Spraying Paint

Old Man Winter is blowing in here in Central NY. I love winter. I get a nice break from working on projects around the property, the kids go sledding then come in and have hot chocolate around the fireplace, I can fall asleep on the couch on a Sunday afternoon and not feel guilty, and I get to enjoy ice fishing with my friends and family. One thing that really sucks about this winter, however, is that I am in the middle of an Airstream restoration and it is just too damn cold to get much done in the trailer. The last thing I need to do out there is to paint the interior. Then I can concentrate my efforts on refurbishing and rebuilding the cabinetry, which I can do in my nice warm shop. I have made one mistake so far in the painting process. Since I had to prime some of the aluminum that I stripped bare, it was left primer grey and I tried to just paint right over it using the final finish. I should have shot it with an almond color base coat first. I'm using too much of the Mulitispec paint to cover the grey. The areas of the trailer that were an off white color are painting very easily, and it looks good without having to use 4 coats. Live and learn.

This is the compressor that I am using. It's a high volume / low pressure set up. It works great for most paints, and is working fine for what I'm doing.Here's one wall just about finished. Once the walls and ceiling are covered, I'll go back and work on getting the nooks and crannies around the windows painted.

This is what the finish looks like. That's one coat over the off-white paint that was on the interior. I think it looks great. Much like Zolatone, but not exactly. There are blue and dark red flecks in the almond colored base. I'm going to put a clear coat on the paint when it's done to hopefully add some durability and make it easier to clean.

November 15th, 2028

Today was the opening day of deer season in Southern NY. I look forward to this day all year as it is a day when I can go sit in the woods, watch the sun come up, enjoy nature, and if I'm lucky, put some venison in the freezer. This year my middle son, Jacob, wanted to come along. Actually, all 3 boys wanted to come but it was Jake's turn to spend some "special time" with Dad, so off we went. I was a little bit hesitant at first, because if you've spent any time at all with a 10 year old, you'll know that they don't generally have much of an attention span. I thought I'd be constantly telling Jake to sit still, be quiet, only 15 more minutes and we'll leave, etc. I was completely wrong. We sat in the rain for almost 3 hours, waiting for a deer that we wanted to shoot. Eventually, I was the one who suggested we go back to the house to dry off and try to warm up. Jacob would have remained sitting in the rain all day if I'd let him. After a cup of coffee and a snack, we decided to head back out to the tree stand and see if we'd have any better luck. The rain had let up a bit, but I was not feeling very good about our chances. Well, we got to the stand, climbed up, and before I even had a chance to sit down, Jacob was whispering "Dad, Dad, there's a buck!". I turned around to see a deer, not 30 yards away, looking straight at us. I unslung my rifle, took aim, and shot. The deer took a few steps, and then fell dead. My kids know where a hamburger comes from, and understand that hunting is one of the ways we feed our family. They know that a gun is a tool that can be used to good and bad. They know that when something is shot, chances are good that it will die very soon. All of these thoughts were going through my mind in the moments after I watched the deer fall. "Good learning experience". "Respect wildlife even as we kill it". "The Lord provides". All of this fled my mind when my boy turned to me and gave me a hug that I will remember until the day I die. It's about all of those thoughts that I was having, but today was also about so much more.

I titled this blog post November 15th, 2028. My son will be 30 years old then. Most likely he will be busy with a career, a family, a life of his own. I will be 59 years old, and I may be wishing for just one more hunt with my kids. Just one more time to be together when it's just us. Well, today I got that wish, even if it's 20 years before I make it.

I be Preppin'

My last step before I paint the interior of my trailer is to clean up, prime, and mount the curtain rods. the straight pieces attach above the side windows above the beds, and the curved piece goes above the rear window in the bathroom. I'll get them mounted tonight, and hopefully have pictures of a painted interior on Thursday.

Masking.

It's been a while since I last posted an update, but that doesn't mean I haven't been working. I've got all of the interior skin in, and I primed the aluminum that I had stripped. Originally, I was going to strip all of the paint in the back, but honestly I found it to be too much work. Stripping the paint off a panel that was on a bench in my shop was a bear, and I did not even want to get into trying to strip the paint off the ceiling panels that were still attached to the trailer. Screw that. So I'm going to paint. I found a paint I like, I've got the bare aluminum primed with an etching primer, and the old paint sanded. I also re-installed the window trim prices. If you take these off, make sure you mark where they came off to make re-installation easier.

I had curtains like this in college.

I really like Frank's map-covered wall treatment. The effect looses something when you do it with the Sunday paper.