The Trailer Cover - TrippinWithDon

I bought a slightly used travel trailer to live in on the property. I am glad I did because I wasn’t too thrilled with what I found when I got back to the mountain after being gone for the Winter. The old trailer that I had “remodeled” the previous summer and was living in the previous summer was gross. Rat turds were all over. There was a streak of dried blood across the floor where one of the winter residents turned into another’s dinner. Of course it smelled really bad.

There is a perfect, flat spot at the top of the property where I wanted to park the trailer. The problem was there is a little used overgrown road I had to clear in order to tow it up there. Trees had fallen across it. It was narrowed by thick brush and it is quite steep.

I spent a week cutting and sawing back what I could and recruited a friend with an F250 to tow it up to the top. It was tight and we still had to clear limbs as we went. It was a slow, touch and go ride but the trailer made it with just a couple scratches.

The Tow Vehicle

The Climb Starts

Tight Squeeze

Clearing the way

This is my morning view now….

The property gets a good deal of snow most years. Luckily, it tends to be the dry and fluffy kind. Not very heavy so I wasn’t too concerned about weight on the trailer. The real problem is the sun and low humidity in the summer. The owner’s manual says to reseal the weatherproofing caulking every every 3 years. I was concerned that there would be a quicker than usual drying out of the weather sealant and I would have to take on the big messy job way more often than that. It may also keep it from getting too hot in the summer. Maybe even keep it a bit warmer in the winter.

It is a pretty basic 4×4 pole frame design. It has a small 8’x8′ porch off the door to be used for a sitting and shoe area to keep dirt out of the trailer.

I bought a post hole digger to save a bit of time. It comes with a 24″ auger on it. That is the minimum depth to meet the frostline depth building code here. I would have like to have gone deeper but there is also a thick layer of shale around that depth. I broke the Auger tip off in it trying to break through. I tried using a heavy digging bar but that had little to no affect. My old standby manual post hole digger was pretty useless too. I was happy if I could get deeper but So 2 feet deep was the bare minimum. I used Sonotubes to save on concrete and raise the pillar up off the ground a bit. I don’t think I’ll use them in the future though. The post hole digger does a good enough job of making a nice smooth hole.

About 2.5 60# bags of concrete per hole. I used 4×4 Stimpson galvanized 4×4 Elevated Post Bases sunk into the wet concrete. I lifted the them out of the concrete a few inches so that they would all start out level and to raise them above the rain and snow a bit. I think I would do it differently next time because I worry that the weight of the roof may someday buckle the post of the Stimpson bracket coming out of the concrete. Next time I’ll raise the concrete up to meet the level height and sink the Stimpson down to the bracket base.

I was challenged by the availability of lumber, supposedly because of the Covid. The Big Box store lumber racks were pretty bare, especially of straight treated 4x4s. My local lumber yard charges a nice premium for the convenience of a local drive. When I need a big load of supplies, its significantly cheaper to tow the utility trailer the 70 miles to the nearest Home Depot. Instead of treated, I ended up going for 10′ fir and painting them with UV blocker stain. Time will tell how that works out.

I broke down and bought a laser level. It was cheap but provides a nice straight line. I used it to mark the top line for the cross pieces between the posts. It was a pretty easy effort but I had to do it later in the evening because the beam wasn’t bright enough to be seen in full daylight. Worked fine for the price.

The uprights were connected by 2×6’s. One on each side of a pole. the doubling up added additional strength and looks pretty good, I think.

The roof joists were built on the ground and lifted into place. Bird Bites were cut out on the ground and I did a much better job then on the outhouse. Luckily I had scaffolding that I made an safe platform to stand on as I was lifting them into place. They tended to want to dangerously roll from point facing up to down. I used Stimpson rafter braces to secure them in place.

Half inch OSB for the roof sheathing. Was heavy to get up there. Again, It would have been next to impossible without the scaffolding. I screwed the OSB into the rafters. Leaving about 1/8″ gap between them for expansion as recommended..

I rolled out the tar paper and got it nailed down. Just in time for the winds to pick up and blow it all off the next day. I repeated the process the day before the metal roof panels showed up and it stayed in place long enough for the 3 days of roof panel installation. It was good timing because the fall rains were starting to roll in.

With the roof on, I just had to put the edge trim on. Relatively easy except for the precarious footing along the roof edges and ladders. Not perfect since this is where I had to adjust for the inch or so out of square. I can live with it.

I also added some faux timberframe support beams. I think it looks pretty good and the double 2X6 top plates made it easy to cover any out of square issues.

The cover survived our snowy winter so next up is to enclosed the coffee deck. The trailer cover is at the top of the property and the wind can get pretty gusty pretty often. So much so that it is not all that pleasant to sit on the open sided deck more often than not.

As lumber prices have skyrocketed, I am using as much salvaged materials as I can. Most are coming from the old cabin I burned down earlier in the year. I was only able to save a few 2×4’s that didn’t rot over time and weren’t covered with mold. I also save a set of French doors and some window panes. There is an old rusted wood stove that I pulled out of the cabin a couple of years ago.

I took the grinder to the old I found in the cabin and got all the rust off it. I repainted it with heat resistant spray paint. I am not sure that I trust it yet but it is in place and ready for a burn. I haven’t gotten the stove pipe yet because they are pretty expensive for the amount of time I’ll use it. Trying to decide the value compared to better things I can do with the money.

The window frames are old 14 panel frames that have seen better days a long time ago. I am not trying to win a reward from Architectural Digest so they would be fine with some paint scraping, sanding a load of wood putty. About half of the glass panes survived but covered with paint and glazing. Only one of the frames would fit without some rebuilding. The other 2 walls needed to have the frames cut and rebuilt to meet their size in the wall. I don’t know if it was a normal window frame thing but one side rail was wider than the other. For appearance sake, I decided to rip the wide rail to match the other. My table saw is out of commission so I had to use the circular saw to cut them to size. Worked fine and gave me at least one edge that wasn’t beat up.

As mentioned, there was only one window frame that could be used in its original configuration. The other two needed to be disassembled and cut to fit. The first needed to be shortened from 14 panes to 10. That required shortening the side stiles and cutting out new bridle joints . No easy feat to get the new pieces to fit. I only have a coping saw and a jig saw. I came close with the jig saw and a generous helping of wood putty, It is fine. The more difficult effort was squeezing the double pane wide window frame into a single wide. I had to shorten and rework the muntin’s profile ends of each one. Then cut out a new bridle joint to reconnect the stiles. Luck was on my side in that some windows pane glass I found lying around would fit perfectly in the rebuilt window frame.

I tried my hand at glazing the windows. Ended up being a mess. I used the latex glazing in the tube. For the remaining panes, I am going to see if I can’t find the oil based stuff. ,

I also had some old sash windows in a frame. I trimmed some width off the frame and mounted them in a 1×4 frame made from old lumber also lying around. They are installed at the top of the front wall and I think they look pretty good.

I used a set of old french doors that somehow didn’t get destroyed in the cabin burn. They were pretty beat up and hinged in the opposite direction than what I want. It was a lot of work to get them fixed up and installed but they look pretty good, I think. Now I just need to build a deck and the doors will make sense.

The Coffee Deck:

Still needs a door

The French Doors

Pallet Wood Decor

I still need a door on the other side of the deck before it will really be wind proof. I woke up to a snow drift in the side room one morning so getting a door mounted is high on the list when I get back.

I have tried to salvage pallet wood a couple of times in the past. With all the effort that it takes to get a good plank of wood out of a pallet, it just didn’t seem worth it. I decided to attempt it again since there are a lot of manufacturing businesses in town usually plenty lying around for the taking. I ended up getting a bunch of good plans out of the stash I had hauled up. I used them to line the inside of the coffee deck. I think it looks pretty good. So much so that I am looking forward to finishing up the rest of the room.

the 22/23 winter was a big snow year. The weight cracked a few of the roof rafters where the slope flattens out a bit over the Coffee deck. I only used 2×6’s because I built it during the Covid lumber shortages and I had to work with what was on the shelves. Especially at the elevated prices. The damage wasn’t bad and it was pretty easy to sister some additional 2×6’s to get everything solid again.

I was using the trailer mainly for sleeping up until 2024 started and showering . Not much else though. The coffee deck became more of a storage room as usual. But once the cabin is done, there should be plenty of storage and I’ll have a nice sitting area.

I ran a power cord up from an inverter connected to the solar system to charge the trailer batteries and give me working 120v outlets. I added a TV antenna to the Trailer cover but even at the highest point on the property there is so signal.

Trailer Cover Build Progress