Vintage trailer Restoration - The End

So we went camping again with our Ramblin Rose and this time I remembered my good camera.

She is a gem to camp with.

It's so nice to have everything we need, games, cooking supplies, bedding, chairs, first aid etc.

Before, I always would to forget to pack things camping such as, paper towels, knives etc.

Rosie keeps everything we need... except for my good camera hehe.

So this is our finished project!

Our 1957 Honorbuilt Romer.

It took us 5 months to complete, which I must say, is pretty good time.

One of my husbands friends was over and was a little confused as to why

our camper is done up so girly. He kind of thought we should have

used greens and browns and more manly colors in our color scheme.

Greens and browns?!?!!? Gah!

I told him there were two reasons we didn't use "more manly colors".

#1. I bought the paint.

#2. This camper is a woman. "How do you know it's a woman?" he asked.

"Just look at her curves!"I replied with indignation.

He couldn't argue with that.

And truly she would have looked so out of character if she was done up in greens and browns.

I just know she wouldn't be happy about it.

She would probably give us all kinds of trouble instead of being the delightful little gem she is.

Greens and browns! Really, some people have no vision.

I talk like this trailer has a personality. To me she does. 

She and I have spent so much time together we've gotten to know each other.

Like the author of a book knows about the characters they write,

each has it's own personality. It is built in with them.

And you can try, but you cannot change that personality.

If you try and force a change... It just won't work.

That's how I feel about Ramblin Rose.

She told me what color she wanted to be painted.

When I was out shopping her voice would pick my brain and say things like,

"That would be perfect fabric for my windows." or "Oh! Look at that cute potato peeler!"

She wasn't super excited for the diamond plating on her front, because it may have been a little too industrial looking. But she became resigned to it because it was sparkly and shiny,

it would protect her paint and it had the word "diamond" in it.

This is who she is. A sassy, classy, darling of a lady.

And so ladies and gents, I present to you...

Ramblin Rose

There will be A LOT of pictures in this post and I will just write a sentence or two  above the pictures to explain things. But I promise not to ramble on (pun on Ramblin Rose's name ha!).

A picture is worth a thousand words, so I will just let them do most of the talking here ;-)

This is a reproduction I did of an original sticker that was on the front of the trailer.

My hubs very carefully peeled off the cracked & faded original one (he did it before I could get a picture of it, dang it!) and I scanned it into the computer. Then I had to play with it, color in the cracks, and reshape somethings until I was satisfied.

If you are in the trailer restoration biz and would like a sticker like this for your lady

send me an email, I would be happy to hook you up.

I made a few other stickers with her name for the sides and back.

Our Rosie has some pretty bad-to-the-bone body art haha!

Here is the view as you walk in the door.

Above the oven is a propane lantern that is original to the trailer that we will use

if we need bright light inside.

I secured those cute plates to the wall with command velcro strips,

and they have held on perfectly.

Electricity, always a conundrum in these old girls.

We decided we didn't want to worry about electricity, power sources and what-not so we

pulled out the old, bulky light fixtures, covered up the hole with a little wooden disk and stuck one of those battery powered push lights in their place.

These are not bright lights but for basic, teeth brushing

and pajama finding these little push lights are fine.

The icebox holds a lot of stuff, but sadly,

despite the numerous layers of styrofoam insulation I put around it the ice box

does not keep in the cold very well.

Things stay cold enough, but I have to watch it, and I freeze as many food items as possible before we go. Then we put in a milk jug and soda bottle that are full of frozen water on each level and things will stay cold for 2 or 3 days. So I guess thats really not too bad.

We were only were overnight camping here, so we didn't need a whole lot of food.

Sink, countertop, and oven. Rosie's water tank is almost 60 years old so we only use that water for washing dishes. I bring our own drinking water.

Also, I used the elastic looped through an eye hook method (explained later when I talk about how I hung my curtains) for securing the curtains on the top and bottom here so they wouldn't get in the way of cooking etc. Behind the stove is our salt and pepper shakers secured in a little crate with a cute, silk peony. All held in place with double sided velcro ;-)

The sink, icebox and oven are original to the trailer.

As well as the cabinets and drawers, but we did have to re-do the counter top.

Close up of above the stove.

Lets take a peek inside the cupboards.

The original cupboard hardware was still in great condition.

So I was able to re-use it. Lucky me!

I screwed some hooks into a thin board and then screwed it to the cupboard above to

hold our hot-chocolate mugs.

This long shelf holds my mixing bowels, kettle and pots and pans.

The little striped tin on the right hold the matches.

My kids love this, I cut out the match strike strip

and taped it to the bottom for easy match lighting.

This is one of the drawers, I found a few vintage place mats at a thrift store and

I cut them down to fit in the bottom.

My hubs complains that we have better knives here in our trailer then we do in the house, hehe.

Many of the utensils I got at the doller store or thrift shops, but I did splurge on knives.

I just hate slicing potatoes with a crappy knife.

But they weren't too costly either, I found the set for $6 at Ross. 

Here is where we eat and play

These vinyl benches and table are original to the trailer.

The table is a little wonky, but it works.

I love these cute little shelves above the table. We keep our books and games here.

We also keep bread and food that I don't want smashed up on the other side.

Our card games and chess pieces etc are kept in these tins that I found at thrift stores.

I painted them to match, but I should have done a clear top-coat because the paint is scratching.

It adds to the feel though right? *wink*

Here is where we replaced the wood panel on the ceiling.

We also replaced the ceiling-vent.

The curtains have to be one of my favorite things.

Here is a close up.

I should talk about how when we pulled out the windows the old aluminum trim surrounding them got ruined. So I replaced it with wood trim. This was a little pricey, but I like the look. 

I used little cafe rods to hang most of the curtains.

But on the curtains I couldn't find a cafe rod to fit I screwed in an eye hook and ran some elastic through them. This worked just as well as the cafe rods, and it's less expensive.

We need a place to keep our stuff.

This little closet is perfect.

It can hold a surprising amount of stuff.

Here is the back bench, this folds into a bed.

It only looks like a bench while we are driving and setting up.

The rest of the time we prefer it folded out into a bed.

Perfect for afternoon napping.

Lets go back to the outside.

In previous posts I talked about what paint we used and how we fixed some of the aluminum trim.

But I did not talk about Rosie's diamonds.

This diamond plating was a little expensive ($75 at Lowe's) but it's so shiny.

And it helps protect the front from rocks our car tires might throw back.

We've been asked by a few people if we replaced the tongue.

Nope, I painted it with some truck-bed-liner-spray-paint (can all those words be hyphenated?).

It took only about 30 minutes and it looks great.

The hubs figured out how to secure the propane tank on.

He used some steel "L" brackets that had holes in them and then wired the propane tank on.

I put extra weather-stripping around the front door.

We caulked around the windows with silicone.

Not just paintable caulk, but actual silicone because it is supposed to hold up really well.

The hubs kind of slapped it on since he didn't think you would be able to see it because it's clear.

But I wish he would have done a cleaner job since you can see it. 

You can't see it very well here,

but it is holding onto dirt so it will be more noticeable down the road.

I am happy to answer any questions that I did not already address here.

Post a comment or send me an email, you can see my email address on the side bar to the right.

Happy trails to you!

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Resources

How to instructions - The Complete Vintage Travel Trailer Restoration Website.

Supplies - Lowe's and our local Camper Repair Shop

More supplies - Vintage Trailer Supply