new to the silver bullet trailers

[1969avion]

I have owned a regular travel trailer before and cannot figure out how to hook up the water and how to dump the grey and black tanks. Any help would be great. Also it is a 1969 Avion about 27 or 28 feet long. Don't know the model it is. Thanks in advance

[Kevin245]

Welcome 69 Avion,

Congratulations on the rig. Here is some specification data for the 1969 model year that should help you determine what model you have.

Model Length MSRP Hitch Wt. Weight

Sports Special 18' 3" $3,995 320# 2,490#

Tourist 22' 2" $5,984 470# 3,500#

Tourist 22' 2" $6,225 425# 3,785#

Argonaut 25' 6" $7,075 435# 4,190#

Travelcader 28' 1" $7,721 550# 4,380#

Imperial 31' 2" $8,126 575# 5,065#


The water intake and waste connections are typically located at the street side rear corner of the trailer. We have a 73 model which was a first year body style change so I'm not certain that ours is the same as yours. Our water inlet is located inside the access hatch just to the rear of the water heater cover. The waste connection and dump valves are located in a curved hatch located below the water intake connection. The dump valve handles are there too.

We have several Avion owners here who may be able to assist you as well. You might want to PM Silverhobby, or Kristi Foster as they both own, or recently owned 1968 and 1969 model years.


Here are a few more links that may help.

Link to a copy of the 1969 model year owners/operation manual.
http://www.silveravion.com/downloads...69%20AVION.pdf

Link to the Avion yahoo group where you can get Avion specific repair and maintenance advise for your rig.
avioncampingandrestoration : Avion Camping and Restoration - Repair,

Dr. G's site is another good resource site for Avions.
Fleetwood Avion Travelcade Club Travel Fifth Wheel Fleetwood Trailer RV Cayo Motivator LeGrande Indiana Unit

Good luck and post some photos when your schedule permits,

Kevin

[AIR-Quarius]

Hey Wagoner! We are over here in Altus Oklahoma. Good luck finding out your instructions from the rest of the Airstream community. Don't be a stranger, and post some pics too. Did your house come with a manual?

[1969avion]

travelcader that's the model and it didn't come with nothing but the trailer. the guy i bought it from just bought it to help out a buddy and it was sitting at a lake lot and the mice got in and made one heck of a mess but got it cleaned up. will post pics in a min.

[1969avion]

still cannot seem to find the hook up for city water on the back pass side their is water outlets but no inlet. Where else would it be? also it the fresh water holding tank inlet on driver side front just to the side of batteries?

[Kevin245]

Unless the PO changed things around you'll find the freshwater tank inlet on front of the trailer. The city water inlet is located in the street (Left) side of the trailer inside the storage door. The waste (sewer) connection is located on the street side of the trailer near the rear.

Here are the pages from your Owner's Manual that cover these systems.



An entire copy of the manual is shown in the first link in post #2 of this thread.

[1969avion]

Is this what the water inlet is suppose to look like? because it's the wrong hookup.

[Kevin245]

Originally Posted by 1969avion

Is this what the water inlet is suppose to look like? because it's the wrong hookup.

Not sure on the 69 as ours is located above floor level and its a female fitting. The PO may changed yours to the hose bib seen in the photograph. Have you traced the line route above the floor, or tried to hook this one up?

For testing purposes you could use a washing machine hose (two female ends) to hook up the system to check things out.

Kevin

[1969avion]

right above it is the hot water heater and then all that i can see it goes up to the holding tank and pump.

[Kevin245]

My bet is that this a drain. Any other doors or hatches on this side of thr trailer?

[1969avion]

one behind it where the power cord goes and no sign of water hook up annywhere on the outside of the trailer.

is this the fresh water tank inlet.

[Kevin245]

Originally Posted by 1969avion

one behind it where the power cord goes and no sign of water hook up annywhere on the outside of the trailer.

is this the fresh water tank inlet.

This looks to be your fresh water tank fill port, and cable for an antenna.

Our city water intake is in the same door with the power cord.

[1969avion]

this is a pain in the rear i'm starting to think that their is no city water hookup anymore or their never was.

[1969avion]

i don't know what kind of aluminum is on the outside but i've used everything around the house and can't seem to get the rain run marks out of the trailer. is their a good product for cleaning these trailers.

[Kevin245]

Originally Posted by 1969avion

this is a pain in the rear i'm starting to think that their is no city water hookup anymore or their never was.

How about posting some good exterior photographs showing all sides from various angles.

Originally Posted by 1969avion

i don't know what kind of aluminum is on the outside but i've used everything around the house and can't seem to get the rain run marks out of the trailer. is their a good product for cleaning these trailers.

The aluminum is anodized and will not shine unless you want to remove that coating (not an easy task), even then I don't know that a mirror shine could be achieved. But they can be made to look newer again.

Cleaning is covered in the manual but and there are other cleaning agents people on the yahoos groups page have reported success using. EverBrite is one that seems to yield good results, but there are others you may want to look at too. Just remember that effective cleaning only a few spots will make a stark difference in the skin appearance and usually leads to cleaning the whole rig. Joining yahoo group will yield you more responses to questions that are Avion specific in nature.

Not that your participation isn't welcome here, by all means we enjoy silver trailrers of all type, and we vintage kin owners need to stick togetheer lest be surrounded. We do have to be careful though as we wouldn't want any of our Airstream friends know how nice the Avions are. So let's keep that part secret.

Regards,

Kevin

[Ganaraska]

There are ways of cleaning and shining anodised aluminum. If you do a web search you will find some, usually they apply to buildings.

Anodizing creates a hard surface nearly as hard as diamonds.

[slowmover]

Cleaning anodized to shine (a matte "glow" versus non-anodized "mirror") is hampered by a lack of DIY info. I've posted some of my experience and thoughts on this in other threads on this sub-forum.

Even new these finishes never really shined. The dealers had all sorts of "tricks" for making them appear better on the lot.

The best advice is to physically scrub it down. Stiff hand brush (anodizing is not impossible to scratch -- a screwdriver will do fine -- but it is diamond hard compared to others) and a good basic alkaline car wash are fine. Do the underside first, then the sides, then the roof. Then repeat with an ordinary RV long-handle soft brush. You can try COMET or others on tough spots. Try not to let dry, so do small areas. Hard water makes it worse, so a water softener in the rinse will help.

I have tried buffered acid products (see other threads) and my wife noted a difference. It takes a number of times to make progress, so concentrate time and effort around doors, windows, compartments, etc where grime tends to build in corners and crevices. This attention to detail will make a difference. There is no miracle product.

Keeping it under cover will prevent the worst from coming back.

SILVER STREAK recommended a dilute mixture of kerosene and ATF to wipe on. It'll hold dust, so use it as an experiment to locate "bad" areas prior to using a product such as EVERBRITE. HILTOP Trailers near Dallas used to use olive oil instead of ATF with a volatile carrier like kero.

"TXIceman" has a SILVER STREAK for sale in the classifieds, and you might PM him for his thoughts as he used EVERBRITE about three years ago on that trailer. There are other products out there as well for the same application (and maybe better), but the prep (it is a coating) is everything.

I wouldn't think of trying to remove the anodization. Takes sodium hydroxide, is nasty (fumes, too) and is terrible work. Have a neighbor who is trying to simply "grind" his way through it with NUVITE on a STREAMLINE and he'll be at still when he retires in a dozen years . . and it's uneven as heck.

Clean, clean, clean. Probably never really had it done in all those years (why we all like this type -- often 5005 sheet -- because it is so durable). Probably by the sixth or seventh time you've gone over it you'll start being happy about it (I did my '34 more times than that in the first six months).

Be careful that products used to clean are for anodized, as some aluminum cleaning products are strongly acid (pontoon boats, for example), and that acid may cause damage you don't want.

.

[1969avion]

As of right now I tried a small area with SOS pads and it took the black stuff off but not the water run lines. That's where my problem is.

[slowmover]

Originally Posted by 1969avion

As of right now I tried a small area with SOS pads and it took the black stuff off but not the water run lines. That's where my problem is.

Same for everyone.

[1969avion]

no one has figured this out well that sucks!!!