Let the Games Begin!

The Chinese have a curse, May you live in interesting times. Well, that can also be transferred to renovating motor homes, dang nabitt.

After we brought Galavan III home and storing it for the winter we discovered a little bit more water damage than we originally thought. The roof which I thought was rubber was actually aluminum but had been recoated so many times it led me to believe that it was rubber. The walls had had a new sheet of paneling glued on hiding the old rotten paneling. So having given some thought of putting it back on the market and taking our loss or fixing it up we have decided to fix it, and see how it goes.

The first job will be the roof, in the spring I climbed up and tried to see just how bad it was, it was bad enough the roof will need replacing. After getting some quotes for having it done we decided to do to ourselves (read Jerome). We got online and found a place to order everything we need from a company in the States. We set up a drop off place at a warehouse just across the border and placed the order. I also found a place that supplies restoration epoxy at a reasonable cost and placed an order for that also. And waited, and waited. Finally, everything was shipped and was waiting at the warehouse in Niagara Falls, NY. Early one Saturday morning off we head to the States, found the warehouse pick up our packages and headed back across the border. After declaring the supplies and paying our duty we got home and started to unpack all the boxes, only to find the vents were missing.

So Monday morning back on the phone with the supplier and was told that they would be shipped right away.Two weeks and three phone calls later they finally arrived. So Karin and I headed back across the border. Once again pick up the package and headed to the fabric store so Karin could pick up some patterns.

This time the border was a little bit interesting, Karin declared the patterns and I explained that we had already paid the duty on the vents, showed the CBSA agent all the documentation from the previous trip, and you could just see the wheels turning on whether we needed a complete search or if my story was just weird enough that I was actually telling the truth, I won out and we didn't even have to pay the duty for Karins patterns.

So now the real fun begins, I waited for a weekend with little chance of rain in the forecast and got to work.

Up early Saturday morning and took off the awning (it will need replacing also) which was duct taped and caulked in place, and started to work on removing the caulking and termination strips.

The Duct Tape and vast amounts of Caulking.

I counted 4 types of caulking including Silicone and  Epoxy (never bothered to remove the existing just went over)

The job was not too bad just really long the multi-tool made quick work or I would probably still be doing it.

One of the main problems with the roof was that the aluminum went under the corner trim.

Just put duct tape and cover it with caulking it will work, NOT!

Day Two: the back half...

...was more of the same.

The first weekend was 16 hours in the sun but managed to get the caulking and the damaged plywood removed and covered with plastic for the week. We still had a lot of water in the styrofoam insulation so this lets it dry out.

We left the aluminum on the front half as it was well adhered and I could not get it off.

WEEKEND TWO
Karin and I had a commitment on Saturday so just Sunday was spent removing more caulk and sanding down the corner molding to remove the residue.

WEEKEND THREE
I applied new Plywood after epoxying all the wood to give strength to any rot.

the white along the side is Epoxy renovator fill to give the edge a smooth transition.

On Sunday after sanding down the fill I managed to get the new roof in place and glued down, it has a few wrinkles but we had a good storm last night and the inside was nice and dry.

Next weekend I have to glue and Eternabond the sides paint and replace the transition strips (Karin and Meg cleaned and scraped out all the old caulking, glue and goo), replace the vents and add the sky light (we are putting in the shower), and the AC which, amazingly enough, works.