About a month ago we purchased, mostly on impulse, an old popup camper. We have friends that have one and they love it, coupled with some memories from my childhood, it seemed like a good thing to do. We were looking in the $4k-$6k range, but one came up for $1k and I scheduled to see it just as it was listed. I bought it right away as the price was great. We were just hoping that all was in decent order.
I was a bit optimistic we’d make it home fine as the tires on the trailer were brand new. We made it maybe 5 minutes before we realized the lug nuts weren’t on tight enough and most had come off. That stranded us on the side of the road while Yun went to track down some lug nuts and a wrench.
Eventually we made it home. I then realized our Honda Element would not have the proper towing capacity – it can handle about 1500 lbs and this thing is about 1800 lbs dry. This was my justification for the purchase of the Tacoma. We will now sell the Honda and should get much more than we paid for it years ago.
Needless to say, the thing was mostly hideous and smelled.
But functionally, all seemed to be in working order. We have watched a number of videos of people online restoring their old campers and thought they looked great – so I thought we might attempt the same.
The first step was to rip everything out of there – but rip gently, because I’d need to put it back in.
Getting the cabinets and appliances out was actually much more difficult than I had anticipated. If it was a proper demo job with a sledge hammer, it would have taken minutes, but I went slow and careful.
Once everything was out – I primed the interior walls and then began to lay the floors. I have a surplus of vinyl planks from the house, so I just used those. They worked great and it really wasn’t that many cuts.
Once the floors were in, the primer was dry enough to go ahead and paint the interior the blue I found. This seemed like a better solution than white (which most people seem to prefer) as it should be more forgiving with keeping it look clean.
The old countertops were pretty ugly. So I used them as templates for some birch I bought.
The rest of the countertops worked out to look the same. They are much more solid and look a lot better. I will change the faucet for something new, but will keep the old stainless sink as it looked fine.
Getting everything back in was no small task. The original wood is pretty cheap and fragile, so I did some reinforcements to improve upon that. I still have paint touch up on the interior and will restain the countertops a few more times before adding polyurethane as a protective coat.
The old cabinet trim was a hideous brown – so I updated that with some light blue trim I received this morning. I like the contrast a lot.
My favorite part was reupholstering the cushions. Ana and Yun worked on those and did a spectacular job – though it took a lot of work. We removed the old zippers, washed them, and reinstalled them on the new. In retrospect, I probably should have bought new ones for a few dollars rather than the hours it took to get the old ones out.
It was a lot of work this weekend – exhausting really. Gabby and Orlando came up to help me and we got everything above done working 14 hours on Saturday and another 6 on Sunday morning.
What remains:
- Touch up interior paint
- Stain and polyurethane
- Install fridge, hot water heater, and air heater
- Replace the curtains with something less visually offensive
- Wash the canvas
- Reseal the roof and paint
- Reseal the bead around the perimeter
- Paint the trailer black
- Remove the external decals, power spray, and paint
- Add new brake lights
- Add new internal lights
- Add new front door light
- Steam clean mattresses
I am hopeful all of the above will be finished by October, as it begins to cool down, so we can start using this thing on our weekends. On top of all that, I need to finish the suspension on the truck. Then I will take it down to the dealership in Mexico to make sure everything is in perfect order.
The paint on the truck is terribly faded, so I will have the whole thing painted. I am hopeful these things too will be completed by early October. With all of that, we should be good to go!