Old Trails West Campster Manuals

[Harry Young]

Hello Campsters,

Thru a series of events assisted thru the kindness of persons on this site "thanks Russ" I went to Los Banos California securing an abandoned Campster for another newbie, on doing a search of the 1969 title I found inside I found both registered owners are now camping off of planet earth now, thus the reason no one came to claim it, the trailer was full of wasps, bees, and dead mummified birds and a host of curious objects from the 70s. The last active registration was 1999, its known to be on this farm 6 years.

This being a gut and suck build it again project I found on demolition of the interior behind a false panel where a pottie was installed a paper packet, inside it was the origional factory papers for the gas lamp with parts blow up, stove with parts blow up, ice box with parts blow up and the hand pump with parts blow up, I will upload what I have to the Doc center by Sept 2nd.

Now a question for this trailer brand of owners...

My Astro trailer "same body totally different suspension" does not have an inside rib reinforcing structure fiberglassed into the ceiling, its a glassed in as a rib-tee approx 2 inches thick in the center contoured into the roof being 5 inches wide like a half moon pressed into the ceiling making a rounded fiberglass beam, it begins just after the front of the side windows crossing the ceiling traversing to both side walls, then on center of this horizontal semi rounded beam it bisects the trailer to the hatch for the pop top. Its a good glass job and greatly increases the strength of the roof...the question is this...Were there Campsters this was done too? by the factory its a first rate glass job?

Happy camping, Safe trails.

Harry

[Dana T]

Good Heavens -- Los Banos, Turlock, Lodi -- a real treasure-trove of poptop trailers. I just may have to spend some time driving around there!

Congratulations on your acquisition, as well as the acquisition of some new things to do....

[Lisa H.]

My Astro trailer "same body totally different suspension" does not have an inside rib reinforcing structure fiberglassed into the ceiling, its a glassed in as a rib-tee approx 2 inches thick in the center contoured into the roof being 5 inches wide like a half moon pressed into the ceiling making a rounded fiberglass beam, it begins just after the front of the side windows crossing the ceiling traversing to both side walls, then on center of this horizontal semi rounded beam it bisects the trailer to the hatch for the pop top. Its a good glass job and greatly increases the strength of the roof...the question is this...Were there Campsters this was done too? by the factory its a first rate glass job?

Congrats on getting the old girl home finally! In answer to your question about the roof reinforcement. . . yes! My 1970 Campster has the same rib that goes from the roof above the front window down the center to where the pop-top begins and another that stretches between the two side windows. I could be wrong, but I believe I sent you some pics when we were discussing the window installation project. I doubt Campster roofs will ever sag.

Take care,
Lisa

[Bobbie Mayer]

My Campster has that same rib work, too.

I can't wait to see the flyers.

[Harry Young]

Thank you for confirmation, The trailer is on my property "H.O.A. avoidance" but is now Joe and Kates trailer of Sun City Arizona as a project trailer to a friend who deserves it having helped me more times than I can count with one eye on my Astro, they signed up on this site as Kate R.

Today they both came up and demolished the interior, pics are being taken...

My Astro is a 1971 model year, mine is off its frame now being sanded, its naked and can be compared to the 1969 cousin the Campster, this has been very revealing to me...

The Astro is exactly the same on all the major points...

However the frame has extended gussets with ribs extending to the edge of the fiberglass body at 8 strategic points, an example of this is both fore and aft of the wheel wells...also a 2" square metal beam bisects the frame laterally under the wood /fiberglass floor adding much needed strength to the floor pan at the door entrance...the roof is congregated towards the outside with four raised 4" wide by 3" high corrugations molded into the hull, the two center corrugations run down the front of the trailer to the belly band just on both sides of the front window, these stiffen my roof and front cowl above the belly band greatly, all four corrugations begin at the pop top hatch running to the front.

The pop top is corrugated too in 4 places.

Suspensions are totally different.

The influence of the Trails West Campster is to much to deny, My 71 is in the first run of Astro Manufacturing production numbers (128) but shows corrections in design learned from the Campster. Astro obviously learned much from it.
Looking up the Hunters and the Compacts I see no molded corrugations into their designs.

The Campster Joe and Kate have will need a reinforced fiberglass floor pan, one wheel well lists about 16 degrees off center to the outside of the frame rail, (no gussets or ribs to stop it) the door cut out in the fiberglass skin for the rear door shows fractures on both sides of the top corners exactly at 45 degrees, understandable to a trailer basically splitting the body laterally in two sitting on its two rail frame.

Kate R will start posting pics soon under remods.

My interest here was the comparisons close up of the two trailers striped down in close proximity.

Another question for Campster owners...On your fiberglass pop tops, does the bottom of that pop top roof come straight down to meet the main roof when in the travel position or is there a lip that flares out 90 degrees to form a softer wider mating surface against the main roof, I suspect the lip in this one has been modified and its been cut off.

Thanx for the replies.

Cheers

Harry

[Harry Young]

Lisa,

I dug up that post and it does show it, when I first saw the pics my eye just over looked that detail...thanks for remembering that for me.

Harry

Congrats on getting the old girl home finally! In answer to your question about the roof reinforcement. . . yes! My 1970 Campster has the same rib that goes from the roof above the front window down the center to where the pop-top begins and another that stretches between the two side windows. I could be wrong, but I believe I sent you some pics when we were discussing the window installation project. I doubt Campster roofs will ever sag.

Take care,
Lisa

[Harry Young]

Campsters,

I have scaned and uploaded the manuals to Donna D. She has informed me the Doc center has gremlins to be tamed but they would get there eventually...those who are curious or would like to see them sooner I can send them off my computer to your email PM me and hit me up for them if you want too.

These Docs may also be the Docs used in Compact, Hunter, and Astro too.

They are out of the sealed owners packet found in a 1969 Campster.

Happy Trails, Safe Camping.

Harry

[Bobbie Mayer]

I was just looking for these manuals, can't find them? In the doc center?

[Donna D.]

Bobbie, Harry sent them to me... they're on an old computer. It's going to require some downsizing, they're all too many megs to be accepted into the Document Center. It was ONE of those things I planned on doing this winter.

[Bobbie Mayer]

Thanks, Donna. I do have a jpg scan of them on this computer somewhere, I will hunt it up.

[Donna D.]

Bobbie, that's what Harry sent me, individual hi-res JPGs. I need to create PDFs of each one and merge them into one file.

[bbuehler]

Harry,
I would love to see that 'naked' little baby girl...with all her special glassed in supports that my poor little Compact II never got the benefit of having installed. I was just looking at purchasing a Trailswest but decided against it...to far a distance at too high an EGG cost...didn't equate to a good deal for me.
Oh well, we'll have to go to CA & AZ, to go gold-digging with Harry (AKA: American Pickers). We'll look at every 1/2 worn down and overgorwn barn out there to find our little glass 'nuggets'!
Sounds like FUN to me...
See you soon for an adventure!
BB

[tdkosta]

Cool story on the find. I think I might also have an Astro. From the pictures on the forum I thought mine was a Campster, but the plate says Astro Manufacturing. So I suppose there is another Astro out there and in AZ even.

[Thee Jimbo]

Hi everyone, did those manuals ever get uploaded, I am restoring a devistated 1971 campster, and these could be very very handy!

Thanks . .jimbo!!!

[Donna D.]

Originally Posted by Thee Jimbo

Hi everyone, did those manuals ever get uploaded, I am restoring a devistated 1971 campster, and these could be very very handy!

Thanks . .jimbo!!!

No, to be honest with you I forgot about it. The Document Center upload was broken for so long, it was one of those things that slipped my mind. Guess I should get with it. Give me a couple of weeks, I try to get it done by the end of the month.

[Bobbie Mayer]

Originally Posted by Thee Jimbo

Hi everyone, did those manuals ever get uploaded, I am restoring a devistated 1971 campster, and these could be very very handy!

Thanks . .jimbo!!!

Probably less so than you think. They were not very detailed, if I remember right. But between us we can probably tell you what the original looked like.

[Mary F]

Originally Posted by Donna D.

No, to be honest with you I forgot about it. The Document Center upload was broken for so long, it was one of those things that slipped my mind. Guess I should get with it. Give me a couple of weeks, I try to get it done by the end of the month.

Oh, wow. Cool, Donna. I didn't remember that you had them. (Cool that you can do it; not that the project got mislaid.)

[Thee Jimbo]

Originally Posted by Donna D.

No, to be honest with you I forgot about it. The Document Center upload was broken for so long, it was one of those things that slipped my mind. Guess I should get with it. Give me a couple of weeks, I try to get it done by the end of the month.

Thanks Donna

And if you need help converting them to PDF's let me know. If you want to email what you have to me, I will be happy to convert for you..

Thanks again. . jimbo

[Linda R002]

That sounds great. Now that we have a Trail West we were looking for that kind of information. We will watch to see when they get uploaded. Thanks Donna.

[Donna D.]

Just to be clear... I did NOT receive an owners manual for the TrailsWest. Harry only sent me appliance manuals, etc. I just got them to download and they're huge. I'll need to redistill the PDFs to get them small enough to upload. I'll work on it tonight. Because they're appliance manuals, etc. which will be applicable to other brands, they'll be uploaded into the correct folder (appliances, etc).

Sorry if I got your hopes up. Maybe someone else can provide an owners manual, if there ever was one?