Layton Renovation Day 2

Today makes 21 days that we've been working on our trailer. I'm not counting the days hubby works and I spend running around town to all the RV stores for parts. So in reality, it's been 4 weeks and 1 day. Today was damp and drizzly. It's been raining so hard the past couple days that the tarp is leaking and we already have water damage on our brand new paneling. So disheartening. On to Day 2's progress...or I should say discoveries...
We continued with the demolition, we kept cutting holes in the linoleum to see how far back the water damage went. And farther...and farther...

Well...this WAS a kitchen counter with oven and sink. The floor damage went this far back. It was all so dirty! In the process of removing the range hood (which ALWAYS rattled when I turned it on) we discovered several nests of a species of insect that I have no clue as to what kind or where they're native too, but I'm pretty sure they're not from around here...

ETA: I just googled this insect, I believe it's a mud dauber wasp. I still am not sure where they are from, maybe all over the US.

Once we moved over to the old Coleman heater we found several old wasp nests, one of which was still active and the queen gave me the stink eye.

At the end of the day, we had discovered several wasp nests, the mud nests, a bird's nest (have NO IDEA how that one happened since it was in the wall), a mouse nest, and an infestation of these brown bug's that I think are related to boxelder beetles.

I didn't get a picture of the interior, but we demolished the ENTIRE interior except for our precious bathroom that we renovated last summer. Here's a sideways view of the kitchen wall with all it's nasty pink insulation.

Man Hours: hubby-12, me-9 = 21 hours

Money Spent: $0

Layton Renovation Day 1

Demolition Day! The first of three actually, but we did not realize that at the time. Lets begin with why we chose to renovate our trailer....Last summer while heading to Yellowstone hubby noticed that the side "poofed" out while driving down the freeway. Throughout the two day drive down it "poofed" out further and further. We knew the corner trim was detached, but we didn't realize the metal siding would detach too.

We pulled out our fancy flame duct tape and taped that corner right up, but that was only a band-aid. Before this summer's adventures (which we have many planned) we decided to tear the front open, analyze the damage, and go from there, originally thinking this would just be a front end job like last summer's back end job. WRONG!!

We started with the removal of the propane tanks, battery, exterior lighting, front windows and screens, front side windows (in this case, one window and one airconditioner), two front corner trims and misc. other exterior access panels near the front end.

 Once we started removing the exterior siding and pink insulation, the damage was becoming more and more evident. BOTH front corners were separated from the exterior metal corner moulding for obviously a very long time because those corners basically crumbled in our fingers with dry rot.

 At the end of a twelve hour day and only 44 pictures to record our progress and "how to put it back together"...this was what we had:

Front wall removed, pink insulation tossed, top bunk fold-down door removed (we left the shelf because it stabilized the whole trailer during this process), back gaucho removed. Oh, and a corner of the floor vinyl cut away to see how rotted the floor was.

Man Hours: hubby-12, me-9 = 21 hours
Money Spent: $0