Frame damage this is a 1986 Airstream Sovereign frame had rust problem behind step.
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| 10-10-06 starting
to remove belly pan & inspect cross members for rust as you can see in the
picture's below there's a lot of oxidation between the aluminum belly pan
and the steel frame. Will clean frame and coat with Por-15 before
reinstalling the belly pan. The trailer jacks will have to be remove in
order to remove the belly pan and then remove the bottom radius as
seen in the left image. The removal of the bottom radius consist of removing the trim then drill out the pop rivets. Be sure to take safety precaution such as wearing a good dust mask and safety glasses ,when you drop the belly pan it will have dust and fiberglass partials all in the air and you don't want to breath that or get it in your eyes. The fiberglass brakes down after a number of years little by little end up with a bad breathing environment also the fiberglass makes a good habitation for small rodents, especially field mice if the trailer has been setting for a long time it makes them a good home leading to bad air quality in side of the camper due to their feces which is an unpleasant thing to thank about but more unpleasant if you are having to breath the same air. |
| Had to move jack's stands out of way to drop the belly pan as I have already stated, as you can see in the picture's below after dropping the lower short panel you can see the cross member very well and the rust in the picture to the right is a good example. On this particular project to the front of the step the frame has some bad frame damage due to water / moisture in about a 12" area , the good thing is it is a square tube frame and only the out side of frame is damage so in this case just had to cut out the bad section on the side and not cut all the way through the frame it self as you will see later on. |
| Remove trim and drop radius panel. The picture on the above far right shows a hole in floor the owner cut out to repair and found the rusty area. What's you see in the image with rust on it is a short extension of the cross member but is welded to the out side of the frame for support. |
| Frame beside step bad shape will have to remove step and repair. Below you can see where the lower panel , belly pan and insulation has been remove giving you a good view of what's going on under the trailer. I have remove some belly pan where the fiberglass insulation was laying on the aluminum pan and would be wet, the fiberglass insulation will be replace by the 2" Styrofoam insulation you will see later on. |
