Campout #2 England Reunion

For those of you that have been waiting for a campout blog here it is. It is not the first campout by any means but it is the first one I remembered to take a camera. Taking the camera is one thing, but remembering to use it is another. Unfortunately I missed many of the family that attended. All of our children, spouses and grand children attended the campout and we should have had such great pictures to show you, but alas I didn't think to get the camera out of the trailer. We had a great time and enjoyed the family a lot. Unfortunately most of the family had gone because of cold weather prior to taking pictures. Here we are with three of our Grand children, Jacom, the tall good looking oneMe and Louise, Eliza, and Adelaide.

This picture is of our camping area. What a great site for a campout. Unfortunately I didn't have the camera when the Moose walked into camp. This picture has Teresa our daughter and Melissa who is married to our Son Joseph, and Evan who is married to our Daughter Holly.

Here is a night shot of the teardrop trailer. You can see we were setting up in a wind storm and never did get the tent set up correctly. The trailer was better than we ever imagined it would be and we slept warmer than we expected.

This picture has our daughters Holly and Teresa and our daughter in Law Melissa. It takes a lot of work to feed a large group and they worked their heads off to get it done. Our Older Daughter Mandi didn't get here until late as she was at a training event in Seattle. The Teardrop kitchen really came in handy for cooking, storage, and clean up. Having the little dressing and bathroom tent was a great up grade from our last trip.

Here are three of our six beautiful grand daughters. Adelaide out in fromt just took the broom from Eliza in the back. The Blonde in the middle is Mandi's youngest Micklee.

Some great shots of the camp ground and the Teardrop. We want to thank the Wilkinson's for letting us use this great camp. Louise was doing a little last minute pick up around the camp. It was really nice to have the lights in the kitchen. It gave us all the lighting we needed to work. I'm not sure if we got out the flash lights at all.

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WE ARE DONE! Well not quite, but we are done enough to start using the trailer. We are going to register it tomorrow so we can start pulling it around. It will be nice to be able to bring it home from the shop and work on little things in the evenings.We installed the gas lifts this weekend. I guess it is better to be lucky than smart. Hit the installation perfectly the first try. Not bad for not having any instructions. We bought these from a company that had gone out of business and was liquidating inventory. They work great. We lift the lid about 12" and the lid slowly opens the rest of the way. It is easy to put down without any effort at all. They work better than we ever dreamed.

As you can tell we had to replace the leather straps on our trunk. The black genuine leather straps broke after the first weekend. We discovered in the small print that the genuine leather had some man made fibers. What it really had was a microscopic leather veneer with cardboard interior. We didn't buy "made in China" the second time. We also installed some sash locks to pull the lid down tight and keep it secure.

This is a side view showing how the trailer looks with the trunk complete.

We installed a lid stay so we could access the box without holding the lid up by hand. We also put in the battery tie downs so the battery doesn't bounce all over the place. This picture seems a little strange in it's color because the flash is bouncing.

Side view of the completed trailer.

This picture shows the fold down stabilizers. There are four, one for each corner. They will make it nice when the wind blows so you are not rocking all over the place.

This picture shows the undercarriage after it was all sealed with rubberized coating. We used this product so it would be easy to recoat when neccessary.

We have a few minor things to complete yet. Our punch list is as follows:

Complete the plumbing hook up to the pump.

Add a light in the trunk lid.

Insulate the ice chest in the front trunk

Complete the oven insulation and slide out

Clean the overspray off the roof vent

Putty, seal and weatherstrip the door frames

Not much to do as you can tell. A good morning for the both of us and we will have everything done.

Well for those who have been following our build, we hope to see you on the road somewhere. We will be happy to give you a closer view. We will be adding to this blog as we add things to the trailer and hope to put up blogs about our trips.

PS. We did get the trailer licensed on Monday. We pulled it over to purgatory flats and had it inspected. It was great on the road. It was funny how much smaller the trailer looked on the back of the truck. Got a few comments from people along the way. Quite frankly it is exciting to have the trailer this far along. It creates new enthusiasm to finish the minor details.

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This is not a new picture, but to our surprise others have been following our construction blog. It was nice that "Camping Earth" did a blog piece and encouraged others to check in on our progress. We gained most of our knowledge about these trailers from others on line and are more than willing to assist those who have questions. Mostly we wanted to answer a few questions that we didn't know had been asked.

First to "Cen". We cut our plywood panels with a jig saw. We cut the first side and then used it as the pattern for the second side. We then lined them up and screwed them together so that we could use a belt sander to even them up. We were very careful to cut slowly and stay on the outside of our line. This allowed us to sand to the line making two perfectly matched sides. It isn't rocket science though. If you make a mistake just take a little more off the pattern. No one will ever know.

To "Tim Outdoors" Thanks for the inquiry about our completion date. Thanksgiving through Christmas is our busy time. We don't really have time to work on our own stuff until the holidays are over. We are going to get it licensed before the first of the year. We have a short list of things we still want to do but none of them would keep us from using the trailer. We will put up pictures and dialog about the trip. Again thanks for your interest.

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We didn't work on the trailer much today because of other committments but we did get the hinge and straps on the front trunk

This completes the outside of the box and really everything that goes on the outside of the trailer. We have a few things underneath the trailer that need to be completed.

This is a close up of the buckles we made from belts. I've looked at this trunk a number of times while putting it together, but looking at the picture I realized I left out a screw.

Goodwin Mill and Cabinets

We built this game table to show in "The What Women Want" convention. It was a real hit. A guy in Vegas wants one only larger. It looks like the person who gets this one lives in St. George. It is made of mahogany with maple squares in the surface.

A close up of the table and Chess pieces. We turned the chess pieces on our lathe.

You might remember the table we had like this in our show room. We sold it and have now built us a new table. We sell it in the colors we show on the chairs in addition to a dark green and a mahogany color like the seats. W e had a lady in the other day that liked the table but she wanted the stools to be all different in color.

We have this kitchen island for sale. We built it for the convention also but didn't sell it. It comes in all the table colors as well. We have a guy in Los Vegas that wants a larger one. Grampa is trying to figure out how to remodel his house so he can have it.

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WE DID IT? We covered the top with Durabak truck liner. It was messy and we didn't do the most professional job but it looks pretty nice. We also dicovered it is pretty forgiving. We were able to cut off some bad spots and touch it up. Over all we are pretty happy with the results. We are going to hinge the front trunk next and weather strip it and put buckles to keep it closed. This will allow us to mount the battery permantly and hook it up.

Side view gives you a pretty good idea of how the trailer looks. Sorry about the mess at the shop. We had a storm that blew sawdust out of the bins and then rained on it.

Rear view shows the rear trunk all completed. We let the durabak dry over the weekend and then weather stripped the inside. We have a short list of things to complete but are close enough to get it licensed.

We pulled it the other day and it tracks very nicely. We are getting excited to go on a trip. Our timing is off though. Winter camping is not our best thing.

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We did get a few more things done this week. We completed the trim on the other side of the trailer and put the finish Automotive lacquer on the two sides. It is a relief to have the trim done as it took a while to do. We only have small things to do now until we get ready to spray the roof.

This is a view of the back and the trim that covers the trailer frame. It cleaned up the look of the back pretty well.

The Matress fits into the sleeping compartment perfectly. Fern made a cover for the matress so it would remain clean. It is really going to be comfortable.

Folding the matress back exposes the carpet we layed. It really gave the compartment a finished look. We still have some tacking to but it is in and looks good.

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We have one side of the trailer all trimmed out and locked up. The Automotive finish has not been applied yet so you can see spots on the finish where we have been sanding and doing touch up. They will disappear when the final coat is applied.

This view shows the storage box on the front of the trailer where we will store the battery, ice box, and other stuff. Kent curved the lid. As you can see the vents have been installed and the patching of screw holes has begun.

Another view of the front box. We have been trying to find a place we can use this plastic hinge we purchased but it just doesn't work.

Here is a view of the inside lock after it was installed. We have both doors on and trimmed. We can lock up the trailer now.

Here is a close up of the door lock. you can see the rope molding detail on the side of the trailer.

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Labor day provided an extra day to work on the trailer and we got quite a bit done. As you can see we got started on the box for the front of the trailer. it will be covered with Rhino liner to blend in with the top.

This is a front view of the box. The battery will go in the right section. There is enough room to stack two batteries if we decide to get another one. The center section will get the ice coolers for the air conditioning, and the left section will hold a propane bottle or other stuff we need to haul.

We cut in the stove and that required cutting into the sleeping compartment by about a quarter inch. This picture shows the removable cover.

This is how the oven and cooktop look set into the counter. It will be attached to sliders so you can pull it out for cooking.

Kent got one of the doors hung today. This is a view from the inside. We actually have the locking handle on the door but it was done after the picture shoot.

This is how the door looks from the outside. We haven't put the glass in the frame yet but will do that during the week.

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Here are some pictures of some of the things we did on the trailer today. First off we insulated the roof and completed the skin on the roof. We also fastened the roof fan in place after applying some water proof mastic.






You can see in the second picture the front of the trailer. You will notice the little black square and the white pipe. That is the fan and air inlet for our cooler. When we get the box on the front it will have a space for ice. The fan blows air into the ice chest and up through the pipe and into the trailer. it is supposed to cool the room up to 30 degrees.




Next is the DVD player. It is wired up and working now. It hangs in the little tray on the door and can be tilted to the proper viewing angle. You can see the 12 volt outlet in the ceiling. It can work off the trailer battery or the DVD battery.






The next picture shows the front of the cooling system. The large grill on the right is the outlet fan, and the grill on the left is the inlet. In the middle is the switch to turn it on or off.





The last picture shows the plumbing for the sink. The water drains out the bottom of the trailer to a bucket for disposal. We will be working on the trailer again on labor day which is monday. Kent will be working on the doors while I try to complete everything in the hatch.

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We had a lot of fun this weekend working on the trailer. (Friday and Saturday) It may not show but we got a lot done. Not as much as we hoped but good stuff. First of all we ran the wiring for the side markers, side lights, and tail lights. This then made it possible to glue on the veneer siding. It really went on well. With that in place we received the fenders last week so we painted and installed them. It really gives the trailer a solid look to have them in place. The color of the siding and the accents will be like the inside of the sleeping area. Cinnamon sugar paneling black burnout trim. You can see on this picture that we have installed the shore inlet so that we can have 110 volt power in the trailer. Over the next few weeks I believe we will make a good showing on the outside and it is going to be good.

Our main objective this weekend was to get the wiring done, and we did. It was hecktic and we had to do trial and error but we figured it out. It was fun when we plugged it in and all the lights came on. Even funner when the lights running off the battery came on. We installed the heater and hooked it up and also installed the outlet where our DVD player will fit. It feels so good to have this done. We can now get on with the wood stuff that we understand.

This next picture shows the power converter installed in the galley. We wanted it readily accessable and it needs ventilation.

The tail lights are working but we are not ready to install the hatch quite yet.