I tried replacing the shower pan. Please help.

[millertimeUS]

Originally Posted by Jhawk

Wow! It appears you know much more about what you're doing than I originally thought when I started reading this. It looks like you're doing really great work! I only hope that I will not be joining the "Full Monte" club. My dad and I purchased a 1970 27' Overlander 3 days ago but haven't had a chance to do any work on it yet. I will have many questions through out my journey. If you or anyone else has the time to help I would be greatly appreciated. My AS was already gutted when we bought it so that will save me some time. So on to the questions.

1.Do I have to pull the body to replace the floor?

Good question, I would recommend starting your own thread like Marco did and post your questions/progress so we can follow along.


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[The-Marco]

Hey JHawk,
There are some threads on doing a shell on floor replacement. I decided on the shell off because I had a feeling that things were going to be a hot mess with the frame and since I have a 2.5 car width drive-way (the absolute minimum amount of space needed for a shell-off) I figured I'd just go for it.

I'm really glad I'm doing shell off, turns out that they hired the worst welders on earth at the ol' AS factory. Most of my outriggers can be wiggled right off, same with two of the cross members. They basically fell off. It wasn't even from rust on the welds.

So next step when I finish grinding the surface rust down is to re-weld pretty much everything and I'm going to box in parts of the frame.

I have a neighbor teaching me how to weld, if you don't have one of those, call in a pro to inspect your frame and fix it up where it needs it.

May God have mercy on your soul.

P.S. feel free to send some pics, I can make some predictions of what you are in store for since I'm right in the middle of this mess.


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[Jhawk]

Thanks for the help everyone! I will be starting my own thread if not today it will be up tomorrow. Just need a few more pictures. I'll worn you all now, so no one freaks out, I have 5 severely damaged banana skins on the rear that will be replaced. The frame is not damaged.

[RM66caravel]

Some pictures please?
Cliff


Yes I said that! Or did I?

[The-Marco]

Make sure to post the link to your thread here JHawk.

So I took the axle off and cleaned up the frame a tiny bit more. If anyone is near Los Angeles and wants a junky rusted axle, please let me know ASAP.




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[Shaggy1970]

I think your going to have a brand new trailer when your done with this project. It might be too nice to take out to the desert! LOL

[The-Marco]

I think you're right


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[The-Marco]

Okay fellas,
FINALLY finished scraping the rust off. Sorry this is taking so long and I can offer the following excuses:
-It is way too hot to work on this thing before 5pm
-One of my pups had a baseball sized tumor on his spleen, got it removed and he has a new lease on life!!! (Please feel your dog's stomachs for hard spots, if they have one, it is worth taking them to the vet)
-And finally, grinding off rust IS NO FUN!

Before I do any welding, I decided to just go ahead and paint the thing. There are parts I will be boxing in, and I want them painted on the inside while I can still access it. It is pretty easy to grind to bare metal for the welds using an angle grinder once it is painted.

So I'm going to go through the entire POR15 product line from the de- greaser all the way to the UV safe top coat. But first things first, going to remove the paint that I didn't already grind off.




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[dbj216]

Glad your doggie is recovering.

I didn't use the "sterling silver" POR 15 top coat product on my frame as it is where "the sun don't shine." I did use it on the bumper and rear frame members as well as the A-frame and steps. I think getting the old paint off is good as I found POR 15 didn't adhere all that well to painted the surfaces.

How do you type in such good posts on your i-phone? You must have magic thumbs?

David

[The-Marco]

Haha, I definitely have to proof read!

I know it isn't going to look stock, but I have decided to use black on the exposed parts of the frame.

Thanks for the tip on the painted surfaces, I will make sure I'm more thorough than I originally planned with the paint removal.

Didn't get to the paint removal tonight because I wanted to do a test area, and I finally removed the LP tanks and brackets, and then got very anal with grinding the frame down where the weld leftovers were. Had to refrain from doing too good of a job (which would result in holes in the frame.) So it isn't perfect. Oh well. Bondo.




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[mwernke]

I took my shower pan, bathroom sink and cupboard out this past weekend, but hoping to stop with those and a new toilet. Can't wait until you begin rebuilding that space. I am painting and replacing flooring, moving the bed, but hoping that will be all. Limited mouse turds so far, but two live mice. Get ting some Irish Spring soap shavings in there for storage time, when I'm not in there on a daily basis.

[The-Marco]

Mwernke,
Do yourself a favor and don't even look at things unless you are prepared to enter my nightmare. For example, don't look inside the walls unless you are prepared to gut everything to get rid of all the rat nests. If you don't see it, you can pretend that it doesn't exist and rest easy if you are like me, once you know it is there for a fact, it will torment you until you fix it.


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[J. Morgan]

On a positive note, I stripped the interior of my trailer to a bare shell and there were no mouse nests in the walls.

It is possible to be lucky...

[The-Marco]

Me and my neighbor spent a couple hours today bending the frame. No more tweaks! Next, we weld, then I'll do the POR15.

The chemical I was using to remove the paint did not work so well, so I'm going to do a test to see is the POR15 will stick before I go through any more trouble.






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[millertimeUS]

Looking good nice work Marco!


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[The-Marco]

Thanks! I had no idea prepping the frame was so involved. But the piece of mind I'll have is priceless.


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[J. Morgan]

That frame actually looks pretty good, try a wire brush on an angle grinder to prep for paint, if you get it smooth and flat, the paint should level out nice..... And really,,,, once you get the belly pan on, who will know if it isn't pretty.

[Shaggy1970]

Originally Posted by J. Morgan

That frame actually looks pretty good, try a wire brush on an angle grinder to prep for paint, if you get it smooth and flat, the paint should level out nice..... And really,,,, once you get the belly pan on, who will know if it isn't pretty.

I think he will know and thats what matters. I am the same way, sucks going thru life like this but its a curse that some of us have.

[The-Marco]

Haha Shaggy! Yes it is a curse! Sure, I have very nice things because of this curse, but my weekends are all pissed away.


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[The-Marco]

FINALY! Started welding. Beefed up the welds on all the outriggers, and well, everything else too. And started boxing in the frame in the back.


And step by step boxing in the frame (these welds are not pretty, but they are strong)