems that we had ready to go. Nearly 1000 miles, no problems! We borrowed my SIL and daughter's TV (Can O'Beans). So, looking for a used Ford F 250 or Dodge 2500 diesel 4x4 Quad cab.
Pictures soon to follow!

Susan

[Burnside Bob]

Well you know how things go. You book a reservation at a campground so far far away, and they've got your money, so when the day comes you go even if you aren't ready. And we weren't, but we went, with the first stop the Airstream dealer for more parts.

450 miles later we pulled into Lake Owyhee State Park, a torrential thunderstorm in progress. All the lightning made the road easier to see!!

Our campsite the next morning:



That evening the lightning began to play again, and judging by the water standing in the beverage cup holders on the cooler, about 3/4 inch rain fell.

Another fine sunny morning dawned, and we saddled up. You drive thru a one lane tunnel going in and out of the State Park:



Down the road (US 20) a bit at Drinkwater Pass:



We headed to Silver Lake, OR, home of the Silver Lake Cafe, famous for steaks. It was closed!!! Rats, hot dogs again.

We took a local road connecting Silver Lake with the Klamath Marsh NWR and US 97. We detoured off to Upper Buck Campground, which wasn't even signed--I just pulled off the road at a side spur and voila, picnic tables, potty, campground signage.



We were so thrilled to have an operational, if not fully functional trailer, that we stopped at Crescent Lake Campground off of US 58 for another night out. Marvellous to have a whole campground to ourselves!!

Back to minding the homestead. My that lawn grew while we were gone!!

Thanks for watching.

[Burnside Bob]

The Phoenix Saga Continues

Somehow I thought our campground reservation was for May 25. NOT. May 5. And the forecast was for heavy thunder showers, so I had to deal with roof issues stat leaving no time for systems testing prior to departure, other than the propane joints for leaks. Yep—leaks!! Picked up new regulator and connecting hoses on way out of town, installed next day at campground. Leaks fixed, stove, cook top, and refer running on propane!

May 18: unit washed and waxed. Yet to do: testing of water system and a dry run of using our septic system clean out as a dump station, install decals, misc detail work. Tally up the costs—the Phoenix didn’t turn out cheap—watch for later post.

During this project several issues cropped up of possible interest to Airstream owners. Some photos follow.

1) Caulk. Sikaflex 221 does not adhere to Fantastic Fans. I had to recaulk my new Fantastic Fans using Dicor Lap Sealant. Dicor Lap Sealant is supposed to have cracking/deterioration issues so I would have preferred to use Sikaflex 715 if I could have found it.

2) AC Drain Line Replacement. My AC drain line was cracked inside the trailer wall. I could neither remove it nor run a snake thru it, so I had to route a new line. To follow the pathway of the original, which runs from the AC to the front of the roadside wheel well, I would have had to remove the interior on the road side and drop the interior skin. Way too much work. In my unit the drain line starts in front of the refer, so I pulled the refer, cut a hole in the interior skin concealed by the wood cabinet to pass the new drain line into the refer compartment. I then ran the line in the roadside corner of the refer compartment, terminating at the well where the refer’s own drain line ends. Not an ideal situation as any condensate will now drip out the refer door BUT no good alternatives. A limiting factor here is the refer is a potential carbon monoxide generator when running on propane so I did not want to make any extra holes and thoroughly caulked around the one hole I did make.

3) AC/Heatpump Install Issues. The AC/Heatpump (Dometic Penguin II with CCC 2 Thermo) came with zero install instructions, no second gasket kit, and no 4 wire communication cable to connect thermostat. Many thanks to Lewster for his excellent thread covering the correct method of installing drain pans and second gasket kit. I used a 4 wire phone line for a comm cable. A standard 4 wire phone line does have the correct ends (RG11) but will need to be cut and respliced so one end is “flipped over” to work. Dometic does have instructions on the web, but they cover install of many different models so careful reading is required. Make sure AC dip switches are correct for your unit’s equipment.

4) AC/Heatpump can admit insects. The caulk job under my AC/Heatpump shroud left a gap in the wiring port marmolated stink bugs used to get into the trailer.

5) Wiring Color Code not followed. I found the 12V outlet at the Entertainment center was wired with brown wire (correct color for 12V outlets) but was electrically connected to the gray circuit. Pulling the brown circuit fuse did not cut power to this outlet, a fact which raised uncertainty about Airstream’s consistency in following wiring color code.


Photos:

Drain Line Connection. Tubing is 5/8” OD x ½” ID. Note two gasket layers—gray above (comes installed on Penguin II) and white (gasket kit you apply).




Penguin II wiring connections. At right AC romex, 10 gauge blue 12V and ground wires. At left, 16 ga blue and black wires to LP Furnace and 4 wire phone line to Thermostat.




Wiring port on Penguin II showing caulk job—insects can get in here.

[J. Morgan]

Amazing work ethic and process engaged for a difficult and extended project!

<HatTip>


Superat stultitia.

[Burnside Bob]

Now that the Phoenix is a functional unit, we have to address the issue of an appropriate tow vehicle. Our aged 1990 3/4T Suburban has too many issues to be a safe TV and technology has moved on.

So, instead of working on the Phoenix and getting the last issues resolved and systems checked out, we've been test driving pickups!!

The local Airstream dealer rents tow vehicles and we rented one for a quick overnight trip to Big Lake off of Oregon's Santiam Pass. This gave us the opportunity to real life test drive the 2013 Ford F150 with 3.5L ecoboost engine with our trailer.

The departure:



Trailer Trip!!


Mosquito Repellent:


Landed:


Mt Washington seen from our campsite:



The Ford F150 with 3.5L ecoboost was a dynamite TV. Excellent torque, hp, and integrated brake control all very nice, almost car like steering but with a stiff suspension.

BUT no payload capacity. With just the two of us, some firewood, chairs and sundries in the bed, and a 900 lb tongue weight, we were maxed out.

If it were just the two of us, and no extras in the pick up bed, the F150 with 3.5 L would be the ticket with 365 hp and 420 ft/lbs torque. But we hope to have grandkids and their gear with us so we need to look elsewhere for more payload capacity.


As of today, we've test driven maybe 15 pick ups. Mostly Ford and Ram diesels. But in our price range most of what we've seen has some serious short comings. Almost all of the vehicles currently offered by dealers in our area are auction purchased vehicles out of Canada, mostly Alberta. These are oil field rigs and were driven by employees who didn't care about the company or its rigs. So we haven't been liking what we've been seeing for sale. Definitely caveat emptor.

Hopefully the TV search will end soon, as it has been a distraction from getting the Phoenix fully fledged.

And the camping? Good, but COLD. 41 degrees inside the trailer come morning, but the furnace worked like a champ getting the chill off.

Best to you!

PS. If you are in the Pacific NW, Airstream Adventures NW truck rental rate of $85.00/day can't be beat. No mileage fee charged.

[Rocinante]

Gotta say, your silver smoker is looking great! Awesome job saving her.

[timhortons]

Trailer looks great. Glad to see somebody finally figured out how to remove the C learn coat.

[Al and Missy]

Before:





After:



You guys have done an absolutely amazing job with this. Time to enjoy it!

Al

[J. Morgan]

An amazing transformation, smart progression and a strong work ethic can work wonders.

I tip my hat to ya for a job well done!

What a change!!

Superat stultitia.

[duncans]

I'm not an interior decorator, so this is back to the basics minus the plastic melty parts that sliced our scalps open every time we walked through. The melted parts extended 1/3 of the way toward the floor--impressive! Like a stalactite----or is it stalagmite?
Front and back, but really could use new cushions and covers. However, it is Heaven to us!

[rmkrum]

The rule is stalactites " stick tight " to the ceiling. Stalagmites sit on the floor. Yeah, I know more trivia....


Sent from my pocket Internet using Airstream Forums

[Resolute_ZS]

I just remember C for ceiling, G for ground.

[mimiandrews]

Stalactites and Stalagmites rule:
It's like ants in the pants. The mites go up and the tights come down.

[KJRitchie]

Is there any burn smells remaining in the trailer?

Now that you are finished was it worth it? Talk about making a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

Kelvin

[Burnside Bob]

Our TV search continued, and we found a winner:



Yes, a 2010 F350 long box crew cab lariat with 48,000 miles on it. We are really happy to be done with the vehicle search.

We are a bit trepidatious about the legendary fuel consumption of the 6.8L V10, but the ride was way better than the F150 we test drove last week. And my is that cabin quiet--V10 is definitely smooooooth.

The F350 has a 'leveling' lift kit in it. Sharp eyes will see that the trailer is a little down at the tongue--that lift kit evidently changes the suspension travel per weight load as the same measurements that set the F150 nicely did not do the trick on the F350. I'll have to move the ball mount up one notch and perhaps bring the spring bars up another link.

Because the F350 sits so much higher, I had spring for a new hitch shank. The silver lining of that is I can now drop the tail gate while hitched up, which compensates for the increased difficulty of getting stuff in and out of the truck bed.

It was about 50 miles round trip to an official Zip Dee dealer for awning inspection and trouble detection. The primary problem is that the poly cord spline that keeps the awning attached to the segmented aluminum cover melted and shrank, allowing the awning to pull out of its channel. Our awning man doesn't do sewing repairs so we will be pulling the awning and resewing (if we can't tease in a new spline) ourselves.

But the tow rig and trailer handled fantastic--best pulling set-up ever!!

Thanks for keeping an eye on our adventure. I'll post soon on smoke smells, and later, on project cost, since we are still spending!!

[rmkrum]

Nice looking setup. It's coming together nicely.




Sent from my pocket Internet using Airstream Forums

[Burnside Bob]

Phoenix Progress:

Water system checked out and fully functioning. Was exciting to see 18" yellow flames coming out of the hot water heater, but after whatever obstructed the combustion chamber burned, we had a nice blue flame and normal on/off thermostat cycling. Whoooooeeeeee, that unit makes some hot water!!

With completion of testing the water systems, the Phoenix is just about done. The only remaining issue is the awning, and the replacement spline for it arrived just as we were taking the Phoenix out for a full field trial. Hopefully we will replace the spline and throughly clean the awning fabric this weekend, bringing the Phoenix's arcing flight from immolation to resurrection to a close.

That's not to say we are done, but the "To Do" list is no longer a list of repair and restore items. Now it is a list of routine maintenance and customizations, like a spice rack, switching out incandescents for LED's, adding a shelf or too so we can cram more stuff in.

To answer RJRitchie's query regarding odor, the Phoenix is remarkably free of smoke odor. Yes, there are enclosed spaces where you can smell a smoky smell--inside of the compartment housing the Sony entertainment system is one. The smoke penetrated everything, so while we did clean every surface we could reach there are a few places that still harbor soot--behind the cupboard that houses the kitchen range hood--didn't pull that. Didn't pull the cabinets at either end of the trailer, so probably behind them (these are integral with an interior aluminum panel). But we did pull the speakers, the bathroom cabinets, the refer compartment and the partition beween shower and bedroom, and so on, and cleaned any surface we could reach by hand or sponge mop. Much of the exposed surfaces we sprayed with a smoke sealer.

By dropping the center roof panel, we were able to clean and replace the insulation above it plus cleaning and replacing most of the insulation above the adjoining panels that transition wall to ceiling plus the upper portions of the endcaps down to the tops of the large windows. This also allowed us to verify that Tolleyizing the rivets was effective--some leakers required three or four applications of Captain Tolley's to seal.

And our test flight?? Just great, everything worked. Here's a few images from our trip over Santiam Pass to Suttle Lake:

Campsite 17 at Cold Water Cove Campground, Clear Lake, Willamette NF, OR:




Canada Geese at Suttle Lake, Link Creek Day Use Area:


Mt Washington from the Round-Suttle-Lake Trail:


A Ponderosa Pine in our Link Creek Campground campsite:


Suttle Lake from our campsite at Link Creek Campground, Suttle Lake, Deschutes NF, OR:



It was cold!! Rained both evenings into the night. Which allowed us to check out the furnace's operation--toasty although the CCC-2 was a bit confusing to properly operate. Guess we need some education there.

Thanks for following us on our adventure. May you have a great next trip, too!!!

[Burnside Bob]

As mentioned last post, the remaining big repair and unknown was the awning. We could see the awning fabric was pulling out of the aluminum case so we were afraid the awning could completely come apart and we didn’t touch it. Sure missed having an awning on our three test flights, tho.

We pulled the Phoenix over to the closest Zip Dee authorized repair guy, where we unrolled the awning. The fabric appeared good, but it was off the case roll most places. And we could not connect the locking arms for some reason. Bad news—have to pull the awning off the trailer. Good news—may only need new polycord.

The awning guy said he didn’t do sewing, so we were on our own. We checked Air Forums for guiding expertise and a big shout out to Zeppelinium, barts, and webspinner for their excellent informative threads. Thank you all!!

We ordered new polycord. The awning basically fell off after we unwound the spring—24 turns I counted. Our flatbed trailer made a convenient work table. Following Zip Dee’s pdf file on awning fabric removal, we also removed the first slat from the awning case.



The polycord had melted onto the awning fabric and we had to undo all the stitching and physically pull the fabric open where it rolled around the polycord. Fortunately we could pry the polycord off the fabric and Susan sewed in new polycord with her venerable Viking sewing machine using a #18 jeans needle and heavy UV resistant thread.





Susan tried getting the fabric and polycord into the aluminum slat—after 20 minutes she got ¾ inch inserted. So the next problem was opening the crimps. This photo shows the crimps at the end of the slat.



My first attempts involved wedging two slot screw drivers into the crimp and prying apart. This caused some damage and wasn’t particularly effective, so I tried wood chisels and other torture instruments without achieving better results. By this time it was dark, which gave me time to “sleep on it”.

Recalling that the Zip Dee .pdf suggests vise grips, I hot footed it to the hardware store the next morning where I found an 8 inch vise grip made for sheet metal working that was narrow enough to fit into the crimped channel.

Loading the awning slat into a bench vise, I gave my new vise grip a try and wow, that is the way to do it. Three photos: before, tool inserted, and after.







With the crimps spread open, I was able to thread the awning fabric into the slat by myself in minutes. Here’s a photo showing the completed stuff job and the tools needed to finish the end.



Here’s my crimp job with the vise grip tool I used. This tool looks exactly like the one in the Zip Dee .pdf and, for the detail oriented, it is a vise grip model 10R, which has smooth, not serrated jaw tips. Yeah, probably crimped the slat too much, but it was done!!



In this photo the awning fabric with attached slat is halfway installed. I fed the slat from the ladder while Susan backed the flatbed trailer slowly.



There was no way the locking arms were catching the awning roller ends and lock into place. Measuring showed the awning fabric shrank 4”, so I drilled a 3/8 inch diameter hole ¼” deep in each locking arm 4” from the last factory made detent. Our thanks to Jimmy at Zip Dee for suggesting the hole size and depth and letting us know that the heat our Phoenix went thru can make the awning fabric shrink.

We then rewound the spring, going 25 turns as the original 24 didn’t seem enough tension. That was too much and we backed out 4 turns, which, since the awning still readily rolls itself up, is still too much tension per instructions, but we liked the way the awning case snapped closed.

The results were great. The locking arms lock at just the right length—much better than the awning on our old 31’ Sovereign.

Had to give the awning a test:





Yep, the awning works perfect in our driveway. Now we’ve got to give it a field trial. Where should we go??

* * * * * * * *

This ‘fix’ ends rehab on our trailer. True, I haven’t installed the blinds in the vista view windows yet; or finished recaulking the beltline and a few places here and there. But that’s minor so for now, at least, rehab is complete. Maybe. For I see that the clear coat isn’t looking so good on top. So probably this fall I’ll be stripping and re clear coating the end caps. Maybe.

So the next post up will be the cost accounting post. How much did it really cost? Does the result justify the expense? Knowing what we know now, would we do this again??

[SteveSueMac]

I don't know if the costs (including your labor) will be justified in a financial/accounting sense - but even if it would have been "cheaper" to buy 2 Pendletons, you must feel so great for what you've accomplished! You know every detail of your trailer inside and out (Jackson Center knows mine better than I do) and we all got to learn a lot through the process.

It's been inspirational to see your vision what what looked like a destroyed trailer to something so beautiful. Money can't buy that.

Really great job. Thanks for sharing and congrats!!!

[Becky B.]

You guys are great! I love the fact that you took something that most people would turn their nose up at & worked so hard to make it beautiful again. You have vision & tenacity as well as great skill! Thanks too for the awning tutorial....I'm coming up to that spot on my current project & those crimps are a bugger! Going to go find me a vice grip like you used! Enjoy your trailer :-)