And the great paint debate is over...

We have been really busy with the camper rebuild.   The more we worked on it, the more things kept getting pulled out of there.   I am still surprised at how far down we went to make it right.  Pulled off some skin and replaced some damaged wood.  Removed all the paneling, pulled out the kitchen completely and the gutted the main walls.

So with the windows out and the skin off this side, I said "this is a good time to paint"  Being limited on budget, we couldn't buy paint for the whole camper.  So after much debate we decided to paint with spray cans.  We could buy a few and get this side done. Use a brand name and we will be able to match the other side when we have more funds.  So  I started by sanding the skin that was off, then sanding the skin that is left up on this side.  Washed all the skin to remove the sanding dust, paint and any mold.

We are going red and white.  The gloss bright red that we wanted didn't have primer built in. So I primed these pieces first. 

A few weeks ago, I ordered this hand held can sprayer from amazon. It was under five bucks I think and makes using spray cans so much easier.  It was made by Rustoleum as well.  

The white I used and the primer  I used under the red were ultra cover.  The white had built in primer.  In order to get the right red color. I had to use just regular  red gloss Rustoleum. 

  

With the hand held sprayer. It went on well and covered easily.   I chose to change up the pattern only slightly on the front of the camper and added an angle.   I am sure this will not please everyone as I didn't follow the lines of the original manufacture.  But we are the only ones that matter as far as this project goes and I am very pleased with the  result. 

While painting is an obvious change. We did get some behind the scenes improvements this weekend.  We finished the  repairs to floor around the door. Replaced the steps and now we can get in and out of the camper easily again.  

I also worked on curtains.  Here is a sneak peak of some of the curtain material. 

I found all my vintage looking material on ebay. 

The more we work on this camper, the more I love it.  I can not wait until it is ready to roll and we are done.  I am envisioning some great memories that we will make.

Here is previous blogs on the camper rebuild.

lots-of-work-this-week-demolition 9-21-14

demolition-is-lot-of-of-work 9-14-14

cleaning-not-so-glamours-job 8-24-14

so-this-is-beginning 8-12-14

Lots of work this week . Demolition is almost done!

We have been working for the past two weekends on demolition. Oh my gosh, it is dirty hard work.
We pulled almost everything out of the camper. Pulled out the stove, the furnace, the fridge and the hot water heater. They were all gas. We have decided to ditch the gas. The fridge didn't work, the furnace and stove were iffy and full of dead wasp nest.   We already own a small fridge that we will be putting in the camper and a radiating electric heater that works very well.  

We may get some disapproval for not keeping the camper original and in the vintage look.  But we plan to keep this camper for at least ten years and we want to make it the way we want it and the way it will work best for us.  

So here is some photos of how far we have come this week.   I don't think we knew how much work this baby was going to be when we brought her home. But we will know how solid she will be and how good she will be to go.

We discovered that the little vent door that was used for the furnace is the perfect size for our window air unit.  The previous owner put a window air unit into the back window and did not keep it level enough.  It drained out into the camper instead of outside.  Leaving lots of water damage.   Taking a lot of damaged wood out and replacing it with new wood.   We will also have to replace the missing window.  But we are making progress.    

Anytime you tear into something this old, there is no telling what you will find.   But sadly we have found no money or diamond rings here.  

While we have been working on the demolition,  I have had to use some of my creative energy up and I've worked on the couch seating.  If you remember it was the ugly camo covered, nasty, dirty couch.  I cleaned the cushions and recovered them in black material with white polka dots.  I love this material.   I will use more of it for other things along the way.  I got all the materials so far on ebay.  It is the world's shopping center.  Anything is a click away. 

So the cushions were cleaned.  I bought thin paneling, just laid the cushion on the paneling and traced around it.  I cut the paneling out so that it is the bottom of the cushion.  Then cut the material out and stapled it to the bottom of the paneling.  The seat cushion was strait across.  The camper seats (we actually kept those)  are L shaped so I added cushions to the sides of the bottom seat shaped like the L also.  I will add some other red cushions to it and brighten it up.  

I also worked on the curtains this weekend.   I can't wait to get to work to start adding walls and painting the cabinets in the camper.  I am ready to see some adding to instead of demolition. 

Some of the curtain material

Catch up on previous blogs about this remodel:

demolition-is-lot-of-of-work

cleaning-not-so-glamours-job

so-this-is-beginning

Demolition is a lot of of work!

We have been working on demolition for the last couple of weeks.  This weekend as the weather cooled,  I was able to get  a lot done.  Pulled off most of the paneling.  It was old and damaged and came off in layers and splintered.  I was covered in small splintered wood and sawdust.  In fact today I took three showers and I still feel like I have sawdust all over.

While working on the trailer, my husband and I started considering to pulling out the stove.  The person who sold us the trailer never camped in it. He had purchased it with the thought that he would redo it and never had money or time.  He did think that the previous owner had used the stove top but not the heater.  The gas furnace wasn't even connected.   The stove was rusting and I had planned on painting it.  But with a lot thought and debate, we decided to pull it out and do away with the gas.  We will use an electric double burner with flat cast iron burners.  We will store it away when we aren't using it and increase our counter space.  We also will put a slate cutting board into the counter top to allow the double burner  to sit without worry of burning or damaging the counter.   At least this is the current plan :-)

Our plan.

We did find a door frame and window frame that will need to be replaced, along with some frame around the skylight, but over all, behind the paneling, the wood frame is in good shape.  We discovered that the fridge will not work on the electric mode. Not sure if it works with gas like it should but since we are not keeping the gas stove we will not have gas in the camper. (seems safer anyway) so we will pull the old fridge out.  We actually have a small electric fridge already that we take along with us when we camp with the pop up so we will just put that to use inside the camper.  We discovered that the bathroom has no water hooked up. A newer water line was ran to the kitchen sink but that is the only line.  Oh my gosh, the camper was used as a hunting camp. Oh my gosh they must have used the bathroom behind a tree.  

So we pulled out the stove, sink, counter top, furnace all the paneling and ceiling this week.   We still have a lot of work to do.  Hopefully we will keep up the great work and get to actually start adding to the camper instead of taking away soon.

I am going to work on the couch this week and get the covering on the cushions.  I will post an update on how I tackle that so stray tuned later this week.   Meanwhile,  I am always open to any ideas and suggestions. I am learning as we go.  It is a lot of fun but oh my gosh this is hard work.

Previous blogs on our trailer remodel:
cleaning not-so-glamours-job
This is the beginning.