Re: [VACList] Question about 1948 Airstream

["Tuna" <rctowns@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi, Liz -

Congratulations on your new acquisition - is there some place you can post
some pictures of it?
My '48 Trailwind (19') had been 'rode hard and put away wet' over the years,
and had ended up as a 'party annex' to some frat house at the U of Montana.
So i gutted it completely, and in the course of doing so made some
discoveries... mine came with an original (1948) rear-bath - a 4'x2'
enamelled steel tub and no holding tank - they drained all the graywater
directly onto the ground. It also had a Sears glass-lined water tank and a
little 12v 'aquarium' pump to pressurize the water system. Previous-owner
'modifications' included a tire blow-out, a bent axle, a ruptured propane
line, and an exploded water heater with accompanying charring around the
resulting hole in the floor.

I'm in the process of constructing a new frame to accomodate the original
'pipe' and a brand new henschen axle/suspension.
I plan to plumb in freshwater and graywater 'tanks' of my own design, and a
blackwater tank, as well.

'restoration' of a '48 airstream requires some re-thinking of some
fundamentals... there really was no 'frame' (as such), and the original
leaf-spring suspension will have certainly lost its 'spring'. When you get
into it a bit, you may find that in some places the floor won't support the
weight of a large dog or a small human, much less a refrigerator or bed, and
that the absence of a frame under the floor will make 'floor repair' just
about impossible. Not trying to discourage you - it's just that the
immediate postwar years of trailer-manufacture used 'minimalist
engineering'... they didn't hold up nearly as well as the trailers from the
early '50's on...

VAC founder Bud Cooper did an astonishing restoration/renovation of his '49
Clipper, and inspired me to do much the same.

whereabouts are you located?

Tuna
Reno, NV