My objective is to get down to the frame. Everything must go. Kelly came back for a second day of dissection and we got the roof off and the walls down. The “fix-it” job on the roof is truly atrocious. There was a piece of angle iron sistered in to support the sagging roof at one point. I recognized it as having been the side of a bed frame! I do have to give the P.O. credit for his resourcefulness I suppose.
The next day I got the floor off and was able to get to work on the frame. The original bumper stuck out really far in back, and the exposed parts of the frame were very rusted, so I cut them off and will re-attach the bumper to solid metal. It will look better that way, too.
I made very careful diagrams of every piece of bracing and every stud, measuring the distance on center from front to rear and Kelly recorded them in the notes. We could rebuild the trailer from scratch if we had to, that’s how thorough the notes are.
While taking off the floor I found lots of evidence that animals had chewed through the Celotex and made homes, as well as yet more wasp’s nests. I am going to clean and paint the frame and then I can finally start putting it back together!