Cool Car Trailer...

[daepp]

Barry - is there a head in the trailer?

[barry2952]

In a way, the whole lounge is the head. I've built the entertainment center to house an RV toilet. One has to simply close the blinds and lock the door to have an air-conditioned bathroom.

[barry2952]

11-12-2006

The Mark II left today for the Naples Concours on the 17th of November. His trailer is much bigger than mine.



The inside of the Phoenix is back to where it was before the accident.







Things that remain to be done:

Flooring for garage area.

Box-in ramp springs.

Install braces and FRP to complete belly pan.

Install lighting in garage.

Add 4 batteries to bank. (8 Optima marine batteries total)

Finish cabnetry in cabin and garage.

Replace bent 15,000 lb hitch on trailer tongue.

Install new Equal-I-Zer weight distributing hitch.

[tabs]

Barry how th fk did I miss talking to U all these years??? I love the Speedster..there is something about the 356 that I just Love. The retro trailer is da bomb.

U mentioned that U collected 50s furniture, and art? This I gotta know about. I wish there were more Boyz on this Board that were interested in that stuff.

Tell me More, Tell me More...

I wil tell U that I am familar with many of the same things...Allan Adler, Porter Blanchard, Venni, Tapio Wirkula, Rex Brandt, John Saccaro, Venard are all names I am conversant with, and I am familar with things that shoot. As far as autos, I have a 69 911S as well as a 69 Mach1 428 SCJ.

I HAVE to draw the line somwhere, I just can't do it all as much as I would love to.

[barry2952]

Hi Tabs,

Actually, that's not a Speedster, it's a Cabrio. There were about 2,000 Speedsters made in '55 but only about 200 Cabrios were made that year. Even rarer are the "Continental" fender tags as only the cars imported by Max Hoffman were tagged as Continentals.

My '50s furniture collection is all commercial grade Miller, Knoll and others. Most of it had, at one time, been lobby furniture is buildings built in the '60s and '70s but most of the designs are from the '50s. My taste in art is eclectic, at best. I buy what I like. I've only purchased one painting because of the artist's name. Jonathan Winters has painted about 150 paintings but has only sold about 10. His art is as strange as his comedy.

Here's a shot of our living room to give you the idea of the range of our collection.

[barry2952]

11-13-2006

I cut off my tonge today. No, not my tongue, the trailer's tongue.

Remember this?



This is what happened to the other half. The tongue hitch was bent about 1 inch off center. The measurement from the center of the hitch to the centers of the axles is a critical measurement. Luckily, the Dexter Airflex system has adjusters built in for alignment. Simply loosen the U-bolts and use the two adjusters per side to move the axle forward or back.



I started off using a cutting torch but that got too hot for the wiring that runs through the frame. I protected the wiring within rigid conduit but the flame would eventually damaged the wires.



I threw open the garage doors and fired up the 2-stroke chop saw. I cut away all the metal that wasn't welded to the tongue and then ground away the welds.



I own a MIG welder but these welds are too critical for my skill level. My friend, the welder, has a portable unit that will give the penetration needed for these important welds.

[tabs]

Here is a picture of me in my former Living Room, the painting hiding behind the Lamp is by David Roberts RA.

[barry2952]

I would like to see your current living room.

12-10-2006 Progress has slowed as Fall chores took a lot of time.

While waiting for the welder to show up I expanded the battery rack to accept 4 more Optima marine batteries. That should bring my run time for the a/c to about 6 hours.

The extra weight will help load the tongue weight properly. The most tongue weight I can get with all three axles pressurized is 1,100 lbs. The batteries will bring the tongue weight to 1,400 lbs.





Took time off to show the Mark II at the Naples Concours. Took a top award and had beautiful weather.



The welder brought his stick welder to gain a real deep weld. He wasn't pleased with the weld's appearance so he came back with a MIG and TIG welder to smooth things out. I ground things smooth and used a filler for a nice finished appearance.



He used his TIG to weld the replacement ramp activating arm. Helps to know what you're doing.

[barry2952]

Sanded down all the rough finish on the tongue and sprayed it with Rustoleum primer and flat black paint.







Installed the new Equal-I-Zer hitch. Dan powdercoated the parts in a matt finish.

A lot of thought went into the design of this product.

[kach22i]

Barry the RSR Porsche club holiday party will be January 13th, I'll e-mail you the latest newsletter - see page 8 of the December issue.

Link:
http://rsp.pca.org/

[911boost]

Barry,

You will like the Equal-I-Zer. I was actually going to suggest it when I saw the damages hitch in your previous pictures.

I tow a 1978 18 foot Mallard camper (real 2x4's in the walls = heavy), and then a 5x7 trailer behind it with my dirt bikes. It works great. I won't tow anything again without the Wqual-I-Zer, it makes that much of a difference.

Bill

[barry2952]

1955 Porsche 356 Porsche "Continental" Cabrio paint job.

In August of 2006 the Porsche was tied down inside the newly finished Spartanette Toybox when we hit a guardrail. The Porsche tore loose from its moorings and smashed into the inside wall of the trailer.

The entire length of the Porsche was smashed pretty flat. The front suspension was bent from contacting the wheel well of the trailer. I knew that my friend Larry Smith, owner of Autometric Collision and new head of the Meadow Brook Concours, had recently restored a 356 from his collection of beautiful cars.

I asked Larry who he would recommend to repair the car and he said he would literally "take it under his wing" to see that it was done right and to justify an invitation to show it at the Meadow Brook Concours d'Elegance in August of '07.

My insurance company sent out an independent adjuster who was very familiar with Autometrics and thought that they would also be the correct company to make the sheet metal repairs.

The Porsche 356 is post-war German engineering at its best, yet had enough ideosyncracies to warrant a mechanical specialist with the right tools and temperament to do the job on the damaged suspension.

Ted turned out to be the right guy. Expert on all things 356. Ted got the task of disassembling the car for repair. He pulled off all the trim, bumpers and windshield so that there would be little masking necessary.

Ted repaired the bent front suspension and found an appropriate replacement brake drum to replace the one that was bent. He was able to straighten the bent rim and detected no tire damage.

When the car came back to Autometric the passenger side sheetmetal was treated to a basic straightening and grinding that exposed some additional areas of concern. The rocker panels had been replaced years earlier but had not been properly positioned. The door sheetmetal seam at the bottom had thickened over time due to rust expanding the layers of metal. They had fit the sill to the door instead of repairing the door and installing the new sills correctly.

This is what the car looked like just before the crash.



The aftermath. The back bumper is pushed in flush with the fender, the door is flattened and the front fender has a distinct slab-side look to it.



I went to look at the condition of the car at this stage and I was shown the thick door bottoms and some minor rust penetration along the bottom of the door. They showed me, with a shim, that the sill was improperly installed to accommodate the the thick door bottom.

It was at this point that I had to have words with the insurance company. They were only going to pay for painting the damaged side of the car, which would have been fine had there been some break line to paint to. Since this is a unibody car with no removable fenders there is no natural break point to paint to.

Autometric's could have blended the paint but the original lacquer paint would have not reacted well to being overpainted with today's two-stage paint. I learned that the thinners used today would seep into the lowers of paint, destabilizing them over time.

I was able to convince a higher level adjuster to take a closer look at the evidence I had gathered in support of repainting the entire car. They brought in their own paint expert that agreed with my assessment and authorized the additional $8,000 to strip and build a fresh paint job. This was on top of the $11,000 already authorized for the bump and paint work on the damaged side.



The car was taken to bare metal all over. The front end was media blasted to remove thick layers of body filler.



The front end had been hit sometime in its past requiring the replacement of the hood. Each panel is stamped with the car's serial number except the hood.

The front end had been pushed in but never bumped out properly.

[kach22i]

Nice things take time, work and money.

Beautiful results.

[barry2952]

[kach22i]

Is your wife selling the Porsche Barry?

[barry2952]

No. Hemmings just used the pictures from the feature they did in Hemmings Sports and Exotic in the Nov '06 issue.

[barry2952]

Still not on the newsstands.

[Joeaksa]

Have just seen this thread and coming from an aircraft mechanic, the work is simply excellent.

As well I lived for a portion in my life, about 5 years, in an Airstream trailer and would love to do what you have done with one.

Keep up the good work and let us know how its going. If you ever get to Vegas to chat with Tabs, let us know. Might drive over for dinner.

Joe A

[barry2952]

I doubt I'll ever be in Vegas. I'm the world's worst gambler.

1-27-2007 Underbelly

I wish I had done this while the chassis was upside down.

I designed the diamond plate sides to have a 46" gap that would be filled with a FRP layer supported by aluminum crossmembers.

Before I was able to install the crossmembers I had to solve a slight clearance problem with the arm that connects to the linear actuator and I had to figure out a way to mount the actuator itself 90° from its current mounting position.

I started looking around my shop for some material to make a swivel bracket from when I spotted the shackles from the old trailer springs. They were the perfect shape but one needed to be smaller than the other so I made a trip to the local trailer supply and found two new spring shackles and a spring bolt to create my contraption. The only hole I had to drill was the one that bolts the actuator to the swivel.



The material I'm using as crossbracing for the underbelly is 1" x 2" x 1/8" aluminum angle. I used it on the flat at the back so that the actuating arm could clear the brace. I was able to trim away enough of the actuator arm to clear the brace.



The FRP is sanwiched in-between the diampnd plate and the bracing. The FRP is connected to the cross bracing with stainless fateners and washers. I hope I never have to take it apart again but I want to be able to if I need to.



Aluminum crossbracing attaches to the diamond plate on both sides.



This is what the finished underbelly will look like. All of the raw aluminum and Frp edges are trated with the same edging used elsewhere.

[barry2952]

Update 3-10-2007 More details.

The Porsche is almost finished. Can't wait to see it.

This is my emergency brake light system. The regular tail lights are powered off of the tow vehicle. This emergency system provides brake lights should the trailer be separated from the tow vehicle. The trailer is equipped with a breakaway switch that activates the trailer brakes, but, no brake lights.

This system takes a separate lead from the battery and passes the current through a Normally Open brake pressure switch. When the hydraulic actuator is activated, both in an an emegency and under normal use, the emergency brake lights are activated.



This is a series of automatic circuit breakers rated at 150A that feed the winch. The wire feeding it is fused at 175A.



The FRP belly pan is finally complete. 240 square feet of Fiberglass Reinforced Panels and 224 linear feet of extruded 1" x 2" aluminum angle and 200 stainless screws and washers.

I installed the system so that a single panel could be removed for service without taking the whole belly pan down.



I raised the suspension off of the ground so that I could measure for wheel skates. I ended up buying heavy duty skates capable of rolling 2,000 lbs each.

Note the nylon axle restraint. These keep the air bags from hyperextending and damaging the flexible stainless steel brake lines.



Business has been slow so I had my crew add an outlet every 10 feet and four new 400-watt metal halide high bay fixtures.





The damaged chair got put back together after polishing the frame.









Each axle has it own ride height valve. That's the black device with the linkage attached to it. That valve get's its instructions from the position of the suspension's swing arm.

This control rod had to pass through the new belly pan. Due to the 6" range of motion the coltrol rod needed to pass through an oblong hole. I had seen oblong grommets in a leather catalog and contacted the Stimson Company and left word with a customer service person. I only needed three of the two-piece grommets so she sent them out as free samples. Thank you Stimson!

Next to the ride height valve is the electric dump valve. Each axle has one. I can selectively dump air to aid the jacks in tilting the trailer for loading and unloading.