Avion truck campers - Hundreds of photos
Without going into too much painful detail, we had a mishap several week-ends ago. While working with sand bag crews on the Mississippi River, the truck and camper fell into the flood waters as a road...
Forum Discussion
Hello All,
Krustydog I'm envious of your progress, especially as I look out to blowing snow today, which I guess you also have. I have been feeling the need to move more quickly on the Avion, and the reality is I have a more than full time job with the rugrat and the house and my job, so now I will accept and enjoy the restoration no matter how long it takes (I have high hopes of heading out this time next year).
Last weekend we picked up a 12ft 1966 holiday travel trailer to buy us some time to work on the avion. It will fit the 3 of us for a couple years, then it will be the next restoration project, or air bnb suite.
Hubbie took the original water heater to work and the pressure test was successful. I expect reports today on the burner's performance. I haven't vetted the original furnace yet, but expect it to also work fine, with a little maintenance.
All cabinet doors are also with hubbie to be treated with ethylene glycol and then a little sanding/varnishing. They aren't in fantastic shape, but will do for now. I'm looking for second hand latches but may have to order from VTS if I can't find any before spring.
The fridge and stove/oven are stuffed into the Van cab for now - I'm not sure the fridge would fit through the door anyway.
My leak proofing and patching has been mostly successful. Temperatures are expected to rise over the weekend and I should be able to finish up with the front window. As the roof penetrations haven't been resealed/vetted yet I'll tarp the whole thing on the weekend so that I can continue to work on inside wood for awhile yet.
Apart from replacing the toilet and BW tank with a cassette toilet and putting a hepvo vent instead of U-traps we will keep the original configurations as everything is intact and working. I'm going to patch the roof hole from the AC to make more room for solar panels. Both our front and rear original vents have fans, so I will replace the motors with new at some point.
I'm working on a configuration to extend the bed a little and still allow easy access from the van cab to camper and not impede sleeping (for 1) on the dinette bunk. The dinette is a little awkward already as the forward bench was removed to increase the size of the access passage to the van and we need it to be useful and comfortable for 2 adults and 1 rapidly growing child
I did consider moving the fridge more forward to help keep weight forward, but then considered that the ease of getting a beverage from the fridge was much better in the fridge's original location - perhaps those original Avion employee hunters also liked a good cold beverage?
Krustydog I'm envious of your progress, especially as I look out to blowing snow today, which I guess you also have. I have been feeling the need to move more quickly on the Avion, and the reality is I have a more than full time job with the rugrat and the house and my job, so now I will accept and enjoy the restoration no matter how long it takes (I have high hopes of heading out this time next year).
Last weekend we picked up a 12ft 1966 holiday travel trailer to buy us some time to work on the avion. It will fit the 3 of us for a couple years, then it will be the next restoration project, or air bnb suite.
Hubbie took the original water heater to work and the pressure test was successful. I expect reports today on the burner's performance. I haven't vetted the original furnace yet, but expect it to also work fine, with a little maintenance.
All cabinet doors are also with hubbie to be treated with ethylene glycol and then a little sanding/varnishing. They aren't in fantastic shape, but will do for now. I'm looking for second hand latches but may have to order from VTS if I can't find any before spring.
The fridge and stove/oven are stuffed into the Van cab for now - I'm not sure the fridge would fit through the door anyway.
My leak proofing and patching has been mostly successful. Temperatures are expected to rise over the weekend and I should be able to finish up with the front window. As the roof penetrations haven't been resealed/vetted yet I'll tarp the whole thing on the weekend so that I can continue to work on inside wood for awhile yet.
Apart from replacing the toilet and BW tank with a cassette toilet and putting a hepvo vent instead of U-traps we will keep the original configurations as everything is intact and working. I'm going to patch the roof hole from the AC to make more room for solar panels. Both our front and rear original vents have fans, so I will replace the motors with new at some point.
I'm working on a configuration to extend the bed a little and still allow easy access from the van cab to camper and not impede sleeping (for 1) on the dinette bunk. The dinette is a little awkward already as the forward bench was removed to increase the size of the access passage to the van and we need it to be useful and comfortable for 2 adults and 1 rapidly growing child
I did consider moving the fridge more forward to help keep weight forward, but then considered that the ease of getting a beverage from the fridge was much better in the fridge's original location - perhaps those original Avion employee hunters also liked a good cold beverage?
