Another quick update on our Teardrop Trailer progress from last weekend! …
On Saturday we sanded down all of the bond-o we applied to our giant, chipped fenders. We started with a larger grit sandpaper and finished with something a little finer to ensure we got the smoothest repairs possible. Thank goodness for that garage sale a year ago where we scored an awesome electric hand sander off of a neighbor! We also used Sikaflex to seal off the inside edges (I call them ‘the rainbow edges’ because they’re the curve) and let that dry overnight.
On Sunday we painted the fenders with four coats of Rustoleum spray paint, and I am sooooooo happy with how they turned out!! They look brand-stinkin-new again! We finally got the hole drilled into the tongue of the trailer frame too, which is perhaps our biggest victory yet! The front jack that we got for the trailer needed a hole to fit through but our frame didn’t have one (up until now we were stabilizing the trailer on some janky stands … it was time to get a little bit safer, ha!) so, four whole saws and one broken power drill later, we’ve got ourselves a hole and the stabilizing jack is officially installed! Now that was a labor of love … Virgil was going down to the garage every night after work for a week attempting to get that hole drilled … it was definitely a hang up that we weren’t expecting! He used WD-40 to help get the final bit of steel out of there, and then we had to sand down the hole’s edges to make it smoother. Finally, he used the angle grinder on the underside so that the jack would sit flush against the base so that we could drill the bolts into it. I don’t think anyone but us will ever fully appreciate how much work went into this part!
^^that was all the steel we had to drill through, phew!!^^
We got three of four window frames fully installed with window sealant and proper rivets! The fourth window is TBD since it’s on the door that we haven’t reattached yet. And we UV-Sikaflexed the outside edges for waterproofing purposes.
With some of the leftover belly pan aluminum we had, we fashioned some flashing for the front doorway (and plan to do so for the galley door as well) to help protect the subfloor’s wood and to create a cleaner edge because we’ll be using the area to slide things in and out under the bed. No parts go to waste on this project!
And finally, we started applying window sealant foam to the fender edges to ensure there is no aluminum-steel contact when we go to install the fenders.
It was definitely a weekend of a lot of little jobs finally coming to a close! This week we’re hoping to get at least one of the fenders on and *maybe* the flashing installed in the galley door. On Monday night we ordered a bunch of materials (lots of aluminum edging to solve our problems, thanks to Rach’s brilliance!) and today I got the notifications that everything has already shipped! So here’s to hoping that we can get to the point of water-testing this weekend! If we can do that, then we’re right on track to finishing this thing in time!
thanks for stopping by!
xo
LAUREN LIVES 