Winning!

At home for the holidays, I’m getting ready to go back to school at Yestermorrow. I’ll be away from the Airstream for a while, concentrating on my schoolwork, so I’m itching to get a little more work done while I’m at home.

Being more of a visual / hands-on learner, I thought it might be a good idea to see if there were any online videos of vintage Airstream repairs I could learn from. I was happy to find an episode of the t.v. show Classic Rides (hosted by Kevin Tetz) on YouTube, posted by user Kenwinning, [now ken nishikats – Ed.] that demonstrates several renovation projects that beginners can do. I watched the entire episode, and made a list of tools & materials I could use to make some simple repairs, just to keep the project moving along.

On my way back to New York (after visiting family down south for the holidays), I stopped at Out-of-Doors Mart in NC and picked up a few of the supplies that I’d need, most significantly a stone guard that they had on sale. Out-of-Doors Mart had both new & vintage Airstreams in the lot, so it was cool to take a peek inside some of them, feeling the history & imagining the possibilities. After that, a couple of trips to the local hardware stores when I got home, and I had some basic supplies to keep working.

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In the evening, I reviewed this 6-minute video on cleaning up the Airstream windows and attaching new weather stripping:

…looks like a quick and easy job, right? But it took an hour and a half just to clean and polish off the bits of old rubber seal from one window, using solvents, a scouring pad, and a Dremel.

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Time spent: 2 hr.

Total time spent: 8 hr.

Skill level: Beginner

Materials Purchased:

• Stone Guard ($ )
• Weather Stripping
• Steel Wool
• ___ Solvent
• Weather Strip adhesive (black)

Total Cost: + $61.06 =

See the entire Airstream renovation episode of Classic Rides now, courtesy of user ken nishikats on my YouTube channel!

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