Getting Dirty Again

We got really cranking the past two days. We ripped out the rest of the front and kitchen area flooring and cut out a replacement pieces. For the right front section, we worked from a cardboard template Rick had made from wood he ripped out when he replaced the left side of the front. Work was easy, but laborious. I helped with the sawing, but Rick did most of the demo, then I followed behind cleaning (pulling all sorts of yucky stuff, including a rodent nest), washing, wire brushing and finally painting the frame. We haven’t actually set the panels in, since we have bolts on order from Vintage Trailer Supply and also need to purchase insulation to fill in the belly pan. We have no reason to doubt that this will be accomplished next weekend.

I also attended to a couple of “housekeeping” chores. First, I couldn’t believe the filth that accumulated on the far side of the trailer in just two years. Even my precious windows had mold on them! Well, I set to scrubbing them. It left us both with two impressions–that we really have to go ahead and purchase the metal cover structure we’d been thinking about–certainly before polishing. Also, we probably have to consider a full out and out washdown as an annual maintenance punch item.

Anyhow, the good end of this is that I think that I isolated the leak allowing water to seep into the kitchen area (where we removed the rotted wood). Mopping up one seam shed water on Rick’s new floor–so it looks like that might be the bad one. I’ll make cleaning that and recaulking it my weekday project.

Oddly, our frame had two hitches attached to it. A year or so ago, Rick pounded and ground the old one hitches off. That left a couple of places on the hitch exposed and gathering rust. Also, there was a bit of rust on the parts of the frame we exposed in our tearout effort. So, I pulled out the wire brush drill attachment and started to work. First step–I brushed all involved sections, washed (and pulled out lots of yucky stuff out from the belly pan) and finally painted the rusted sections.

So, the weekend is over. . .We have enjoyed some great food and stupendous weather… We’ve worked to the blues, crickets and cicadas…We are truly dirty and I have paint flecks on my wrist that may never come off. We are slightly sunburned and very, very tired… Together, that’s all an exceptionally good thing. Happy Labor Day!