Rims and Tires The first photo shows the original tires, rims and hubcaps as they were when purchased. We came to discover later that the tires were from 1993 so the previous owners had replaced the originals from 1974. Shockingly, we did about 500km’s on the tires before replacing both the rims and tires. The rims and tires were purchased separately given the unusual bolt pattern that these hubs have from the 70’s. The specific size is 15 x 6 and the measurement is 6 X 139.7 load index 2600. Trailer tires are different than regular car tires so make sure your tires are rated for the appropri ..read more

Water Heater Over the years, I have tried various tankless water heaters in my projects and have always had issues with them. This past spring, I discovered the Girard on demand tankless water heater and so far, it has lived up to my expectations. Previous tanks would cut in and out depending on water flow, were very annoying to winterize, have required parts to be replaced and needed venting through the floor or cutting additional holes through the walls. The Girard has none of these issues. When I have my Airstream parked at home, I need to run over 100 feet of hose from the exterior tap to ..read more

Before construction of the interior begins, be sure to review the post on layout planning as there is important information to consider. I have seen numerous builds where the owners/builders have started by laying down their flooring first and then building on top. In my opinion, this is a terrible idea for numerous reasons: First of all, much of your floor space will be covered by cabinets, water tanks, storage, etc. Flooring will not be visible in these places so all you are doing is placing excess weight in your trailer. Secondly, during construction, the floor is a high traffic area. You w ..read more

In many cases, you can reuse the original interior wall skins. Its a good idea to remove them carefully in case you go this route, its also a good idea to label them so you know where each one goes back. Putting new aluminum on the interior is time consuming and expensive when often, all the originals need is a good cleaning and a few coats of paint. When your insulation, rough plumbing, electrical and initial framing are finished, you can begin to put the walls back on. We used a pressure washer on both sides to get them as clean as possible. Put up the most obvious pieces first but leave the ..read more

This is mostly a photo update as insulating the shell is much like what we already covered when we insulated the subfloor. Again, we used closed cell spray foam insulation. 1.5 inches were applied to the walls. We made sure our solar panels were installed first and placed the wires where we wanted the foam to keep them. We also ran a piece of pex through the aluminum ribs running from our water pump to where the water heater will be. The tail and marker light wires ran against the bare aluminum and will be covered by the foam, but the remainder of the electrical will be done afterwards. I have ..read more

The first (often overlooked) thing to be considered when planning the interior layout of your Airstream is the water tank location and plumbing possibilities. Often, the way that the beams in the frame are laid out determines where your grey water tank is under the subfloor and thus will impact the location of things above like sinks, shower, etc. Keep in mind that the drainage is gravity fed so you will need a gradual decline from any drains into your holding tank. Because we did a complete shell-off renovation and rebuilt our frame, we were able to relocate the grey tank from the rear to jus ..read more

The subfloor consists of 5/8 thick plywood that gets secured to the frame and also holds the shell on. I suggest cutting the 4×8 sheets of plywood in half and installing one at a time to make things a bit easier. The plywood should slide under the shell and into an existing aluminum channel. Often times, this channel is so corroded that large parts (or perhaps all of it) may be unusable. In this case, you can use pieces of 90 degree 1/8 thick aluminum to substitute. Rivet it to the shell and then screw into the plywood as you would do with the original channel. The plywood should also be screw ..read more

A major issue we discovered when replacing the aluminum belly-pan was the overlapping of the original and banana wraps OVER top of the shell. This design flaw is hidden by the aesthetic metal strip around the perimeter and is a major issue for leakage and the result is extensive rust damage to the steel frame over time. When water drips down the side of the trailer and gets behind the aesthetic metal trim, instead of draining to the outside and just dripping to the ground, it will leak into the subfloor section and ruin the insulation and even worse, sit and corrode the steel frame over time ..read more