Rucio's Winter Makeover

[WildBirder]

Hi Jen, Fantastic job so far. Thanks for all of the pics. My Boler has been hand painted and in my quest to find away to have the paint removed. (no place to do to myself) I found that boat yards will use a Soda Blaster on FG boats to remove paint but not harm the gelcoat. Have you tried the Soda blaster on the body anywhere? Was the clean up form it horrendous?

Cheers,
Mark

[jen b]

Mark, the beauty of the soda blaster is that it just blasts baking soda, which is totally harmless in the quantities we are blasting with.

We've just used it on the window frames so far - geez, never occurred to me to point that thing at the roof paint! But I can see how it would work. It's a really useful tool for cleaning up things that a sand blaster would damage.

When blasting the window frames we did the work outside, and it left just a little bit of soda laying on the ground (and between your teeth). No biggie.

Oh, and editing to add that they work best in dry conditions, which is to say that on a humid day, the nozzle gets clogged up.

[jen b]

The big moment of truth came today inre the longitudinal flange where the clamshell hulls are joined. Per the discussion on the "is this condensation?" thread, I decided to look hard at the possibility of just chopping that flange down instead of re-capping it with the U-shaped Trimlok.

So, further inspection today confirmed that the hulls are bonded together on the inside, so we expected that I would not end up with two half-burros upon cutting into it. The two flange bits of each side hull are not even glued together in any way - they're just kind of hanging out there not doing a lot. So off they came.

We used a Dremel cutting tool for the first rough cut, and then used the grinder to smooth that up a bit. Finally, hitting it all with the palm sander improved appearances quite a bit.

After that, we dumped a WHOLE BUNCH of fiberglass resin into the resulting gap between the outside hulls, and put some fiberglass cloth over that. Once that's dry, tomorrow, we'll start Bondo-ing over to smooth it all out. We'll end up with a bit of a ridge, but nothing like the flange-ridge. I'm happy with how it's going so far. I think for sure the structure is now stronger, not weaker. While my dad was up on the ladder attaching a strip of fiberglass cloth and resin to the roof, I heard him exclaiming, "this thing ain't never coming apart!"

So to anybody else who's eyed up that Trimlok and the flangey thing underneath, you have my blessing to get rid of that whole mess.

Oh, and funny thing about this trailer. I am getting to know it pretty well by now, and have decided that at the Burro factory circa 1980, careful attention to detail was just not the name of the game. The two halves are joined together a bit willy-nilly. In places on the roof, one side is higher than the other. It did require some care when we went after it with the Dremel because of the crookedness.

Ok, pictures.

1 Starting to chop.
2 Flange-less back side
3 Front with flange,
4 Front without flange.

[cpaharley2008]

Gee,
If we could just lose weight that easy.

[jen b]

1 A view of the front of the trailer, from the side. Flangeless below the window.
2 More chopping on the roof. You can see how not-connected the two flange things are.

3 Roof after some grinding.

4 Roof after smoothing up with palm sander.

[jen b]

Give me coveralls and a Dremel, and I'm MAD WITH POWER. mwaaaahahahaha.

[DannyH]

Jen, great work and pictures. I can't wait to see that silver paint and like the interior cabinet work. I had the same thing happen with an uneven body when I rebuilt mine. Most people don't notice it, but the back left is about half and inch lower than the right. I didn't see it until I had it all put together, but I sure see it now. If I end up with another restore in the future I'll find out more on the soda blaster, it sounds like fun

[h.mike]

Jen: Do you recall which HF soda blaster you used? Also did it require a separate compressor? Kind of basic questions but I really like the idea of soda blasting. thanks Mike

[Carol H]

Jen, its looking GOOD! You go girl!
When your finished can I borrow your Dad and Uncle - I only have a few things I would like to change on the trailer

[jen b]

Carol, I think he'd fire me if I did that!

I frequently call and start conversations with "hey Dad, I have another idea!" and it usually involves some ridiculous amount of work but we also usually make it happen.

The other day I said, "hey Dad, I have an really good idea! You know how the floor space is really small? Well, what if we made a slideout! Wouldn't that be awesome?" and he just kind of ignored me.

[jen b]

Originally Posted by h.mike

Jen: Do you recall which HF soda blaster you used? Also did it require a separate compressor? Kind of basic questions but I really like the idea of soda blasting. thanks Mike

Sorry, missed this earlier! I don't entirely recall, but it was the model in the neighborhood of a hundred dollars? And it does require an air compressor. You have to do some assembly out of the box but it's not too bad.

[jen b]

More photos....

1 what the rear used-to-be-a-flange is looking like

2 the top, not yet Bondo-ed

3 interior

4 exterior


I am pretty happy about the de-flangification. I realized that the two outer hulls are held together with about a 3-inch strip of fiberglass cloth-n-resin from the inside, which certainly is strong enough. But now we've made it a whole fiberglass sandwich by adding the 6-inch strip to the outside.

Getting closer to being ready for paint, maybe another month or so.

[Pat B Ohio]

WOW! Every time I look here there is another cool mod. Do you think I could deflange my Uhaul? That would open up my paint options......
We bow to you Lady of the Grinder.

[jen b]

Pat, thusly with my bopping you on the head with my Lady of the Grinder Bondo Wand, you may proceed...

It really is not difficult as long as you're feeling confident with the fiberglass patching methods.

It's a reasonable guess to say that the UHaul probably has a pretty similar interior binding-together of the outer hulls, so I don't see why it would not work. Like we're going to have with the Burro, you'd end up with a faint remaining ridgeline, but to me that's no big deal. It's more than worth having the additional rainproofing and structural stability.

Thanks to Donna for planting the idea in my head!

[DannyH]

Lookin good. That last image reminds me of a cow trailer paint job. I can't wait to see the finished silver/grey.

[rabbit]

Wonderful foto-documentation, Jen! I'd rather do the documentation than do the doing of, that's for certain. Don't envy you the glass work. Maybe the five yrs. I spent in the "itching game" when younger put me off it permanently. But believe me, I DO understand, as does every fiberglass and body shop mechanic.

jack

[jen b]

jack, since my day job involves sitting at a desk pushing emails and ideas around, this is terrific fun for me despite the dust and mess. I'm having a ball, but I can see how it would get a bit old if I had to do this all the time on other people's stuff.

Another thing I have decided: NO MORE ADHESIVE PRODUCTS! No more than strictly necessary, anyway. After many hours with the heat gun and scraper and scraping and sanding sticky residue, I would shake my fist at 3M if only I could lift it.

[ThomasE]

Looks a whole lot nicer without that flange. All these fiberglass trailers should come that way, without any vertical flange, belly band etc... Guess it's too much work for the manufacturers to remove and finish.

[Raz]

Quite the project. Like Jim, I envy the space. With the windows out, door off, ect. have you given any thought to lifting the shell off the frame, sliding the frame out from under and painting it. The shell will never be any lighter. Raz

[cpaharley2008]

And do not forget to Soda blast...Heck, you will have a new camper by then.