Journey with Confidence RV GPS App RV Trip Planner RV LIFE Campground Reviews RV Maintenance Take a Speed Test Free 7 Day Trial ×
RV Trip Planning Discussions

Go Back   iRV2 Forums > iRV2.com COMMUNITY FORUMS > Vintage RV's
Click Here to Login
Join iRV2 Today

Mission Statement: Supporting thoughtful exchange of knowledge, values and experience among RV enthusiasts.
Reply
  This discussion is proudly sponsored by:
Please support our sponsors and let them know you heard about their products on iRV2
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread Display Modes
 
Old 09-24-2014, 07:13 PM   #127
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Snowbird - Waterford Mi and Citrus Springs Fl.
Posts: 3,609
Like he doesn't already have enough on his plate....
__________________
1997 37' HR Endeavor, 275hp Cat, Freightliner
03 CR-V Blue Ox, Ready Brake
ahicks is offline   Reply With Quote
Join the #1 RV Forum Today - It's Totally Free!

iRV2.com RV Community - Are you about to start a new improvement on your RV or need some help with some maintenance? Do you need advice on what products to buy? Or maybe you can give others some advice? No matter where you fit in you'll find that iRV2 is a great community to join. Best of all it's totally FREE!

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest so you have limited access to our community. Please take the time to register and you will gain a lot of great new features including; the ability to participate in discussions, network with other RV owners, see fewer ads, upload photographs, create an RV blog, send private messages and so much, much more!

Old 09-24-2014, 07:43 PM   #128
Senior Member
 
Fleetwood Owners Club
Freightliner Owners Club
Spartan Chassis
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: FORT WORTH, TEXAS
Posts: 2,746
When you do the gluing I recommend you do a little research on vacuum bagging. This applies a good even pressure to your panels and is not that hard to do. I use to do it working on F-35 aircraft. You don't need anything fancy just a big piece of plastic drop cloth some putty to make a seal, the round rope works great. and a vacuum pump. You will need a couple of pieces of felt or other non compressible porous material for the ends of your tubes.
Do a little search on Google and you will find more info. This will give a good clamp up of your parts.
Bill
__________________
2008 Newmar Mountain Aire
450 HP Cummins ISM 4000MH Allison Trans.
Towing a 2014 Honda CRV with a Blue Ox tow bar.
WILDEBILL308 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-25-2014, 08:18 AM   #129
Member
 
Wild Irish's Avatar
 
Gulf Streamers Club
Join Date: Sep 2013
Location: NW Oregon
Posts: 70
OK now that I see a picture (worth a thousand words) I see that all my suggestions are totally wrong! Your underlying structure is completely different than my old Pig's framework. Your plan to build the entire wall on the floor and then lift it into place sounds like the winning plan. I agree with Wildebill308 that vacuum bagging might be the best way to go to get a really good bond of the wall materials. I do dissagree with you on your opinion of why the skins get bubbles and wrinkles, as I have some experience with that problem. The actual structure of a motor home doesn't move around as much as you may think, but heating and cooling will expand and contract the skin, and if the glue that bonds it to the luan lets go, or didn't bond when laminated, you will get wrinkles and bubbles , especially when the sun hits it and warms it up. Most of the older MH's that have bubbly areas have delaminated and rotted luan due to moisture incursion behind the filon. If you have the right contact cement (made for motor homes) and get a good initial bond by using a pressure roller all over the surface, or vacuum bagging, it will never flex enough to wrinkle unless you do something really bad to your rig. I truly admire your ambition, and hope all goes well on your project...you will cherish your MH all the more after putting all that work into it, and you will know what you have after it's done.
__________________
I said "I'll own a motor home when pigs fly"...Well I now own the "pig", and love it!
Wild Irish is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-27-2014, 02:35 PM   #130
Senior Member
 
Piker's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,707
Got the motor out today.... Here's a link to the thread with some pics if anyone is interested.

Need to spend some time thinking now... whether to move forward with a test run on building the new side panels or not. It's about a $700 loss to build one panel if it doesn't work out... which I guess isn't a whole lot to see if I can recover from the 20k we have into this thing so far.

Sure has been a rough old haul with this thing... but I just keep trying to look forward instead of backward, and even though it's been hard, I sure have learned a lot about myself... and the man upstairs... through all this. Regardless how this turns out, good has come from it.

cheers
__________________
1994 Holiday Rambler Endeavor LE
6BT Cummins -Rebuild Thread Here-
-Exterior Renovation Thread Here-
Piker is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-27-2014, 06:37 PM   #131
Senior Member
 
Fleetwood Owners Club
Freightliner Owners Club
Spartan Chassis
Join Date: Nov 2009
Location: FORT WORTH, TEXAS
Posts: 2,746
I would make a small test piece and vacuum bag it to get the feel of how it works. Earlier you were talking about worry that the rivets would pull through. I may be wrong but isn't where the rivets are installed comen to the metal frame?
Bill
__________________
2008 Newmar Mountain Aire
450 HP Cummins ISM 4000MH Allison Trans.
Towing a 2014 Honda CRV with a Blue Ox tow bar.
WILDEBILL308 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-27-2014, 06:45 PM   #132
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Snowbird - Waterford Mi and Citrus Springs Fl.
Posts: 3,609
Frame above the floors is alum. Also, regarding anyone with doubts regarding the rivets and Filon, note the later HR product is constructed/assembled identical to this one, with the exception of the alum skin. The newer stuff is 'glass.
__________________
1997 37' HR Endeavor, 275hp Cat, Freightliner
03 CR-V Blue Ox, Ready Brake
ahicks is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-27-2014, 08:44 PM   #133
Senior Member
 
Piker's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,707
Quote:
Originally Posted by ahicks View Post
Frame above the floors is alum. Also, regarding anyone with doubts regarding the rivets and Filon, note the later HR product is constructed/assembled identical to this one, with the exception of the alum skin. The newer stuff is 'glass.
I just have so little experience with this kind of thing, and I really want to be sure I would be doing this right. If I can get the same results with Filon as I can get with Aluminum... then I'd go with the filon as it would save me almost $700 on material... plus, I don't think I would have to paint it? (this would save hundreds more $$ and tons of work.) The stuff here is "polar white gelcoat."

I don't really want to try and glue new panels to the frame. I think that's problematic at best. I will need to tuck the new panels underneath the fiberglass molded front and rear end of the rv... making it difficult to glue. I would rather just stick with riveting... even if I had to use a few more than with the aluminum.

The downsides (that I know about) with the filon is that it would cost $200 more to "test" as it only comes in 8' wide rolls...the up side of that is that if it works, I've got enough filon to finish one whole side instead of half. It also cracks or tears if you handle it wrong? I'm worried about the way in which I would have to suspend the filon over the luan before I laminate it. Seems like it would tear easily... although at 8' wide, it's got an extra 3" per side that I could use to grab it with something... and then cut off later.

Actually, the extra 3" per side is also attractive cause I wouldn't have to worry so much about getting the filon lined up EXACTLY over the top of the luan for the entire 32' length...

Also, if I could come up with a good process, I could recover the entire wall with just 1 panel, and do away with the seam that runs lengthwise half way up the exterior wall. That is an attractive idea... but I'm not sure how I'd handle a 7' x 32' panel? Might be heavy... and unwieldy.

I dunno. Lots to think about here.

Thanks so much everyone for the input.

-cheers
__________________
1994 Holiday Rambler Endeavor LE
6BT Cummins -Rebuild Thread Here-
-Exterior Renovation Thread Here-
Piker is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-28-2014, 06:22 AM   #134
Senior Member
 
Daveinet's Avatar
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Location: Chicago Area
Posts: 1,288
Handling the large panel is easy. Invest in the suction cup handles used by glass installers. Loop several ropes to the rafters of your garage. Loop the rope to the handles and lift it up and swing it on.
__________________
2004 AllegroBay 34XB Nov 2017 Banks, Front & Rear Trac bars, Konis
Sold:'83 Revcon Prince 31' FWD GM Performance 502 w/Edelbrock MPFI, Thorley Tri-Ys & Magnaflows, 4L85E 4 spd. Tested to exceed 100 mph.
Daveinet is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-28-2014, 06:45 AM   #135
Senior Member
 
Piker's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,707
Quote:
Originally Posted by Daveinet View Post
Handling the large panel is easy. Invest in the suction cup handles used by glass installers. Loop several ropes to the rafters of your garage. Loop the rope to the handles and lift it up and swing it on.
Suction cups... that's it!! I had theorized about pulling the panel up with ropes and pulleys off of the rafters... but I never thought about suction cups. What a great and simple idea. Thanks!

-cheers
__________________
1994 Holiday Rambler Endeavor LE
6BT Cummins -Rebuild Thread Here-
-Exterior Renovation Thread Here-
Piker is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-04-2014, 01:53 AM   #136
Senior Member
 
Piker's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,707
Thanks

I posted this in my engine thread, but thought I should put it here too since different people might follow each thread:

Well... it looks like we're going to close this chapter in our life. My wife has developed an incurable chronic illness over the last few years, and despite our attempts to find medical relief, she is still plagued with it. We've decided that it would be best for her and for myself and for our 2 girls that she quit her job of 17 years. This of course will reduce our expendable income... by a large margin, so we'll have to give some things up... the RV being one of them.

Now that colder weather is upon us, I don't think I'll worry about tearing anything else apart until spring, at which point, we'll start parting this out. We feel blessed to have experienced the travels we were able to enjoy - a 6000 mile tour of the west, and 2 trips to florida. We will remain forever grateful for those trips... and for the people we took with us... and also for those whom we met along the way. The cool thing is, we all just feel at peace with this... it's amazing what you can go through when the man upstairs has his hand in it.

So... with that... I just wanted to close this thread out properly with a "thank you" to the RV community here and across the map for being so supportive through this whole RV experience. I'm walking away from all this now, but you never know what's around the corner... Life can change in a moment, so I'll just tuck this dream away perhaps for another day... who knows.

thanks again.
-cheers
__________________
1994 Holiday Rambler Endeavor LE
6BT Cummins -Rebuild Thread Here-
-Exterior Renovation Thread Here-
Piker is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-04-2014, 01:56 PM   #137
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Apr 2011
Location: Mission Viejo, CA
Posts: 388
Best to you and your family
__________________
Bill Lynch
wblynch is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 01-17-2015, 03:21 PM   #138
Senior Member
 
Old Car Nut's Avatar
 
Country Coach Owners Club
Oklahoma Boomers Club
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Woodward, OK
Posts: 1,147
Just Delayed

One heck of a project. I hope you're able to get back to it. You have come so far.
Old Car Nut is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 01-17-2015, 03:47 PM   #139
Senior Member
 
Piker's Avatar
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 1,707
Quote:
Originally Posted by Old Car Nut View Post
One heck of a project. I hope you're able to get back to it. You have come so far.
Well, we decided last month that this was still something that we'd like to pursue. We're not exactly sure how it will all take shape, but we're hopeful someday this will have a good outcome. I was blessed with some serious overtime just before Christmas... working 220 hours in 3 weeks... this was enough to help jump start the engine rebuild, which anyone interested in can read about here

Right now, I'm trying not to think too hard about the siding project and just concentrate on the engine. Trying to take the whole project on at once can overwhelm me pretty quick, but looking at it like many small projects, one at a time, isn't so bad.

All for now... Thanks again for all the encouragement we've received from the members of this forum.

-Cheers
__________________
1994 Holiday Rambler Endeavor LE
6BT Cummins -Rebuild Thread Here-
-Exterior Renovation Thread Here-
Piker is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 01-17-2015, 07:21 PM   #140
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Snowbird - Waterford Mi and Citrus Springs Fl.
Posts: 3,609
The absolute biggest of the big projects are all done one piece at a time. Best of luck. -Al
__________________
1997 37' HR Endeavor, 275hp Cat, Freightliner
03 CR-V Blue Ox, Ready Brake
ahicks is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply



Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


» Featured Campgrounds

Reviews provided by


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 07:38 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.