Andy the 57 Westerner Restoration Thread

Holy cow, Rod! Andy is going to be totally handsome when he's done. Good work!

Rod

This project is nothing like I have ever tried. Needless to say, it felt and continues to feel intimidating and at times daunting.
Here is some Restoration:

I started at the curbside rear radius and rebuilt that. (radius rotted)

Radius - 3 pieces removed.
 

(skirtboard was broken in three pieces) It came apart when I took out the nails holding it on the trailer. It  had a big knot in it and it split there.



Notice also the peeling linoleum. That would later be removed from the original floor before cutting and inserting a new piece of plywood floor.

I made templates from the original pieces and learned to use the Harbor Freight pocket hole jig. The storage compartment floor needed replacing. I measured back about 21” and cut the floor and replaced the rear section. Wood for new sills was bought. I used a nice clear Fir- gorgeous strong wood.

Andy’s wood paneling runs down to the bottom of the sill and is sandwiched between the sill board and the skirtboard. Much of that was rotted away, so I had to cut a piece of oak paneling to become a spacer. The goal is not to exceed the original width of the trailer.

(shows skirtboard above wheel removed)
 

(skirt board added)



 I used a piece of cardboard to size my spacer as seen here. I figured it was easier to mess up on a piece of cardboard than on a piece of paneling. This became my template for cutting the paneling spacer.


The horizontal skirt board above the wheel will be trimmed once the skin gets put back on. Then it is marked with a pencil and trimmed.


Clamp your wood.


Radius clamped.
 


The clamps were used to mark the points at which I would drill out the holes for the pocket jig as well as stabilize the wood for drilling. Here is the final product. 



The storage door was not mounted when I bought Andy. It had been removed and left in the inside. The frame for the storage door was all bent and I straightened it out. It now fits snugly but awaits an internal wooden frame on the inside.

I would later find out that even though templates can work, they only work, if the original piece of wood was cut correctly. For example: The sills I measured were 2 7/8” tall, which I remember at the time thinking, “ Gee, that’s a weird dimension… “ Well, it turns out, the C- Channel of the frame is 3” tall. Now, after replacing that sill, it’s 1/8” less. I decided to leave it rather than go and redrill and rescrew everything for 1/8”. This all becomes very apparent when you rebuild the radius.

Along the way, I bought some used vintage levelers. 



I got the rear floor in and screwed down. I sealed the gap with silicone. I don’t know if that was the right thing to do, but it’s done, now. I was going to put plywood over the seam below the trailer floor where the seam was. This was how it was constructed originally.  

Coated plywood piece covers the floor seam underneath.


The rear street side radius was a plague. I removed the pieces and then started to plan ahead. This is where I got stuck – mired in planning and what-if’s. The street side wall has a bulge in it. The image doesn’t show the bowing out of the studs from top to bottom, but it bows out significantly.

(kitchenette in trailer) The image below shows the kitchen still intact, but was pulled to the wall and that caused the countertop to list outward.



 I removed the kitchen with a little help from my son…

The street side wall also appears to be sagging as well. The sills are short by ½”(measuring only 2 ½”) at the front side of the wheel well. That means the left side of the trailer is shorter than the right side. Also, the front outriggers on both sides are bending downward augmenting the drop. In the image below, you can see the drooping floor as which has created another problem with the front edge of the floor.

So, all this is going on with the street side wall. I went through hours of deliberation trying to figure out what to do first. Weeks and months drifted by. I pulled the skins off completely hoping to find what was causing the bulge.
Paneling has warped from water damage and the studs bulged outward. The marriage of warped paneling and bent studs were creating the bulge. I was convinced no strapping or jacking was going to help this wall. I would have to replace the paneling, and the studs – essentially rebuilding the wall. Not to mention, some of the horizontal wall supports were twisting. Many of the butt joints were poor and had gaps as much as 3/8”. 

Then, I had to figure out how to repair the wall without taking it off. I don’t have the space to remove the wall and work on it. It’s just not there – no workshop, and no garage. Andy sits outside on my small driveway with no cover except the shade of a magnificent maple tree.

Somewhere along the way, I built a ceiling support.



Before I decided to go forward with mitigating the frame issues, I was working to raise the street side wall. Below you can see how I did it with a floor jack. I found some scrap wood to insert into the gaps. If I hadn’t decided to move forward with the frame issues, then I would have customized the sill by making it higher in front because the difference in height to level out the floor was greater there because of the sagging outrigger. The blocks did level out the floor pretty well.


Blue arrow shows the gap between the sill and the outrigger, once the wall was lifted. Notice also that the front floor edge is warped – another floor issue.




The gap was @ 5/8"
 

 
Rear of front sill near wheel well. The small piece of wood is the scrap wood filling the gap once the wall was lifted.



 
So, that’s the latest. Well sort of. I am currently working on reinforcing the body to be removed from the frame. That will take a few days, then I will report in.

Cheers,

Rod

  

Hi Dan,

I am looking forward to sharing how I lifted the body. I am using some of Rin Tin's technique with some variations. I didn't get as much done today as I would have liked. Still working on supporting the body.

Cheers,

Rod

Way to go Rod. It's great reading all of your postings since you joined and being able to see the skills, confidence, and know how you've gained from all of the questions you have asked.

Like a pro!

Hi!

Yesterday, we rolled the up the roof. I believe the biggest help was that I had run a narrow strip of wood across the front part of the roof edge.  We first watched Larry's how-to video on rolling up your roof. 



We  had to restart once because the roof started to drop off the back.  So, I went to the back and pushed up the roof while my son, Nik, held on to the roll. 



Make sure to keep things even and clamp after the first rotation.  We used three clamps per side.



We decided to roll off the back because of the downslope that goes to the rear on these Westerners.




The roof isn't really heavy, it's more cumbersome than anything. You can see the placement of the three clamps in the image below. As on the front edge, I had run a narrow wood strip along the rear edge of the roof edge as seen in this image below attaching the wood strip with screws.  I think it helped a lot by stiffening the roof edge.


Look Ma!




Then we strapped it and I will eventually tip it up and cram it in my ever-getting-smaller carport. I first strapped it across the middle, and then added the two others and finally removed the strap in the middle.






Here is Andy without the roof and Andy's tiny helpers.


Here is the topside of the ceiling.  Not to bad, really, except for some dipping and minimal rot around the vent hole and a really annoying dip just above the corner of the upper kitchen cabinet. Then, there were the silly lime green screws along each rafter, for some unknown reason. Most of those had been removed by the time I took the picture, but you can see some on the peripheral rafters.



I cleaned up most of the aluminum particles that were strewn across the tops of the roof panels. Here is a close up of them.


Here is the underside of the roof vent hole.  Buzz got stuck in a small hole next to the vent hole.

Cheers.

Rod

Rod,

Finally getting caught up on internet activity while out camping. Your progress is impressive. Amazing what you can do when you plan ahead, and do your homework. Your confidence has to be sky high. Will be anxious to see when you get the frame off. I know you want to check out the front frame issue. Nice job posting your progress for others to follow. I'm toasting you right now from Torch Lake, Michigan. Way to go Westerner bro!

Dan