October

After an extended hiatus due to school and putting a new apartment together (and possibly watching all of Twin Peaks but in no way admitting it), we returned to the Airstream for fall break. Our original intention was to backpack Red River Gorge this break, but we read each others' minds and decided to work on it. 

I work best having a project, that I can do in a couple days with no other tasks to tend to. I set out to remove the subfloor, which hid the last of the godforsaken insulation. My strategies removing floorboards were sequentially as follows:
1)Beat the shit out of the floor with a hammer then remove the bolts with the edge of said hammer
2)Chisel blindly at where I believed the rusty bolts were hiding, then vicegrip them out
3)Ask my dad for proper tools 

First casualty of the weekend. Replaced with a fiberglass handle.

Lyss worked on the tar-wrought walls, using enough Goof-Off to leave the average train completely graffiti-free. It mostly liquified the tar, which then smeared, then dremeled off.
The new plan of action is to use truck-bed liner on the entire inside, leaving it airtight and waterproof for years to come. We're not too bent on leaving the inside of the shell gleaming, just flat and ready for some plastique applications.

Before. The tape has dried to a rock over the years.

After. Still remnants of tar but flat enough to primer and seal.

We had been entertaining the idea of a completely new underbelly/pan. When the subfloor was off, the need for a new pan was justified. Many places were rusted out, and what were not had rat and mice nests littered everywhere. There were cactus bits that they made nests with, which was pretty cool. There were mummified or completely bones corpses of mice and rats. We wondered it they lived in harmony. We highly doubted it.


Taking off the underbelly was tricky. There are different layers of rivets on an Airstream, let alone one that has been repaired multiple times. Crawling underneath to de-rivet while insulation and dirt are falling on you from the aluminum panels you're unhinging is pretty fun. I had wood in the corners of my eyes. I'm still wondering if petrified mouse poop can give you pink eye.

Next up is to powerwash its entirety. Then it'll be ready to be truck-bed lined on the inside and a new underbelly fitted to it. We're not entirely sure if the frame and shell are still attached. Before we move it next weekend we're going to fasten it in places so it doesn't morph into a kite on the road.

Looked okay in the back.

Party was up front/

All off. Now the game is not to rack yourself.

Never paint the outside of an Airstream.

Prevent this tragedy.

Frame has a lot of rust. Going to be sealed again after it's cleaned.

Finding out what attaches the frame to the shell is surprisingly obscure. We were in this pose a lot.

The floor and pan cut into 3x3 pieces, last truckload of stuff to bring to the dump.

Life's hard.

Break down the walls

We started off the weekend by learning what a rivet is, which is a pretty interesting invention; then learning how to remove them, which only requires a drill, so thanks Fixing Things on YouTube for the tutorial. Now that we knew what the hell we were working on, we went in and worked on it. It took a while to get the groove of popping out a rivet perfectly, but it was pretty satisfying work. After a few hundred were out, we pulled off some of the god-awful colored vinyl (which is actually a vinyl-aluminum-vinyl laminated sandwich that is impossible to shear). Then our first taste of what lay beneath; we had prepared mentally for it, but it's nothing like seeing it for the first time: 5 million mouse turds.

The Airstream was equivalent to an apartment complex for rambling rodents.

Our fully-protected selves began pulling out the exposed insulation. It wasn't that bad once we started. Seeing some shiny aluminum underneath the mouse-chewed/shat/nested kept us going. The only downside to pulling off the insulation was a lot of it didn't want to leave; the factory used a tar-based glue to hold the insulation in place whilst they put up the walls and wiring.

Lovely.

After hopping on AirForums (if you're not a member yet, get crackin') we found this wasn't that bad to remove, given some time, patience, and heavy chemicals. First we used GooGone, a household solvent that works really well getting things un-sticky, and Lyss removed some tar from a 4 'x 2' section in about half an hour, which looked pretty good. Next up is heavy duty GoofOff, which even removes graffiti, along with using a scrubbing pad connected to a power drill. We'll see how that goes in two weekends once we're back from Mammoth Cave NP. As for now, about 20% of the aluminum walls have tar covering them, with little wisps of insulation still sticking to them, along with some 50 year old masking tape that dried as a sediment.

 Really? I'm all for pointless aestheticism but it makes the wall look worse...

 She opted to wear my clothes for this job since they already look dirty. It took one hell of a scrub to get some tar specks off her skin. Next day she wore pants.

Post tar removal, this part won't be exposed so I'm not too bent on leaving it pristine, although there will be layers of sealant applied to the inside.

So here we were, ripping off vinyl walls to hear the rain of decades of mouse droppings hit the rotting wood floor, sometimes hitting our head and once falling down my shirt. I knew Lyss was thinking it, because I was too: will this place ever be livable, let alone a home where we feel safe from the elements and our dogs won't contract a disease? 

Then my dad came along. As I said before, he's a carpenter on Jesus' level. He said we were being too kind to the vinyl walls, and just jumped in ripping that shit like Julius Erving on an eight foot goal. In an hour all the vinyl was out, including the layered fiberglass end-caps (which I crane-kicked in two, one of the most satisfying feelings of the weekend), and all the insulation was bagged. A woman in a trailer across the fence was asking if everyone was alright, which I replied yeah. The floor was littered, but the walls and ceiling were insulation and appliance free after we ripped out the archaic Coleman AC unit. We met my sister for coffee and talked about our weekend before she came and saw it for the first time. She was impressed with how big it was on the inside, and wanted to help out a couple weekends once it was a reasonably safe place to breathe.

 The black tank. Wish the mice would have known this is the correct location to poop.

 Rat nest. They really made this place a home.

A true test of the human spirit.

I smacked my forehead on the glass crank-out windows.

Words of encouragement hit us all weekend, fading our doubts and worries. Lyss' family thought it was awesome what we're doing. My dad came out to help and bring tons of stuff to the dump so we could keep working past dinner. He also told stories of pulling dead raccoons out of insulation, because you'll never be as gnarly as your dad, and I need to be reminded of it. At the barber shop people were asking tons of questions when they overheard me talking about remodeling the Airstream. A guy jumped out of his truck to start asking us questions, most of which were invasive about how much it cost and where I found it, but uplifting nonetheless. Lyss and I kept each other going, and I've realized it wouldn't be anywhere near the amazing project it is if I didn't have someone equally driven (and unhinged) by my side. It's been one of the best weekends I've had in a long time, but now it's time to take a shower and get the fiberglass shards out of our skin.

Sunday night, swept and stuff removed. Rest in hell, you various neon wall panels.

Getting started

The floors are rotting away at the edges from the leaks in the body, the vinyl walls have halfway been removed (have been popping off the rivets with a hammer, not the right way since there is no electricity where we are storing the Airstream). Once all the vinyl is off we will be seeking and destroying all the little leaks, most of which I am guessing come from the windows, all the while scratching off the black residue left by the 50 year old insulation. 

Sadly the cool stuff, like off-grid appliances and furniture building, will have to come after the boring stuff, electricity and plumbing. Nonetheless my girlfriend's work, her mom's work, and my dad's job site are providing us with enough broken pine pallets to make Pinterest ashamed and want to rethink its life decisions. With this seemingly limitless free wood, we plan on building all our furniture, since Ikea doesn't sell too much that fits the roundness of an Airstream.

The door frame is 5'5" high. You don't  notice because you're more concerned with the two foot drop to gravel.

There's something just so awful about these. Underneath is the black tank, which will be removed and not replaced.

Ours is only 26' long on the outside (where Airstreams lengths are measured). This creates a design challenge, since we will be dealing with about 150 sq ft. 

Bathroom

Luckily everything but the black tank from the bathroom had been stripped away, but by some lucky stroke I found pictures of what it looked like in 2005.

Looks completely original

 WTF Dixie cups??

Original ad for the 1967 fleet. Things were different then.

Why did a rave-teen with $100 paint the entire Airstream but leave the bathroom completely original? There's a lot of questions, like how much shorter were people in the 60's? 

I know at one time it was maneuverable, but had been bolted stationary at some point.

I plan on having a small shower, and a composting toilet, eliminating the need for a black water tank. The plumbing seems easy enough, but let's see once we get to that point in the project.

History and Lore

Airstreams are a piece of American history. America, as a land and culture, is awesome. Making campers since the 1930s, the lead designer was also the designer of the Spirit of St. Louis, hence the riveted appearance.

The first manufactured Airstream; anyone seen The Rocketeer?

I was sent pictures of the Airstream for sale showing neon purple, fiber-optic orange, and gouge-your-eyes-out neon green and teal walls. It looked like a child threw up gallons of crappy Kool-Aid drinks his uninformed parents gave him.

How anyone fell asleep in this is beyond me.

"I dress down to perpetuate the myth I'm a fixer-upper."

Upon looking for pictures of renovated 1967 Overlander Land Yachts to get some ideas I stumbled upon the Airstream I was about to buy, betting that there had only been one person who had smoked themselves dumb enough to paint an American legend these colors.

Nice on the outside.

 But no.

 Just no.

They said they had been using it as a guest house. I doubt anyone came over.

So there's some pictures of what it looked like before the guy I bought it from nobly ripped out the interior for me. Leaving only the 50 year old vinyl as a reminder of how dumb a color scheme can be.

My guess is the last owner was trying to make a cool travel camper for him and his kids, and got dragged down by having a steady job and responsibilities. Good thing I skipped all those nuances.

It happened fast.

There I was minding my own business, scanning the internet for an idea I was interested in. Already obsessed with backpacking and minimalism, I had successfully paired down my belongings to what could fit in a Nissan Versa (if I could somehow strap two dogs to the roof). I had been talking to my girlfriend about where I dreamed of living, where I said a small, square-ish cabin with a loft would be my ideal living space. Of course it was on some mountainous property with great scenery, and that's where I began to worry: I am broke. $40,000 in debt from mechanical engineering education in a shrinking job market.

So there I was minding my own business, putting off doing senior design work, and stumbled upon tiny houses. I saw the wheels and thought to myself "gross, that's too small. They must be high. I have dogs. I have backpacking equipment. I have..." 

Then I started to think. I thought it could happen. I drew design after design. With minimal effort, I got my girlfriend on board, which is still crazy to me. Then I realized the price of creating an off-grid home, and we thought "maybe a couple years down the road."

I could be dead in a couple years. To hell with that. Also I'm extremely impulsive. To double hell with that. My dad, who is basically carpenter Jesus, suggested finding a low cost camper to convert. I told him I was too obsessed with exterior beauty to go that route. Then I realized he was right, and got to crackin' on finding something beautiful on the outside (or at least so retro it's mind-numbing).

From the get-go, Airstreams were my main squeeze. It reminded me of locomotives, planes, like something so modern it's always going to be a classic (or the other way around?). For two months I texted to receive discouraging replies, called weird old dudes, and e-mailed people that I found out were straight scammers. I had only one Airstream in the Midwest I thought could work for the price. As the summer creeped closer to July, I knew the prices were only going up, so I took a break. I looked at converting buses, RVs, shipping containers and whatever wasn't an Airstream. 

Then someone texted me back. He had lowered the price, and was going to move across the country in a week. My girlfriend and I drove only an hour to see it, and we loved it. I played it cool by waiting to text him the next day, and in a week we had an Airstream in storage just begging to be given some love and attention. 

So here we are. A cheap, realistic middle step between being apartment-dwelling college students and tiny house owners. I realize that if I hadn't been so persistent on contacting everyone with an Airstream for sale, even when I knew it was a longshot, I wouldn't have gotten the deal I had. When you're stranded, the best direction is any direction that isn't standing still.