Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
I've been asked by a few of the members here to start posting pictures.
Here is the first of many of our '72 Boler American, rescued from 15 years of supervised neglect in the woods of MA.
You may have already seen this in the Referrals: For sale ads in the forums.
The body was covered in dirt and moss while the roof grew Lichens and was embedded with branches from a fallen tree.
After a few minutes using the snow brush from the trunk, things are looking better
A quick once over with the power washer shows marked improvements.
Note the lower door hinge was broken as well.
Add some soap, water, elbow grease and a 2nd power wash. You get a whole new look!
Duct taping the roof hole, with the door held up using a bucket.
Then we hit a snag, the wiring was fried.
Fought with that for a few hours, before heading off to Walmart to buy a wiring kit. By then it's dark and I'm wiring by flashlight.
With the wiring patched and the door tied shut we are off to find a place to stay for the night.
One look at the mold, and you will know why we didn't sleep in it the first night.
The interior got a good 1st run at cleaning, but was nowhere near close to being suitable for sleeping.
We also forgot to pack the sleeping bags
After 2 days on the road (1934.9 Km and 4.5 tanks of gas total return) including a freak hail storm while on I-90 somewhere near Syracuse.
Add in one day of cleaning and fixing to pass any border inspections and we finally have our first egg at home.
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
Looks like you are starting all your work and ready to jump right in.
It most certainly looks much less scary now. Amazing what a good bath can do.
Thanks Gina,
Wait till you see what a little liquid TSP sprayed on followed by a horse brush does to the ensolite.
We have a tentative plan on cleaning which will be followed by Concrobium for mold control. We are going to try to track down a fogger to make sure we hit all the little nooks and crannies.
Someone here suggested using Simple Green to tackle the job. I contacted Simple Green with a link to the eBay listing asking which of their products they would suggest for the task at hand. Thinking I would pick some up while we were picking up the trailer in the USA. They replied by saying they were sending a complementary case of samples, enough to do the job. ETA was last week, but nothing has shown up yet. If it does show up before we finish, we will try a comparison and report back.
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
WOW you did all of that cleaning while in transit? I am impressed! Makes a huge difference doesn't it! You even have windows, now I am jealous!
Yes, we had to clean the outside including the underside before crossing the border as specified by Agriculture Canada regulations for importation. We were confident the attached foliage would have attracted some attention at Customs.
We were trying not to attract attention since our Boler American was missing a couple of the required things, namely a FMVSS or CSA compliance label and the date of manufacture. (Still trying to determine if Boler American ever provided either).
Got a little scare when we first stopped at the booth and the border guard asked specifically about the date being marked. I replied "I'm not sure, would that be on the tag with the serial number because I know where that is."
That was the closest we came to an inspection, though it is possible someone could have looked at it while we were doing the paperwork. I'm glad because we had only done a cursory cleaning of the inside and was worried they might say something about the mold.
No need to be jealous. I figure in the end we both paid about the same. You bought replacement windows, we paid more, had to travel farther, spend 2 nights in hotels. Yes, cleaning makes a huge difference, thank you for the compliment. I noticed it rained during both our trips.
Beautiful! Where was it built? You'll be egging in no time!
Adam
Well it's probably time for me to stop lurking and introduce myself. I am Roy in TO's wife and co-owner of this egg. My name is Carol Ann in TO (notice a similarity in the names?)
To answer your question -- this particular Boler was made in Witchita. I am very aware of this as I was the one that carefully washed the logos on the front and back ends on the weekend. (along with taking the pictures)
Thanks to the rest of you for the confidence boost. Although we aren't doubting the intelligence of the purchase, it helps to know that others think we aren't crazy.
Glad to see a Boler American soulmate. We found our '72 boler american on ebay a couple of years ago, and have been having a lot of fun renovating it and travelling. So far we've made two cross=country trips, putting about 20,000 miles on the rig, without serious incident.
Alterations that really made it nice included electric brakes, fantastic fan, and adding front dinette. We're sitting in it as I write, in an rv park in Gilroy, CA, that happens to have its own wifi hotspot. A trend I hope all parks will make.
Anyway, congratulations on your purchase. You'll have many pleasant memories that I hope you share on this site.
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
Glad to see a Boler American soulmate. We found our '72 boler american on ebay a couple of years ago, and have been having a lot of fun renovating it and travelling. So far we've made two cross=country trips, putting about 20,000 miles on the rig, without serious incident.
Alterations that really made it nice included electric brakes, fantastic fan, and adding front dinette. We're sitting in it as I write, in an rv park in Gilroy, CA, that happens to have its own wifi hotspot. A trend I hope all parks will make.
Anyway, congratulations on your purchase. You'll have many pleasant memories that I hope you share on this site.
Thank you Lance,
I'm interested in your front dinette mod. We have the one piece under seat storage. How did you do it? Are pictures posted here?
I'm sure we will have a lot to talk about over the years. Just wondering, does yours have either the FMVSS or CSA compliance label?
Roy --
I have a thread in modifications called blue boler pix that has a bunch of pix of modifications I've made, including the front dinette.
Basically, I removed all of the fiberglass and gaucho and built framed boxes for each side. I cut out tops for the boxes that matched the curvature, using cardboard for a template, and the made foam cushions to fit on top. The one next to the sink holds our laptops and other stuff, and the one next to the door holds the porta potti. The lids are the same size, so its easy to move the cushion and lid off the porta potti so it can be used in the wee hours without a lot of hassle. Also, since its up on the ledge, its high enough so you don't fall to the floor. Anyway, the website should give you some ideas, which I'm sure could be improved.
I have plates on the frame, but don't know what if any certifications are there. It's in storage until the Isleton crawdad festival. I'll take a look then (June 16), and let you know.
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
Sweat equity....gotta love the $$ savings in the purchase.
Looking forward to more pictures too
OK Donna,
Here are some more pictures.
Sorry for the delay, but we've been working on the trailer, camping, trying to keep up with life and generally procrastinating on both editing pictures and posting.
The first picture shows all the cleaning supplies we used to clean the inside for those that are faced with the same task. What you will need most of is "Carol Ann's Elbow Grease", but I'd suggest you find a local source which is packaged under many different labels, since our supply is getting low and is very expensive to ship and store.
A good dose of liquid TSP sprayed on and a scrub brush took off most of the black stuff. That was followed by lot of rinsing and wiping down with water and bleach. The Concrobium can be sprayed on, wiped on or even fogged to get into all the nooks and crannies. Somewhere in all of that we used many of the Simple Green products the manufacturer sent us. It was a process of finding out what worked best for what and where since the dirt and mold was different throughout the trailer.
Here is a before and after the cleaning of the ensolite. (sorry the before picture didn't show, so I posted more pictures below)
And one of the Nuts that filled every storage spot, Scamp must have had some insight to the potential for storage when they called their first trailer the Acorn
The exposed fiberglass and wood were then painted with Kilz. We are in the process of regluing the ensolite with Super77 and painting it with ONE SHOT SIGN PAINT (Thanks to Billy from PEI for suggesting that product)
The small peice of painted Ensolite that is hanging was not glued yet as I was still working on the FG repairs for the hole in the roof from the fallen tree while I was working on my door fix.
(Those pictures will all be posted later)
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
I know it's been a little more than a year since I started this thread, I'm finally at a point where I can start posting more of the progress of our restoration.
The first major fix we did was to replace the closet door that was falling apart from getting wet. The hole in the roof was temporarily repaired using duck tape to stop most of the water from coming in. Not the best answer but it was a quick fix to a problem that worked.
I bought some almond melamine pressboard and iron on sides from Home Depot. Using the old door as a template I cut the wood to size and mounted it. It looked good but the door would not stay latched. Back in '72 the thickness of wood was measured in inches, today it is metric. Somewhere in the conversion I got a slightly thicker piece of wood. The problem was resolved by simply insetting the handle a fraction.
We had a big trip planned to the east coast in a few weeks, Yet we still wanted to go to our first ever fiberglass meet, Bolerama 2006. So we loaded up the truck and trailer with camping gear, tools and assorted repair materials and headed off to Emily. While camping we were able to put faces to many of the names we see here regularily - as well as get some work done on the trailer. We were able to install the closet shelves at our first fiberglass meet while the new closet door (done just before Bolerama 2006) and painting the closet wall (done this year) completed the job. This is the final result:
I don't regret doing both at the same time. All the people at Bolerama were great and quite willing to share their handy work. In keeping with their spirit I'm posting how I did the shelves in the Mods and Alterations Forum as Wire Closet Shelves
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
I know it's been a little more than a year since I started this thread
Well it's 2 years now and I still have not posted the things I did while at Bolerama 2006.
With a big trip planned to the east coast a couple of weeks after Bolerama, I really did not trust the tires that were on the trailer. I bought 3 new tires mounted on rims on sale at Princess Auto on the way up to Bolerama (same price as tires alone). I changed the tires between checking out the other trailers and socializing with a great gang of people gathered at Bolerama.
The original tires were a 6.00-13 bias tire, a single badly worn one remained as the spare.The trailer came sitting on a pair of P165/70R13 (?) car tires that were on it for a very long time. Everything pointed to the closest current replacement being a ST175/80R13.
I soon learned the 3 sizes were not even close. This picture shows the 3 tires side by side.
The worn 6.00-13 on the left, the car tire in the middle and the ST175/80R13 on the right.
Below on the left is the 6.00-13 compared to the ST175/80R13 and the picture below that shows the problem I encountered.
The new ST175/80R13 tires would not fit under the body and over the hub without prying the torsion arm down. I was able to move the arm down just enough to get the tire over the hub, using the side mounting holes built into the axle with a tire iron and scissor jack. With the new tires on, I thought we were one step closer to being ready for our first big trip. On the way home from Emily, I could hear the tires scrubbing going over bumps. I quickly learned to slow down and avoid bumps.
Once home, I could see the tire marks on the top of the wheel well. I got the trailer down to my local welder who cut the axle off and welded some 2" x 2" tubular steel between the two. That solved the problem while giving me a better riding height at the same time. Our big trip was still a go!!
I am positive we would not have made it through some of rough side roads out east without having raised the trailer. At the end of the second summer I had to replace one tire due to extreme wear from what I now know to be a BAD axle. I replaced one tire and swapped the new spare for the better of the worn tires. The man at Cerka axle took one look at the worn spare and said "BENT SPINDLE".
I've ordered a new axle which will change the original leading arm to a trailing arm with electric brakes. I will be switching tires again ... the axle swap allows me to use a 5 on 4.5" bolt pattern using an ST165R12 tire. This tire size is crucial to obtaining the best results with the axle swap. Luckily Princess Auto has a Carlisle ST165R12 mounted on a 12" (5 on 4.5") rim on sale @ 25% off. Oddly enough this is the closest match in overall size to the original 6.00-13. The original spare tire cover fits the new tire perfectly.
The axle swap will posted much later. I will try to post the fixes in the order they were done. There is more than a years work to catch up on posting first.
Trailer: 1972 Boler American and 1979 Trillium 4500
Posts: 5,141
Quote:
I will try to post the fixes in the order they were done. There is more than a years work to catch up on posting first.
We raised the axle the day before we left on our 3 week trip. That same day, the same welder added on support for the propane tanks, the battery box and the tongue box as shown below.
A full description was posted as Adding a tongue box in the Modifications, Alterations and Neat Updates forum
the GDec
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