Day 20 A full day on the trailer

Today started off a little cooler, but still a very nice morning. I was so looking forward to sleeping in until at least 7:30, but my brain had me up at 6:30am. I started thinking about all the work that needed to be done on the trailer, in the house and around the yard, that I thought I had better get moving. I crawled out of bed and tossed in a load of laundry. At least I was getting up on my own, with no alarm clock, I was just awake and ready to get things done.

Saturday morning chores were done; I pulled some weeds and cleaned up in the garage a little. I checked on the chicken around 9:15am and there was already an egg. I let them out to run around and they were all too pleased to be let out so early. They scratched all over the yard, rooting up all kinds of bugs and they seemed particularly interested in digging around under the big blue spruce.

Scrubbing roof heading toward the rear of the trailer.

With the ladders in place I started to work on the roof. I pour big puddles of paint stripper and would cover about one square foot at a time. I’d let it sit for a few minutes and then scrape it over to another section, spread it out and let it sit again, continuing this all over the roof. The roof had been covered with silver roof mastic and the minute the paint stripper hit it, it would turn to black tar.

Cleaning around roof vent.

The roof vent was particular hard hit with roofing tar and some other tan seller that was particularly hard to remove. I ended up covering the seams around the vent with an extra amount of stripper and letting it soak, while I work on another part of the roof. When I came back to work on the vent, most of the tar came off with light scraping and the rest would come off with an SOS soap pad.

I spent a lot of time working on the roofing trim and was able to get the left side of the trailer pretty much cleaned from top to bottom. There is just one small section that I hope to spend a little more time with tomorrow. On the right side of the trailer the trim is covered by an awning rail. When I first saw the trailer 20 days ago, I thought the awning rail would have to be replaced, but now with it all cleaned up I think it is in pretty good shape. I would like to remove the rail and spend some extra time with it.  This will also allow me to clean up the trim underneath. One of the things I am really looking forward to, is ordering an awning and putting it up the first time.  How nice it will be to sit in the shade of a new awning when all the hard working of restoring a trailer is done.

Trim on the left side all cleaned up.

I spent all afternoon working on the roof. I started on the left side of the trailer and work back, toward the rear of the trailer and down the curve. I then switching to the right side of the trailer and did pretty much the same. The right side also has the vent cap, where a gas heater would have vented. This is something I want to investigate and see if I can find what kind of heater it wouls have been and can I find one to put back. It would have to be a very thin and probably tall unit, but it will be fun to investigate and see if I can find one.

Cleaning around the right side of the vent.

Cleaned up for the night.

I worked until about 4:30pm and then went into clean up mode. When I washed the top of the trailer off all the goo, tar chunks and paint stripper residue (I removed most the stripper with the putty knife and put in on newspaper to toss away) would run down over the trailer. This left stains and a mess all over the sides, so I gave the entire trailer a quick wash over with an SOS pad and cleaned everything up. The trailer is really starting to look good.

One thing I have noticed, now that the trailer is starting to get all polished up, is that you can now see that this trailer has gone through some hail storms. Hail dimples are all over the trailer. I think they actually give it character.  Its been said that a  trailers worst enemy is a hail storm and this trailer  has seen a few in its 60 years.

It took me a little more than an hour to clean up, wash and dry the trailer. I had friends coming at 6pm, for more birthday celebrating (I like a Birthdays that last for days) and it was now 5:45pm. I was covered in trailer grime and needed to get cleaned up myself.

I took one final picture of the trailer and wow, does it look better.  With one more day I should be able to have all the heavy scrubbing done and then I can work with the Truck Box Polish and shine it up to a high shine.  Oe thing for sure is I'll need to seal it so it doesn't water spot, otherwise all that hard work will be for nothing.

It was a fun day with the trailer and I was pleased with the progress.