Hinges:
I reused mine.
Latches:
The problem is the fact the door will be 1/2" above the face of the cabinate. I wasn't able to find anything locally that matched that. I ended up reusing the old catches, but installed new latches to meet them.
Of course - it's also true that exact replacement can be mail ordered. I found exactly the latches we had at one point - but don't have the URL handy.
Painting:
I painted mine by rolling. The trailer had been painted once already (poorly) and needed some fairly extensive (by my skill level anyway) body work, so it needed to be painted. After scraping off as much of the old paint as possible and doing the fixes to the glass, I scuffed it down extensively using a palm sander.
This is the part most people will likely wince at... I first used the palm sander to eliminate the last stubborn areas of loose paint - using uh... 20 grit sandpaper. :)
The proper scuffing was then done with 150 grit sandpaper (which also smoothed out the results of the 20 grit). The 20 grit paper btw was left over from when we refinished our floors (110 yr old red oak - gorgeous stuff) which was covered in carpet glue (AAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGG!!!!). Only the 20 could chew through the glue.
Anyway - after the scuffing, I rolled on a couple layers of Rustoleum's 'clean metal primer'. That was followed with three layers of Rustoleum paint (gray on top, blue on bottom).
The time consuming parts are on the ends. Prep work at the beginning takes forever, but you have to get off any loose paint or it'll just flake off taking your new paint with it. The detail work at the end was also time consuming. I painted all the exposed metal trim black (hinges, latch, bellyband), I also painted all the old external window seals with black spray vinyl (which I REALLY recommend if yours have gotten gray and cruddy looking - but still serve their function nicely). The external aluminum window frames were also painted with silver paint (easier than polishing up the aluminum).
I've posted photos of all the work in an earlier thread.
Mike
watters
Linear Mode
