Restoring a tin tent trailer, part 7

Hello, and welcome to my page!

This is part 7 in my on-going series on rebuilding my old camper trailer. These little trailers are sometimes referred to as a "canned ham" trailer because of their shape. I like to refer to it as my "tin tent" trailer because it's not really much bigger than a large camping tent.

I ended my last post in this series with a few photos of the interior floor supports that I had put in, and a picture of the back end of the trailer from the outside.
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At this point, I started fitting the aluminum skin back on the trailer. The upper empty space on the back of the trailer had a large window in it when I bought the trailer. The window was not original to the trailer as built, there may have been a window on the back, but it would have been smaller than the one that had been put in when I got the trailer. I decided to rebuild the back without any window in it, it's one less leak potential on what is essentially part of the roof of the trailer.
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The best piece of the aluminum skin from the back of the trailer was the bottom section, it didn't have any big holes it it. The only problem with using that piece of the skin was that it didn't have the lap seam joint on the bottom of the sheet. I decided to attempt to bend the seam joint on the bottom edge of the sheet to make it easier to use on the back of the trailer to cover the area where the window had been, and to fit the next lower piece of aluminum skin properly.

I set the piece of aluminum skin on my outdoor work table and clamped a 2X3 in place on it to use to form the first bend necessary to make the seam. I folded up the seam using a hammer and a piece of 2X4 to bend the aluminum across the length of the seam.
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I used my 6 foot long straight edge as a backing to finish bending the seam.
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When I was done with the bending, I had an acceptable lap seam on the piece to fit the top of the next lower piece into.
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After getting that process finished, it was time to fit the piece to the back of the trailer.
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After getting that piece fitted, I had to find another piece of aluminum to make the next lower piece of skin for the back. I had a piece that I had taken off the trailer, but it had some larger holes in it, so I didn't want to use it for that area, so I had to come up with a different solution. That will be the subject of the next post in this series.

That's all I have for this post, thanks for stopping by to check it out!

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13 comments
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arent you worried about ventilation?

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Well, I have a roof hatch, a window on each side, and 2 windows in the front, so I think I have enough windows. :-)

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oh. nevermind then...

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And, here i thought you were talking about the hole that is still the back of the trailer ^_^

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I cant wait til the inside, thats always my fave bit to.do.

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I'm still so fare away from starting on the interior...
I'm not sure what I'm going to put in other than a bed shelf in the back. I have a camper stove that I could put in, and I would like to put in seats and a small table in the front, but space is pretty limited inside, so I'm really going to have to plan carefully for the things that I might want to put on the inside.

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It is definitely about storage solutions and very clever uses of space. We have done up the inside of a couple of caravans as well as a horse box a mobile library and a bus. I really want to do a new one because I think this time we could spend a little bit more money and do a very clever interior that is not just made out of scrap like we used to do it when we were much much poorer.

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I certainly know the feeling of doing the best you can with the materials available to you. I've built a lot of things that way in the past.

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Wow you always have so many different projects going on at once.

Are you planning on taking that thing out on the road eventually or are you just going to sell it once it's all done?

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I'm planning on using it after I get it put back together, hopefully at least once this fall. I bought this one because I can pull it with a small truck or mid size car.

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@amberyooper You have received a 100% upvote from @steemguardian because this post did not use any bidbots and you have not used bidbots in the last 30 days!

Upvoting this comment will help keep this service running.

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Watched this video and now want to slap some base lines.
I've only bowed a base... and not an electric one.

But, in a band, a base usually is just playing ... what i think of as boring repetition.

I was wondering if you have suggestions
if i want to get started.

And, i still can't understand a guitar.

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You're pretty much correct about the repetitive nature of playing the bass, you mostly just play a pattern of notes for a song, and sometimes you just use the same note repeatedly until the chord change on some songs.
I suppose the first thing you have to do is get your hands on a bass guitar. It's easy enough to learn where the notes are, that would be the first step in learning how to play.

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