The Millicent Chronicles; two foot roof raise, big tailgate

[Elliot Naess]

All right, let’s wrap this up. The Komf-O-Krate has been cluttering my front yard for a week -- long enough!



A big mystery was “Where Is The Water Tank? Turns out, that’s one piece that I could never have removed without chewing away the rest of the trailer first. The fresh water tank was three inches thick and sandwiched under the floor between the frame rails. Must have held several... pints of water.


It helps to have help:



My neighbor Mishawn sometimes comes over to assist on my projects. Here he wields the magnetic sweeper, which picked up fourtyeleven gazillion rusty staples and assorted other ferrous debris from the Komf-O-Kamper - keeping said pointy things out of Millicent’s tires. When Mishawn helps, the work slows down, but it CHEERS HIM UP, which is rather more important, since it is probably not all that much fun to go thru life as a permanent Short Bus Student. A little bit of my time... cheap. The grin on his face when I call him my Chief Assistant Project Helper... priceless.


All done:



Nekkid. Ready to become a bumper-pull flatbed. No, the frame is not bent -- the factory kicked it out in the left rear corner to make more room for the sewer tank.

Big dirty job. Didn’t take all that many hours, but quite unpleasant work -- except for the fun of DESTROYING THINGS.
Demonknight is taking the windows and Captainkf is taking the furnace. I’m gonna go take a shower.

Now back to our regular programming!

[Demonknight]

hate to point this out..thats kind of a wimpy looking frame...hope the one under my butt is a bit stronger....I have hopes of turning it into a car trailer...

[Elliot Naess]

Yes, that trailer frame is on the flimsy side. The factory probably counts on the stiffness of the "house" to keep it from flexing. I'll be building a whole new frame on top of that frame, so it will be fine.

The wheel bearings are scary loose -- need servicing before use. Tires are petrified -- replace. Then it will make a great Kinetic Racing Sculpture hauler.

[timbuk]

there will have to be duty on that furnace if its coming up here to bc canada..... plus where captainf is that furnace could be on double duty! nice work spreading the parts elliot global!

[captainkf]

I have family in spokane, so I get things shipped there. Then when I go down to visit (we live on the border, so 2 hrs to spokane) we pick whatever is waiting. If we stay down there for 48 hrs, we can bring back $400 worth of goods duty free. This is much cheaper than shipping. I have had ups charge up to 80% of the value of an item for brokerage fees. they're theives as far as i am concerned.

- Richard

[KevinCoughlin]

I have to admit to reducing a "not quite good" trailer into it's component parts as well. The trailer was made into a radio shack by a bunch of ham radio fanatics in Bellevue (the town, not the mental home) and was a gift when they got space in a converted bus for disaster drills. Since I've gotten it, it has been a construction office out at my property, and has yeiled the roofmount A/C (110 volt unit, and is mounted in the rear bedroom of old #36) - the sink is remounting later this afternoon into the bus, and the two 40 gallon fresh tanks and battery powered pump now act as a self contained water source in the 8 x 12 shed next to the bus that houses our bathroom (temporary water hoses to it have been frozen for three months here just outside Spokane).

I was GOING to try and re-use some of the cabinets, but the build quality of them is just so poor as to not bother at all. I used "freebie" and "cheap" cabinets either left over from my own remodels, or found in various places. They do better, although the bus is still what I consider VERY rough. The frame (about a 20 footer) has tandem axles, electric brakes, and is destined to become a trailer for my 1931 Chris Craft replica runabout (funny.... HIS wife said he had to get rid of the boat, or her.... glad he liked his wife better!).

We have lived in our bus (sister to Elliots first one - old #35) since last spring - through heat (had to put a tent over it to cut the temps) and a few feet of snowfall (little woodstove half surrounded by concrete blocks for thermal mass when it was -8 degrees Fahrenheit) and it looks like I'll be in it for at LEAST another year. So this weekend my wife and I have started planning on making some PROPER modifications to this road-bound spaceship - including more insulation and a possible radiant floor. Still thinking about whether a roof raise is warranted - I've gotten used to the ceiling and the smaller cubic area is easier to heat/cool - I will have to think how much room I will lose in the extra flooring.

I still haven't mounted my amber rotating lights on top - but I think I will HAVE to. Don't forget, Elliot - I have a pair of light bars (front and rear) set aside for Millicent, as well. If nothing else, I can bring them with me to Davinci Days in July!

[Elliot Naess]

Hey, Kevin, how are you! Finally dug your computer out of the snow, eh?!
Trade you four drive tires for those light bars at Corvallis in July.

Now, here is the first item from the Komf-O-Kamper that is installed on Millicent:



Not a big deal, but finally some Progress again!

[reprobate]

Great sermon, Elliot! Yeah 90% of every job is the 10% at the end. Anyone can start a job, but it takes patience and perserverance(sp?) to see a job through to its completion.

Alas...there is no sister to Julie.....but she does get a dreamy look in her eyes every time she looks at Millicent.....

[Elliot Naess]

Now stop right there, Reprobate -- I'm no home-wrecker! So you better tell Julie that Elliot says she is fat-ugly-and-stupid, and then you spend the rest of the day convincing her how wrong Elliot is. Hopefully, that will cure her of Millicent envy.

Yeah, it was Sunday, and the only church I attend is the one with the giant pale blue ceiling (and stars at night), so I figured I'd try my hand at preaching to the entire world via the internet -- a bit about finishing projects and a bit about being neighborly. Won't happen again until next leap year, I promise.

[Elliot Naess]

The second Komf-O-Krate item has been installed; convertible table.



Serves as table, and...



...as bunk for Sam -- Peter and Jerri’s little sprout who joined the team on Christmas Eve.
The now-unused seat on the right will be replaced with something more practical -- it already proved not-very-useful.