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TheSubaruJunkie's avatar
Jun 21, 2017

My 1984 Travel Lite 17 footer

Hello Everybody! I wanted to share my 17ft camp trailer I got for my family & I to use. I picked it up last year and have had to do a little work on it. But it serves us well and our family loves it!

Here's some exterior photos:







A couple shots of the interior when I first got it:








It pulls really well behind my Toyota Sequoia. Straight as an arrow and the truck can barely tell its there.


Here we are enjoying it on its very first family trip to Lake Tahoe.


And another site not far from Tahoe for trip #2


It really does make camping possible for our family!

37 Replies

  • Tvov's avatar
    Tvov
    Explorer II
    Nice work! That camper is laid out almost exactly like an old 13 foot Sunline that friends had years ago. The color scheme is identical.
  • fantastic indeed. If the camper works for you, then it's the right RV. It doesn't have to be new, huge, or a Taj Mahal on wheels.

    We were in the Teton's and Yellowstone recently and saw all kinds of new/retro styled campers along with many older units like yours. There seems to be some real momentum in the industry offering throwback models. Lot's of 'canned hams' and 'tear drops' rolling down the road.

    KJ
  • Love the old sub 20ft trailers. Looks to be very nice. Great job and great find.
  • Thanks Guys! I don't know anything about the history of this trailer. I kind of bought it in haste, and could have maybe done a better job looking it over. But its much better than sleeping in a tent!! And the price I paid was fair, considering the market for these things :E

    One of the things I did overlook was the fact it was missing the back-rest for the sofa, which also doubles as half of my full size bed. I was able to find some cushions that kind of worked as replacements, but they were not very comfortable at all. The 30 year old foam was not going to cut it with my wifes bad back, and me trying to enjoy the wilderness with her :)

    So first thing first, was to build a new bed frame and order a new mattress. Before any of that, I had to do something about this "shelf" that seemed to only exist to bruise my wifes shins in the middle of the night.

    Before:


    After:


    After that, it was time to do something about the bench area. Both rear corners of the trailer suffer from rot. I originally cleaned out all the damaged wood and sprayed some expanding foam insulation into the corners to stop any drafts.


    And then I set forth laying out a basic frame,


    Once that was complete, I covered the frame with some sheets of plywood,


    And then layered that with some hard foam padding.


    I wanted a mattress that would fit the entire useable area in the back of the trailer. So I bought one that was slightly too large and then cut it down to size so it would fit.


    $12 harbor freight ceramic knife cut thru the memory foam & dense foam like it was butter!




    And now we have the most comfortable sleep you'll get at 4400ft in the forest!


    I also removed all the old curtain rods, and half-curtains (which are useless by the way!) and replaced them with something that will actually block the sunlight. The curtains used to be a set of full length curtains we had in the bedroom when we bought the house. I was able to cut them all to size and just quickly staple them into place.

    They do much better at blocking out the sun than those useless half curtains it used to have.


    I would have liked to have curtain rods and all that fancy stuff, but I only had a few days to get all of this work completed before a weekend camping trip. And the first trip with the new bed is Wife approved!!