Trailer Talk Tuesday: Third Edition-Paint & Seams (1967 PlayMor)

Beautiful, isn't it?  I know, I know--but you have to see the potential, right?  So, here's what's been going on with Jolene, our 1967 Play-Mor camper that we are restoring.  

• finished removing the first layer of vinyl flooring--still have another layer (that I know of) on two-thirds of the floor, under the dinette and seating area.
• started stripping the exterior paint
• found the logo!
• started the process of removing the eternabond seal tape from the seams
• convinced myself that this project was a good idea.  really.  ;-)

So, here are some photos of the paint job on Jolene.  It appears the previous owner used latex paint, bless them, because it's coming off easy with the CitriStrip paint remover I like to use.  I wanted to get the majority of it off and then finish off with the wire wheel or a buffer.

Under this paint was:

the logo from the dealer!

I was excited to find the dealer's logo to the left of the back window.  This one came from Little's Camper Sales & Rentals in Tulsa, OK.  I love that the phone number doesn't have 3 digits for the first part of the exchange.  Instead, it's AD4-3740.  I'm going to try to save that logo or trace on top of it when we do the final paint job.

And under this paint was:

the Play-Mor logo!

I'm glad I went with a milder paint stripper and was able to recover these two logos.  I haven't decided yet how I am going to incorporate them into the exterior paint scheme, but they will both be part of Jolene's final look.  So, the paint issues seem to be fairly easy.  Just a lot of stripper application and scraping.  Now, on to the challenging part:

This lovely stuff is called EternaBond and if you want to seal a seam on a trailer roof, this stuff is AWESOME.  Because it's permanent.  And ugly.  And hard to remove.  And ugly (did I mention ugly?)

The white vinyl part is easy to remove with a heat gun; it just peels right off.  What is left behind is a thick layer of gray goo that is something like tar and whatever that sticky stuff was that attacked Mr. Incredible:

Goo remover and acetone did absolutely nothing.  The only thing that works is the the heat gun and you have to just scrape a little section at a time.  It is definitely an exercise in perseverance.  Or patience.  Or insanity.  Take your pick.

Trusty old heat gun wins again.

If When we get all the seams cleaned up and the paint removed, we're going to remove the metal pieces holding the sides together, apply putty tape and then replace the metal strips.  After that, we'll caulk and it should be like it was meant to be.  You'll see the pretty metal seams again, instead of the white tape, and it will definitely look more original.

The other fun thing we found this week was some water damaged wood that had been covered up by vinyl wallpaper and paint.  Fun times!

This section is the left of the front window.  They apparently used whatever wood they had hanging around to replace the rotten wood.  Behind this is the wiring, so, this is actually a blessing in disguise. The camper only has two lights:  one bulb over the sink and the original propane gas light that looks like this:

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 I'm not crazy about a propane light, but I don't want to remove an original appliance.  Since we have to remove the wood anyway and it gives us access to the wiring, we are going to add three undermounted LED lights underneath the bulkhead, which is right over the front window.  This will give the whole trailer more light and especially the dinette area which is where I plan to have my writing table.

The other area we found to be a little bit sketchy is to the left of the door and above the door:

We found a local source for the bendable 1/8" plywood used in these campers and the plan is to cut out the portion that needs to be replaced and fit in the new wood with the old.  That particular plan makes me a wee bit anxious, but Mr. Blue Jeans & Turquoise assures me it's doable.  

I didn't want to leave you on a down note, so here are some inspiration pics from my Pinterest board!

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Thanks for traveling along with us on this little adventure!  Hopefully we'll have some prettier pics in next week's edition!  Happy Tuesday, friends!