With the refrigerator cabinet face boards cut to size, I moved on to the upper fridge vent.
The lower fridge vent would result from an appropriate number of louvered holes placed into a new replacement panel for the original propane compartment door, but Lil' Queeny had no fridge to begin with so there was no roof vent.
For those who aren't familiar with the role of these vents here's a simple low-down. The fridge cools by using heat - heat in the form of a little propane flame or a 110V or 12V electric heating element. That heat, in a little chimney on the back of the fridge, results in a refrigerant loop that causes coolant inside the system to draw heat from inside the fridge and dissipate it out the back in some coils. A convective flow of air across these coils draws the heat up and out - it pulls heat out of the inside of the fridge in other words. Of course we all realize that the absence of heat in our universe results in COLD!. But in order for this to work, there has to be a relatively balanced flow of outside air from the lower vent, past the fridge coils, and out the upper vent in the roof or high in the wall. The excess heat from the heating elements or the propane flame also rises up and out through this vent.
With their unique rounded side walls and roof, Travel Queen designed their own refrigerator roof vents that I fondly refer to as the "Travel Queen chimney".
Lil' Queeny didn't have a chimney because she started life with an icebox, but our donor camper had a chimney! And it was in great shape for 45+ years old. No dents or misshapen nature, the result of overhead smacks and wacks from such evil objects as tree branches. When I removed it from the donor camper I gave it a quick look see - and placed it on the shelf. Now I took it down and gave it a closer look.
I used a scraper and a vice and hammer and a length of flat steel stock and cleaned it up good, straightened the edges and flattened the screw holes.
Then, evenly balancing it front to back with the visual positioning of the lower vent (rough opening) I marked the roof. From that spot I adjusted it's inboard/outboard position to both fit the roof stringers and the location of the available roof space in the cabinet behind the upper shelf, noting that it also appeared plumb in it's vertical surfaces. After marking the exact location of the necessary roof opening, I drilled a 1/8" hole in the paneling from outside to inside and found the positioning was fine. Then I drilled larger holes in all four corners and used a sabre saw to make the rest of the cut.
Here's how it aligned and looked from the outside. Note how it's upper height limit is BELOW the highest levels of the roof line. This is an exterior Travel Queen characteristic I really wanted to have. I'm glad I was able to find an original piece and didn't have to use a more modern looking vent.
I still have to add a couple of 1x2 or 3/4" plywood cleats between the roof stringers before it's complete. I'll do that when I'm working more on the roof.
I removed the vent and put it back on the shelf for later. After I get the camper metal skin back on, I'll drill holes from inside through the metal in the corners of the opening, cut out the rectangle from the outside and install the roof vent like any other exterior fixture.
Then I had breakfast, got my haircut and went to the dentist.
