Ok this is a big one. But we are so happy with the transformation!
The original plan was to rip these doors out, take the shower out, then replace that wall with something more structurally sound than this flaky MDF stuff the trailer is made out of. Well as we started taking more and more parts in this area apart we came across some water damage issues and this projected slowly started to become a lot bigger than we thought. No problem though!
Like we planned, to start we took these doors out, Kyle literally had to rip them out of the wall. The wall was so water damaged the screws were just spinning in their spots when he was trying to unscrew the hinges.
Next was the shower. That was quite the project, we saved the potty though (thats a post for another day). Ok so now we have a hole in the wall and a hole in the floor.
Thankfully this wonderful man from "Tom's Tools" showed up just in time to help with the rest of this project (aka: dad)!
When I got under the trailer to fix the hole in the floor, I noticed this nice water spot. This is directly underneath where those 2 doors used to be for the storage box. Those pipes in the photo are from the shower that used to be there too. If you step on that spot in the trailer you can feel how spongy the floor is. Not too safe.
So this fixing the hole in the floor will soon be cutting a bigger hole in the floor then fixing that! Here is the hole in the floor fixed from underneath the trailer.
This is the underneath photo of the storage box. The previous owner repaired half of the box it seems. That is where the white painted wood is, then they braced the new repair with that 2x4 it looks like.
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| My lovely hand model from "Tom's Tools" 😉 |
Basically we didn't need any tools for ripping this wall out. That is how bad the water damage was, you could stick a butter knife through the wall if you wanted too. Dad just pulled pieces of it off with his hands chunk by chunk. We got most of the wall off then started with the floor. It was hard to decide how much of the existing vinyl we should cut out so we started with a small section…
Dad started on this corner, again just pulling pieces of rotted wood up with his hands.
Then came the power tools.
Ok so now we have a nice little hole in the corner and a big hole where the former wall used to be. Oh but we kept going!
After about an hour of ripping, cutting and using every saw we own we managed to end up with this backwards "L" shaped hole. We then removed the rest of the vinyl and decided that we should replace as much of the rotted wood as possible.
Thanks to Andrew, we had some heavy duty OSB laying around that was perfect for this project. We strategically cut some pieces to fit our new hole so they would be braced by the metal beams under the trailer as well as some wood pieces we would put under the trailer for extra support.
Now that the floor is fixed, we wanted to tackle the support for the storage box lid. Dad took the wiring for the storage box light out and added wiring for the new outlets that we will be putting in later. Also as you can see the "supports" for the storage box lid weren't even connected and they were just some dinky 1x2's stapled to the wood. You can also see 2 different pieces of wood here but really there were 3 different pieces of wood, the third tucked behind the wall that we can't see in this photo. All those boards were sagging and overall this mess needed some help.
It may not look like much but after awkwardly shoving that 2x4 and some shimmed wood into this cavity then re-screwing those little 1x2s back in really helped support this part of the storage box lid.
Now its time to put the new wall in. We bought a piece of 1/2" Zip System Sheating from 84 Lumber for $20. This stuff is waterproofed on one side so I primed the back side with the Zinsser Bulls Eye Interior Latex Primer we have been using. Kyle and Dad cut it down to size then Dad notched out one corner and with some force and shims he and Kyle got this piece in nicely.
They also installed a piece of 1/4" plywood to fill the other hole in the wall on the right side then added 2 outlets, one to each new wall.
They added one USB Outlet and one standard outlet in this corner. Previously the only outlet on this entire side of the PUP was the one for the AC. So now it is nice to have more spots on this side of the PUP to plug in if need. Also with our new "potty/side table" that Kyle tackled we now have a spot to plug in and rest them on the side table if need, like a phone or speakers, etc.
It may not look like much from an outsiders perspective, but man was this a project. We are so glad that we tackled it and so thankful for all of Dad's help. Kyle and I would have been pretty lost without him. 2 separate days of work and we have a stable and (hopefully) waterproof section of our PUP. Next we will need to secure the wall to the floor and support it from inside the storage box then paint and put the new flooring down. But for now, we are very happy with how this turned out!
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