The New Box!

Mike was a true professional. For just under $1,000 he built this amazing box for our trailer.

I am SO EXCITED!

Now I just need to attach it to the trailer and then reinstall the water heater and shoulder lights.

Reconstruction II

Here I installed the new bulkhead. So far, it's only attached with 4 bolts and washers (2 on each side). The bolt screw into the metal frame on the side of the trailer. It was difficult to drill the holes in the right places but I did it with careful measuring.

Nothing like a blury picture on a blog! Here I reinstalled the support framing. I rebuilt it out of the same outdoor plywood I used for the floor and ferring strips. I made sure the keep the old pieces to use as templates. I also added some extra supports because I don't have the wooden side panels for the cross beam to rest on.

At this point, it's time to start thinking about replacement body panels. I called Buckleys in Maryland and they had lots of Coleman parts. I guess they purchased parts from the Fleetwood factory in PA when it closed. He quoted me $1,400 for the front panel, the lid deck, the lid, the hinge, the gaskets, and shipping. That seemed really expensive considering that I would still need to rebuild all of the wooden body panels in order to use them. So...I decided to have a diamond plate trunk built. 

I met with Mike at M&M Metals in San Antonio, TX. I made careful measurements and gave him the following drawings. He quoted me a time frame of seven business days.

Reconstruction I

 I cut a new floor out of 3/4" outdoor treated plywood. I made sure to keep the old floor so that I could use it as a template.

I glued vinyl flooring to the plywood. I bought the flooring and the glue at Lowe's. The rolling pin came from the kitchen and helped get out the bubbles.

This plastic gasket was designed to go in between the trunk floor and the cabin floor. It wasn't large enough to accomate the new 3/4" floor so I had to cut off the bottom flange. It was shaped like a "T" when I was done. I applied silicone caulk and then stapled the vertical section to the cut edge of the floor. I applied more silicone caulk when I joined the two floor pieces together.

I cut out a new bulkhead from 1/8" oak veneer plywood. It wasn't thick enough so I had to use two layers. 1/4" would have been perfect. I stained it with a stain/polyurethane combination in what my husband calls "cheesy 90's oak color." It was the closest match to the original cabinets.

The shelf behind the electrical box fell down when I removed the bulkhead. Apparently it was stapled to it. I wanted to prop it up while I still had access to the area (without pulling out the electrical box) so I built this little support stand out of ferring strips.

Demolition VI

Several bolts hold the floor down inside the trunk. They were very rusty.

There are quite a few bolts and screws holding the floor to the frame. You can access them from under the trailer.

Here is water damage to the floor in the seam between the trunk floor and the floor of the main cabin.

Mold under the vinyl flooring. Very stinky.

Trailer with floor removed. I don't have a picture but I also removed the support and the bulkhead.

Demolition V

With the side and front panels removed, the trunk looks like this:

I removed the access panel for the water heater.

Then I removed the screws holding in the water heater. They were coated with the same ultra sticky goo as the screws in the lid hinge. I'm sure it's a way of waterproofing the holes. I think it probably works pretty good.

Here is the gas line connection to the water heater.

The gas line is attached to the floor under the trailer.

I removed this line carefully so that I could reuse it.

Here is the trailer with the water heater removed. The two water supply/return lines were very inflexible and the connectors were attached after they were threaded through the holes in the floor. I couldn't find a way to get them back through the floor with the connectors on so I cut the hoses just behind the connectors. The hoses were so stiff that I decided I would replace them and install new connectors when I reassembled the trunk.



Demolition IV

Having someone to help you demo the trailer is a good idea. This is my husband. He came out to use his new dremmel tool to remove the rivets connecting the side panel to the bulkhead. I suppose that I could have done it but I'm adverse to pieces of hot metal flying toward my face. My husband, on the other hand, loves it.

 Here is the water damage under the access door.

I completely destroyed the front panel while trying to remove it. It was already damaged but I really messed it up. There was more of that super sticky foam tape holding it to the side panel. I used a screwdriver to pry it off. If you don't want to wreck your body panels, don't use a screwdriver.

There is a thin piece of wood connecting the side panel to the front and back panels.

Here is the back side of the wiring for the front shoulder lights. All of the lights had cracked lenses and I was having trouble finding replacements so I ended up just cutting the wires up next to the fixture.

Suprise! Welcome to Texas! Home of 10 bajillion wasps.



Demolition III

I needed to slide the bed in more than it wanted to go in order to take out the screws on the top of the bulkhead. The stop inside by the table was easy but the other side was in the track and the nut would just spin when I turned the screw. I had to jam a wrench into the track behind the rail to hold the nut still while I turned the screw.

Once the stops inside the trailer were gone, I could move things around and remove the stops on the outside. Then I could push the bed in further than it was supposed to go.

With the bed pushed way in, I could remove the bed glides...

and other screws that held on this white piece of trim.

The trim was also held on by a long strip of super sticky foam. I had to really pull to get it off.

This is a photo of the wiring under the edge of the lid deck. I had to disconnect it to take off the deck.

These are the plugs that go into the back of the light switch inside the trailer.

After I removed the lid deck I found a piece of wood was being used to support it. This is mold that was growing under the leaky crack.

Demolition II

I removed the access door. The hinges were some kind of rivet thing. I had to break them (the rivets) because two of the access screws were behind the hinges. I figured I could replace the hinges with bolts if needed.

The screws holding on the ABS side panels were partially covered by the door gasket.

I removed the locks. They were attached with super sticky foam tape and screws.

I removed the screws holding the lid deck down.

There are screws under the front edge of the trailer holding the front panel on from the underneath. They had washers because the weight of the panel would have pushed through the tiny screw head otherwise. You can also see that there are little screws holding the floor of the trunk to the metal trailer frame.

Removing the lid was difficult. It kept collapsing on me. It's also held on with star head screws that are waterproofed with some super sticky super evil putty/caulk stuff. It was everywhere and very very sticky.

Demolition I

I started by removing all of the obvious screws and bolts that I found inside the trunk. Each time I took out a screw or removed a nut, I took a picture of the hardwear next to the area where it was supposed to go. I wasn't sure how many of the original pieces I would need to use, and I didn't want to have parts left over. That cutie in the background is my 3 year-old, Holly. She helped by getting me drinks of water. It was over 95 degrees in the hot Texas sun!

This bracket connects the side board to the bulkhead. It is held on by bolts and rivets. We ended up removing the rivets with a drill/dremmel tool targeted attack.

There are several screws all around the inside lip of the trunk and in the light fixture. I had to buy a special star bit for the drill to remove some of the screws.

This metal L-bracket houses the wiring for the inside light and the outside shoulder lights. It also collected water from the crack in the deck and dumped it out through the light fixture. It was easy to remove.

This bracket connects the bulkhead to the floor. Easy to remove.

Inspecting the Damage

This first picture looks the worst, but it turns out that it wasn't really all that bad. The crack was covered with duct tape when we bought the trailer but we knew it was there. It didn't appear to have let any water into the trunk at all. However, the potential was there.

 This is a bad picture of the biggest problem. There is a crack running down from the top of the "lid deck" to the area under the hinge. It had let a lot of water into the trailer before we took it to Camping World in New Braunfels, TX to get it repaired. They left it out in the rain (more water got in) and then "fixed" the problem by squirting silicone caulk into the crack. It didn't solve the problem. Since the crack exended under the hinge and the caulk didn't, water could still get in.

This is the paneling inside the trunk next to the access door. So much water was getting in around the seal that the wood had swelled to twice its original thickness. The seal actually appeared to still be in tact, but the door was installed in such a way that there was a gap that water could get through.



All over the trunk we found tiny cracks in the ABS. This is just one example. The biggest problem areas were under the lip where the covers met the floor and around the locks.

This is another example of Camping World's terrible fix. The stabilizer had fallen off the underside of the trunk lid. But instead of gluing it back on, they reattached it with bolts drilled through the lid. Each bolt was topped with a hershey's kiss of silicone caulk. It looked terrible!