JAN. 18th, 2005

This part of our trailer project , the frame building part....is going to be the most money consuming part of the whole thing. That means it's going to take us a number of months to get all the parts & such together ...before I can afford to have one of the local welders put her together ...
So , this is going to be a slow and long process before I start the fun part of building the house on the frame.
Once the frame is done and painted....then I can plod along buying a bit of wood & such here and there to build the house , which wont hit us monetarily so hard as the frame part will.

Last Tuesday , I ordered 3-7000 lb . capacity Dexter trailer axle assemblies (includes springs, hubs , brakes ,axle-hangers etc.)...which cost a lot ,at $1710.00.
But they're great axles designed specifically for the better quality Travel Trailers & 5th wheels on the market...versus some cheaper axle that might be rated at carrying 7000 lbs....but is so poorly manufactured , it's true load rating might only be 5000 lbs.
Since our trailer is going to be an Old-School Rolling home ....with a peaked roof and lots of pretty woodwork on it's exterior ...that means she's going to be considerably heavier than a more conventional type . So, I want good axles that can handle the load and wont break when I hit a bump.
Today , I'm ordering the wheels & tires which is going to cost us a whopping $1416.00 plus shipping....UGGH!
But, even though this stuff is expensive...I feel really good I'm starting this project.
The next things I need to buy are the front A-Frame Trailer Coupler , Jack, stabilizer jacks , breakaway setup and few other details....then I'll start buying a little steel here & there for the Frame and store them at the Welding Shop.
Then when I've got everything together ...hopefully by this April or May , the welder can put her together .

A particularly cool detail that makes me feel this project wont take forever is.... I have all the parts I installed in our Bus , plus all the other stuff that hasn't been installed yet to use in our trailer project. This is really going to help a lot in moving this project forward in a more timely way .
 I still need to get a decent shower setup , a nice little Jotul Woodstove , good on-demand hot water heater and a number of other things ...but most of the really big & expensive stuff is covered. Which is cool....
I've come up with an idea on how to keep our bus too...what I'm considering and researching right now...is to cut approx. 2/3rds of the bus off ...replace the drive line and slide the rear end forward . This will give us a way to tow our trailer and still keep the bus.
So far this looks like a really good plan. Our trailer is probably going to be around 38 ft long and if I shorten up our Bus ....I'll have both combined vehicles down to a more manageable size. Leaving our Bus at its length right now ...which is approx. 35 ft and trying to tow a 38 ft trailer with it would be absurd and definitely unsafe ...plus I'm pretty sure most states wouldn't be very happy seeing someone driving a 73 foot long rig around .

Just like I did with our Bus, Latcho Drom ....I'll try to get as many pics of the construction process up here as I can...

Sometime next week the Axle assemblies should get delivered and I'll pop off a few pics of them ... I've never seen a Dexter Axle and am looking forward to seeing how they're constructed.
 

JAN. 25 , 2005
Our Trailer Axles , wheel & tires and a few other parts arrived today …here’s a few pics.

Having the Axles & the other stuff is very cool….I feel good that the process to build our trailer is becoming real instead of just some good idea…that might or might not happen down the road sometime.
It’s going to take me a few months to get the steel together…because I just don’t have the money to do this in one big chunk.
 So…I’ve been spending quite a bit of time searching the Net for good floor plans and photos of trailers …so I can get some ideas on how I want to set ours up.
Even though I don’t want a conventional looking trailer … I do want an efficient & smart use of that limited interior space.
The better Travel Trailer & 5^th Wheel manufacturers have been in the business for a lot of years …and they really know how to use the limited amount of space & living area in a rig very well.
So…I’ve been taking what I feel are the best Ideas from each of them and trying to integrate them into our trailer’s design.

Another great resource for ideas to check out are websites where fulltime RV’ers modify their rigs to make them more comfortable and efficient. I’ve found tons of great ideas on all sorts of stuff…and highly recommend anyone thinking of doing a project like mine to check them out first before finalizing any plans.
The companies that manufacture RV’s might have all sorts of nifty ideas on what to put in their rigs ….but often , their designs are more targeted toward people who just use the rigs for occasional campouts .
If the trailer is going to be your fulltime home ….you really need to find out what really works and what doesn’t… and the best source for finding that out is from the folks who live in their rigs fulltime.

Sometime next week I'll order the the rest of the stuff we'll need for the trailer frame....jack , breakaway switch  , fenders and such.
Then I'll head out to the steel Dealer here in Sitka and buy a piece or two of steel ....

Forgot to mention where I bought these great axles & tires...
I picked them up from Six Robblees down in Washington State.
They were very nice people to work with...particularly a very decent and extremely well informed lady named Mary , who wouldn't even let me buy the axles till she researched them to make sure they would work out right for me.
Here's their website ....check it out , they have just about everything needed for building trailers

 

Mar. 8th , 2005
Been Super busy at work ....but I have been ordering stuff for the Trailer project.
I ordered all the windows and the Door , they should get here next week ....I hope. 
I needed to get the door and windows before I start work so I can get everything measured out right before starting the project.
I bought them from R & G Mobile Home Supply Inc. ...down in Texas. Once again , I lucked out and found really nice folks to work with.
Once they get here I'll take some pics.
Click-Here to check out their website
They have GREAT prices and lots of stuff for RV's & trailers. I'll probably order our shower setup from them pretty soon.

This morning I ordered the TrailAir Pin Box that I'll need to install ...
Because of the weight rating I'm suspecting , we'll have to design the trailer as a 5th wheel instead of a more conventional type.
The TrailAir Pin Boxes are mighty expensive , but after a bunch of research I found they have a fabulous reputation and everyone agrees they're worth every penny.
I paid a whopping $940.00 (includes shipping to Seattle )
Here's their Website

I also ordered the Mounting Wings that are welded up to the frame for hanging/attaching the Pin-Box.

I'm not done with the project yet , but anyways ...here a pic of the telephone & Satellite/Cable TV 'center' I've been putting together for our trailer.

 

I've been buying really cool products made by the Channel Vision Company for this part of the project . When I get the last few parts ...I'll go into explaining the system.
Here's Channel Visions Website

 

MARCH 14 , 2005

Like I mentioned in my previous entry ….I’m very busy at my job, being sick and other stuff…
But… anyways, here’s a short explanation on what I’m trying to do here.

Building a large live-aboard trailer is not at all like doing a relatively simple School Bus conversion.
Where a company has done the ‘hard part ‘ of building a good frame for you already and all you have to do is figure out the floor plan and install the various bits & pieces.
A travel or 5^th wheel trailer’s frame …particularly one you building and designing yourself has to be very carefully thought out.
They’re not at all just some simple box you tow around behind you.

A good & safe Trailer frame is a complex collection of not just the steel size you’ll use for the actual framing but also all the stuff you attach to that frame.
Axles, wheels, tires etc. have to be sized correctly to handle the load ….so does the king-pin (or the coupler in travel trailer setups)

This is like a big ‘puzzle’ …if you don’t match up the pieces correctly the whole thing is going to come out screwy.
Not just screwy …dangerous also.
Small under-sized axles will break…bad design flaws in a 5^th wheel trailers over-hang can cause king-pins to snap off and all sorts of equally nasty things can happen if you don’t think this thing out very carefully.
I don’t want to mess this part up ….because it’s not only dangerous to have something fall off your trailer while your cruising on down the road …it’s also a very expensive and often difficult fix if something nasty does happen.

So I’ve been doing a lot of research before leaping into anything here. I’m breaking ‘new ground’ here …I want to do this job right.

Thankfully I’ve been getting a lot of help from the folks I’ve been buying the axles, king-pin and such from. They seem to be really nice folks who want to make sure I do this project right.
The frame part has been a bit harder to figure out …but I’m getting there.
After reading up on steel strengths & such …I’m mostly sure what size of framing I’ll use.
My Glen-L 5^th wheel trailer plans call for 5 inch channel main rails ….which is way too small for a heavy live-aboard 5^th wheel trailer…
So , I’ll go for 10” rectangular box steel for the main rains …and 8 inch for the cross members and probably the over-hang portion also.
Figuring this out took some time ….there’s not much info out there on building you own trailer . So, I checked out a lot of sites that sold large flatbed trailers and such and used their frame sizing as a guide.
For the actual modifications of the Glen-L plans, I got an immense amount of help from Stan Miller who’s been nice enough to take a lot of his time and answer my questions about his AutoMate 5^th wheel trailer.
He’s got the best website I’ve ever found with pics of a trailer frame being built. I’ll use them as a guide for designing our trailer.
Thanks Stan!
Here’s his website
http://www.stanmiller.info/pages/automate/am-intro.html
 

In a few days I’m ordering the rest of the stuff we’ll need for attaching to the frame….wiring , plugs, break-away switch & controller , shock absorbers and a 8000 lb. (rated ) Atwood landing gear jack setup .
I want to make sure we have all the necessary parts stock piled before we start the frame building portion of the project. This will allow me to get absolute measurements …rather than having to make modifications later.

Once I have all the right bits & pieces collected, I’m going to have to take a break from ‘Spending’ for awhile. Our Credit Card debt is getting out of hand in a big way…
So I want to knock it down a bit before buying anything else….

But if everything works out right for us we should have the complete frame put together by the end of this summer …then I’ll figure out if we want to build the house portion here in Sitka or do it down South.

MARCH 15 , 2005

It's my day off today so I started ripping out a lot of the cabinetry in our bus .
I hated to do it a bit , but it needs to be done so that I can get ready to cut her down to a size we'll be able to tow our trailer with.
It's funny in a sad sort of way that it only took me 6 hours to wipe out months worth of hard work....
O well....at least I'm movin' forward.

Here's a pic of what she looks like now.


I want to straighten up the bus a bit before I rip out the rest of the walls & cabinetry...but I'm pooped out from whacking & hacking on stuff ...so I'll wait till my next day off to do some more.

MARCH 27 , 2005

Been busy finishing up a website for a charter fishing operation and also at the store where I work.
But my TrailAir Pin Box and pin-box mounting wings got delivered the other day...which is nice.
Here's a pic

 

This is quite the heavy-weight piece of equipment I must say... it better be for almost $1000.00 + shipping.
The Mounting Wings in the picture are what holds the pin-box to the trailer .You weld them up to the under-side of the over-hanging section then bolt the pin-box to them .
My trailer Door and windows got lost in a Seattle warehouse for awhile , but they found them and are shipping them up to me next week.

I also ordered a set of 8000 lb. capacity front landing-gear trailer jacks from PPL Motorhomes for around $700.00 ...still need to buy the motor for them though.
When I get a little free time , I'll set up a page that will list the prices I've paid for the different stuff I'm installing and links to the various Websites I purchased them from.
Also my Trailer Break-away switch and trailer wiring and plugs got here the other day.

I still need to order a few more 'frame' items ...like the stairs/steps and rear stabilizing jacks . But things are getting very close to being finished in that department.
In a week or so I'm going to head down to the steel dealer here in Sitka and order the 2-28 foot long x 2"x 10" x 1/4" rectangular main rails.
I'm surprised how expensive steel is getting ...these will run us around $1600.00. The guys at the steel place said it's going to keep going up in price because of the high gas prices ...wish I could afford to buy all the steel framing at once. But I cant .

I've been checking out stuff I'll need for the trailer project and really lucked out in finding a couple of Websites for Kitchen Cabinet doors and cabinet kits.
Sierra Cabinet Door
Has great prices on doors and drawer fronts....which are often the hardest part of building a cabinet. I ordered a few doors & drawer fronts from them yesterday because I need to build an Entertainment Cabinet for our apartment . I'm building it to fit into the trailer when were ready to move into it.

Another great site I found is...
Kitchen Cabinets Depot
These folks have great prices on Kitchen Cabinet Kits....I'll most likely buy the trailers cabinets from them.

So....things are going slowly but smoothly ahead in our project . Realistically I don't think the frame part will get done till around the mid-part of October this year...but that's Ok.
Once the frame is finished , I'll give it a few good coats of some anti-rust paint and store it away till next spring.
Over the winter , I'll buy various stuff for the inside and start the house part next spring.
I don't think I want to try to build on the frame during the winter rainy season here....learned my 'lesson' about doing that sort of thing with our bus conversion.
By the way....
Happy Easter
 
 

 
APRIL 5 , 2005
It's my day off ...so I headed down to Buckland Equipment and ordered our two 20 ft long 2"x10"x1/4 main rails...
cost us $884.00 which includes delivery.
Because of cost I decided to go with 20 footers instead of 28 foot ones ...And speaking of Cost,
It really pays to shop around and ask questions before jumping into things.
The Steel dealer I was originally going to buy the steel from wanted around $1500.00 for 2-20 foot pieces...which I almost agreed to. But on the way there I stopped and asked a couple of  local welders if there was any other option here for buying steel...
They told me about Buckland's and said his prices were about half of what the 'other' guy was asking.
Glad I asked !

I had major issues with file corruption problems on our site and had to pull the whole thing down this morning ...I'm not looking forward to the weeks of hard & tedious work of trying to upload tiny chunks of the 'new' site on a crappy and slow Alaskan Dial-Up system...
UGGH !
 

 
APRIL 12 , 2005
Our windows, door & Atwood 8000 lb. Front Landing gear jacks came today.
Here's a pic of the windows & Door



We got 4 of the smaller windows and one large ....I've come up with a basic layout for our trailer and figure as long as I add a couple of sky lights we'll have plenty of interior 'natural' light.
They did a really nice job of building the windows to fit the specs I gave them.....I'm really happy we ordered them from R & G Mobile Home Supply Inc..


Here's a pic of the various parts for the landing gear jacks....the second pic is what they look like when put together.
 

 
APRIL 14 , 2005
I've been trying  to keep our trailer building project moving forward in a reasonably affordable & timely manner ...so I had a local mechanic put 1 of our Dexter axle/wheel setups together...

Here's a pic


Once I get a little free time , I'll attach the springs so that I can get the right measurements for designing/modifying the Glen-L trailer plans I have.
I don't feel really rushed to figure out the exact measurements of everything yet...because we're at least 4 months away from having the frame welded up. But it is nice to be moving forward .

 

 
APRIL 28 , 2005
I've gotten a number of emails asking which Glen-L plans I bought for this project.
OK...I choose the Queensbury set of plans.
Here's the link
Queensbury 5th Wheel Plans

I chose this particular set of plans because its the largest (at 29.6 feet) set of plans Glen-L offers.
It's not anywhere hefty enough to carry the load that a fulltime setup demands ...but it's a very good starting point. Because you get to see in a very good detail how a trailer frame is designed.
I Highly recommend getting getting a set of Glen -L plans for anyone thinking of building something like this

I get paid in a few days and will head down to the steel dealer to order some more steel....
This is a hard time for me....I've always been a bit of an instant gratification sort of a guy. I've toned that down a lot as I've gotten older...but it's still hard on me to do a project this way. This feels like it's going to take forever to get our trailer completed.

Wish I was rich or could win the lottery .....
O well...
 

 
JULY 26, 2005
Been God Awful busy at work...with endless tourists and such. But I have ordered some more steel for the frame and in a few days will order some more...
Plus , when I get a bit of free time here and there...I've been working on our Frame design .
I'm finally getting a better understanding about what types of steel to use for our frame and the best way to put her together....I'm a bit of a 'Detail' nut so this has been a tedious but fun thing for me to figure out.
I'm learning that trailer frames are designed with the minimum amount of steel needed to do the job right. There's just no need to over-build them....
My first 'plans ' were absurdly 'over-built' and would have taken away needed weight carrying capacity from the final product.
Once I finish the framing plans I'll up-load them to our site.

I've been playing around with my auto-cad program and have come up with a basic plan for the Trailers interior I like....I'm working toward a rear-bedroom 5th wheel trailer instead of the more typical 'upstairs' one.
Here's a pic of the basic idea...

For the exterior of the Trailer I'm going for a paint scheme like the pic below . I'll go halfway up with a two-tone cedar Lapp boards and then use cedar shingles up from there.
 

I'm going for a look similar to this great job someone did on their House Truck....

 

 
JULY 31 , 2005
I've been playing around with my design program again ...and think I like this new plan for the interior setup better than my other front bedroom one.
Click-On Pic



This plan allows us to have a better use of space (storage wise ) and I added in an important detail I missed in the last plan ...our little Jotul woodstove.
I've been doing a bit of 'Web' research on larger water tanks ....which we'll definitely want to have in our trailer.
Here's two sites I found which sell the big 95 gallon tanks I want at very good prices.
Tank Depot
Plastic Mart
 

 
August 4 , 2005
I was going through my old list , that I complied last October ...of things I need to buy for our trailer building project .And figured it might be a good idea to call around and find out the up-dated prices of the stuff we'll need .
So I called a store down in Washington to ask about the availability and price of the little woodstove we want to install.
Turns out the price went up $175.00 on the stove ....so that made me realize I better get on the Net and find one at a better price and buy it.
So that's what I did
  I ordered our little Jotul F 602 CB woodstove yesterday .....for $699.00 plus $60.00 shipping to Seattle.
 Plus...It will probably cost us another $70.00 to have the stove put on a barge and shipped up here to Sitka.
Here's a pic
 

I choose this Jotul F 602 CB because its a good looking little Woodstove with a great reputation...plus it's pretty light-weight at only 160 pounds.
It's rated to heat an area of approx. 800 square feet...so it's a perfect sized woodstove for our trailer.
I wanted to buy the painted version of this stove ...but that would have cost us at least $250.00 more ...
So , I'll use 'Stove Bright' high-temp paint and do the job myself.

I also called a local Stain-Glass artist friend up ...and ordered the Little Stain glass windows we'll need. The guy is really nice and will do the job for very little...so I figured I better get on this.

This is the way I do any conversion project.... I buy the stuff ahead , so that I can get perfect measurements to design the interior and such.
I hate finding out later things just don't fit....so I'm a big time advocate of planning ahead.
I'm sure we'll build the trailer frame here in Sitka ...but I'm not at all sure we'll finish it up here ,because of the Lousy weather we have ...
I'm figuring ...If we do move down to Oregon in a year or so , it's going to be more cost effective for numerous reasons to have most of appliances and such bought ahead of time....
All we'll need to do down there is buy the trailer construction materials and put her together ....
 

 
August 7 , 2005
I've gotten quite a few emails recently from folks who are saying they're glad to see me getting back to work on our Trailer project....
I am too , but this is a really expensive project for me and Millie so its going to be a long-term situation here.
Neither of us make that much at our jobs ...so I'm going into big-time credit card debt here.
And that's not a good thing ....
But even so , this project is very important too me ...so I guess we'll deal with the debt problems later.

I've run into an interesting and disturbing snag in our project.
A few days ago I called the folks up at Dexter Axles to ask their engineers where to correctly locate the leaf springs on the axles we bought.
I needed this information so that after installing the springs I could take the measurements between them for the sizing of the frames cross-members .
So, Dexter's people gave me the spring location info...and after that I asked them about the true weight carrying capacity of the Axles I bought .
I told them that I picked up 3 axles , hubs ,wheels, tires and such from one of their licensed dealers...and gave them the batch number on the axles .
They looked up the number and told me they were 6000 lb. axles.....
I said ...wait a minute here...the dealer I bought the axles from told me that the combination of the axles , heavy-duty hubs ,springs ,wheels & tires actually gave me a 7000 lb. per axle capacity.
Dexter told me ...Sorry, but that doesn't matter because the Axle is a 6000 lb.one and nothing is going to change that fact.
I was furious ...and called six robblees up ,telling them I spent a fortune on these axles ,wheels etc plus the shipping to Alaska and didn't appreciate it one damn bit that instead of having 3-axles that added up to a 21,000 lb capacity ...I now had only 18,000 lbs.
They told me that everything they had ever heard about this sort of thing ...was that I really did have a combo that added to 7000 lbs. per axle.
So I called Dexter back up and told them what six robblees had said ....
They said Nope you've only have 6000 lb. axles....
I called Six Robblees up again and told them about this and they said they'd get in touch with Dexter and find out the straight poop on this.
Eventually they called me back and told me that the D60 Dexter axle could with the addition of heavy duty Hubs be considered a 7000 lb. axle.
Which made me think I was hearing a bunch of bullshit ...because the D60 is a 6000 lb.axle and nothing more.

So ....I've decided to just order another axle setup to get us back up to a more realistic weight carrying capacity.
The way I'm thinking about this is... if it turns out Dexter is right ...the 4-axle setup will give us 24,000 lbs....
And if Six Robblees is right I'll have 28,000 lbs....
But ,I'll just build the trailer thinking that I have a total of 24,000 lbs to work with ....

When I first started thinking about building a big 5th wheel trailer....if someone had said I'd be building a trailer with approx. 18,000 lbs capacity ....I would have thought that was a LOT!
But after researching the companies that build the higher end 5th wheels I've found that their 'Dry-weight' ( what you can put into the completed trailer weight wise...clothes , food tools etc. etc. etc. before you've reached the maximum carrying capacity of the rig)....isn't very much .
And...Those trailers are made out of fiber glass and aluminum ....not lots of wood like ours will be.
So , I'm really glad to find out the truth about our axles.
I would have built her thinking I had 3000 lbs more then I really did to work with.
But even so it would have been nice to be told the real truth about this from the get go....now we'll have to fork out approx. $1200.00 for the extra axle setup.
 

Our new Watts Model N35B 'city' water pressure regulator got here yesterday.
Here's a pic
 

This is a very serious pressure regulator ...built like a tank.
We picked ours up from the great folks who live in their RV and sell all sorts of quality water system related stuff.
This regulator cost us $59.95 + shipping
Here's their Website
RV WATER FILTER STORE

I also ordered a AquaJet water pump that gives you 5.3 gallons per minute (gpm) at 65 pounds per square inch (psi) of pressure from these folks because we'll need a very good water pump that puts out enough PSI to keep our on-demand propane water heater running.

 
August , 23 2005
Been pretty sick for awhile and busy at work dealing with tourists ...so I haven't gotten much done toward our Trailer.
Our water pump arrived and I'm happy to say it sure looks a lot better built then our previous pumps were.
Plus...I had a local Stain Glass artist make us up a couple up a couple of Panels that we'll install up in the bedroom
Here's a pic

He did a pretty good job ..so I'll have him make a larger panel that will be installed near our living room area.
Some time tomorrow the Barge will unload our new woodstove and another Dexter Axles setup....really looking forward to seeing the woodstove...

 
Sept, 4 2005
Got today off ...so I'm busy taking care of some business and such.
I've re-worked the interior plans again to include a tiny side-porch in the rear of the trailer .
Here's a Pic (disregard the dimension lines....my Auto-Cad program does wacky stuff every once in awhile )


 
Our big 95 gallon water tank should get here next Thursday or so....and I'm ordering a bunch of kitchen cabinets to build a entertainment cabinet that we'll use in our apartment here in Sitka and then move it into the trailer when the time comes.
Since I basically know what's going to go into the trailer and what size each piece of furnishing will be ....I'm going to build some of the interior stuff ahead of time ...which I figure will work out nice for our apartment and for when we move.
It's very possible that for all sorts of reasons we wont do much more than the trailer frame here in Sitka ...which means we'll need to rent another place down in Oregon . It will make life easy by having these interior pieces for furnishing an apartment down there .
I'm not sure what were going to do yet ...
Were moving into the real rainy season here in South East Alaska ...so I held off on buying more steel for the trailer frame.
I learned my 'Lesson' on trying to do stuff outside here during the winter months ,when I suffered through trying to do a decent job in the pouring down rain on our bus conversion. And I'm not going to go through that again ....  So....
Right now I have enough steel to build the main ('middle') 20 foot section of the frame ...and I'm thinking of having a welder put that together for us...then we'll attach the 4-axles .wheels etc. to that .
When that's done we'll find a place to store her ....and figure out if we want to buy the rest of the steel down in Oregon to finish the frame up there or just 'Bite the Bullet' and do her here.

Here's an overview picture of the basic frame I'm designing without all of the 2" x 6 " and 2" x 2" cross-members we'll add for strength

 
Sept , 11 2005
Still feeling pretty miserable and exhausted from being over-worked at my cruddy job.....But Anyways... we did get our big 95 gallon water tank delivered the other day ....
Here's a pic

It measures 67" x 22" x 16 " and cost $ 170.00 ( plus around $97.00 for shipping )... Plastic Mart took their Bloody time getting it here ...But , a nice detail with this company is you pick the size & locations of the inlet/outlet & vent holes .
It's a good sized tank and I'm really happy with it.
Now with the two 35 gallon tanks we have left over from the Bus project ...we'll have a 165 gallon fresh water capacity .
Which is cool for long-term camping out in the Boonies's.
To keep the weight down while traveling..... I'll build/design the water system with bypass fill valves that will allow us to fill only one or all three of the tanks.
 
 

 
Sept , 20 2005
Well ...I've run into another interesting snag with our trailer project....
At the beginning of July I wrote a check for some steel I wanted one of the dealers here to order....so since then every week or so I called him up to find out if it made it here or not....only to be told 'not yet'.
Last Saturday at work , I noticed the guy walk by the store and ran out to ask him what was up....and could he at least call down to Seattle to find out what was holding things up for over 2 months.
He tells me...."Well , Michael ...I never ordered it because I thought it was a smarter move to wait till you could get all the steel at once to build the frame."
I felt like slugging the Mother F&%$@#....but stood there in amazement that someone thought they could get away this kind of shit.
So today I headed down to his place and told him I wanted my money back....
Which at least he paid back.....the A-Hole.

GAWDDD I really hate this place.
The First dealer , well-known for ripping off people here...tried to charge me 3-4 times what the steel should cost.
The second dealer ...who I bought the 2-20 foot main beams from ....thought I was a totally unreasonable bastard for being upset that they took over a month and a half to get here because he "accidentally "had them shipped up to some Mine near Fairbanks.
Now this other Bastard decides he'll be the judge on what I should do or not...

I don't know what we'll do here....I'm going to give a steel company down in Seattle a call and see if they will sell to me direct...and if they can cut me a good deal I'll try to order our steel through them.
I kind of think they'll charge quite a bit more to an individual ...then they would with someone who had a business account .
So ...if that is the case ...we'll stop the frame building project and just save up money for a move back to civilization sometime next year
 I figure down south I'll just be able to walk into some steel business ...have them cut the stuff to the correct lengths and sell it to me on the spot.
That way I wont have to pay to have the stuff shipped up here ...plus I'm pretty sure I wont have big surges in my blood pressure , like I get from dealing with this relentless 'Alaskan Way' of doing business .
 
By the way...on the way back home , after I picked up the check for the steel that was supposedly ordered 2 months ago I stopped by the shop that made our two little stain glass windows and ordered another bigger one for the porch area.
 

 
Oct. 5 , 2005
I called around about steel and haven't had much luck ...but still working on it.
I have been busy working on projects though .
The 5 cabinets I ordered  from Kitchen Cabinets Depot got here ...and I've almost completed our Entertainment System cabinet , that we'll use here in the apartment and then move into the trailer....

When I'm finished with the project I'll have a page with all the construction details.
I'm really happy with the Quality of these Cabinets ...they're made out of real oak facings and oak doors with solid plywood sides and such.. Not a bit of particle board was used anywhere on these great cabinets...
Since there's no particle board used in their construction ...they're actually very light-weight & strong cabinets . So I'll be able to use them in our trailer ...As Is.
Rather than designing and constructing a bunch of Built-In units like the typical RV has.
 

 
Oct. 7th , 2005
I'm really happy with the looks of our new RV-500 on-demand water heater ...but I'm also big on Alternative Energy systems .
So , I ordered what appears to be a very nice and light weight Solar Collector (Solar Hot Water heating Panel ) for $279.00 ...
This is an incredibly good price for a Collector ....and it only weighs approx. 20 pounds , which makes it great for not over-loading a RV, Bus or trailer's roof.
Today I'll order from Sears an inexpensive 30-gallon Hot water heater that we'll use for the hot water storage tank ...
I'm not sure yet if I'll design a Closed or Open loop system ...I'm leaning toward an open-loop system because it would be a lot easier to construct , plus lighter in weight...but closed-loop systems are nice because you don't have to worry about your system when the outside temps go below freezing .

With our bus conversion , I was going to build a Solar Batch water heater so I bought a 18-Gallon Tank....
Here's a pic of it...

And had figured on painting it black , attaching all the necessary bit's and pieces and locating it in an insulated box topped with Solar glass.
 I really like these kinds of easy to construct Passive Solar heaters... But I want to keep anything on our Trailer's roof lightweight and low-profiled .
So...it's back to the drawing board.

This coming Sunday ( day off from Work ) , I'll try to finish up the entertainment Cabinet....I've got the six drawers on slides built where we'll store our substantial DVD and VHS movie collection and my X-Box & Playstation , but I still need to do a bunch more work on the cabinet. Wiring it up for 120 volts and adding the 12-volts lights...attaching the drawer slides to the cabinet etc. etc. etc...
Constructing this cabinet has been an invigorating thing for me....I was feeling a bit overwhelmed with problems finding steel for the frame . And even though I'm leaning toward saving money so that we can move south where things are easier to find and much more affordable ...I hated the idea of spending months on this godforsaken island just waiting and not doing something Trailer Project related...so this has been nice.

 
Oct. 18th , 2005
Been Super Busy at work...but I've been wondering what was going on with our Solar water heater..
So today I called up the dealer and asked them to check out when the heater would get shipped. Good thing I did...the buggers never finalized the sale with the factory ,so it never was shipped.
According to them ....everything's Kosher now and the heater will ship out of the factory this week sometime.
Geez Louise....

Today I ordered our Fresh Water & Holding tank monitor from Snake River Electronics down in Idaho.

I chose this monitor after getting on the Escapees RV Group forum and asking folks which monitor was good and which ones are not so great....some very trustful types recommended this unit , so that was good enough for me. (Thanks Mark )
It cost $160.00 + Shipping

 
Oct. 23 , 2005
It's my day off , so I walked down to the guys store who made our little stain glass panels...and picked up another stain glass panel I had him make for us.
This one will be located behind the woodstove area ...and measures 1 ft.x 2 ft.
Here's a pic of it

I did something interesting and pretty cool yesterday....and became a licensed manufacturer of Travel Trailers & Campers within the state of Alaska..
The primary reason I did this is ...I have no question given the social & economic trends these days around the country that we'll be treated pretty poorly in numerous campgrounds and areas because our trailer wont fit the conventional ideas of what a 'real' RV is.
It's already SOP for School bus conversions to be turned away from many campgrounds , because they're 'Home-made' ...so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that no matter how pretty our trailer will be ...we will be turned away from campgrounds .
They'll just politely tell me that their insurance policies only cover real RV's manufactured by real businesses ...and since our trailer wasn't made by a licensed business  we cant stay.
I'm fully aware , the 'real reason' behind campgrounds policies relating to 'homemade ' rigs ...has nothing whatsoever to do with issues about un-safe and questionable building practices relating to self-conversions and other 'outside the box RV's...it's really just about keeping the riff-raff out .
Since campground owners cant legally come out and say...we think you're Hippy Scum ...they've come up with legal ways to discriminate against you and your rig.
So....since I'm not hippy Scum or some similar odious type ... I don't want to have to put up with that crap.
Millie & I've experienced way too much of that sort of stuff when we traveled and lived in our van conversions ...and it got Old very quickly.
Now that I'm a Licensed Manufacturer of Trailers....I'll be able to tell some campground owner or clerk ....Excuse me....but our trailer is not "Home-Made' at all , it was built and designed by a perfectly legal business , licensed to build trailers for a mass-market.

Being a Realist I know we'll still run into problems ....but I figure , anything I can do to make our lives easier is worth a try.
It only cost us $100.00 per year to be licensed ...which I feel is a very good deal.
Not only does it give our trailer a more legitimate status....it also allows us to get back into online and other sorts of sales.
Before 'The Mobile Homestead " we were 'The Soused Moose" , which was an online store selling Alaskan Gifts & Foodstuffs.
We didn't make a fortune doing it , but we did OK , for sure.
I dropped the 'Soused Moose' , because we were figuring on moving into our bus conversion Latcho Drom...and knew we didn't have the room to store the inventory .
Now that 'The Mobile Homestead' is licensed I'll be able to become a dealer for Alternative Energy related sorts of stuff...which I think is very cool .
 

Since were full-swing into the rainy season here in Sitka , and cant realistically do any outside projects. I've been buying some more stuff I know we'll need for our trailer.
The Converter I installed in Latcho Drom came out of our last Bus 'Home' ...still works , but its around 8 years old . So just to be on the safe side I ordered a new Intelli-power Converter from Camping World. I'll install the old converter in whatever rig we wind up choosing for our tow-rig.

Plus , I ordered a 30-Amp RV Power Conversion Kit that we'll use for our Trailers main house plugin at campgrounds and such.
This is a very nice setup which is typically seen at any marina ...but I hadn't thought of using it for our trailer , until I found
Natasha's Camping Site
These folks switched out their old pop-up trailers house plugin for the Marinco 30-Amp RV Power Conversion Kit ....

 
Oct. 30th , 2005
I'm probably certifiably insane for doing this at this time of year when the weather is pretty much miserable...but damn the torpedoes ...full speed ahead !
I've started the cut our bus down to a better size to tow the trailer with project.
Today I ripped the wooden side panels off the front exterior of the bus and then went inside to demolish the last few cabinets and walls.
Here's a pic of our poor sad looking bus now....Boo-Hoo

In a few days I'll head on down to the Lumber place here and buy a bunch of stuff ...then I'll take down the wooden walls in the bus and start the painful process of hacking large chunks off the bus.

 
Nov. 8th , 2005
I lucked out and got 2 days off in a row so I've been busy working on the bus....
I have a page where I'm chronicling the experience with lots of pics here
Latcho Drom ReVisited

Our Solar water heater finally made it here and it looks like a really great one....when I get some time I'll upload a few pics of it...

Click-Here for Page 2 .....