Home Improvements - Part 1

It has been a good while since I posted here. I have been meaning to get back into regular posting, but somehow always seem to get distracted. The husband and I have been busy making various improvements to our home on wheels. =)

Last year we finished the exterior paint job. It took probably a full year to remove ALL the decals, tape, and repaint everything outside. We still need to do another application of clearcoat, but that will come in time. I'm sure it would have gone significantly faster if we'd have had a garage to house Gertrude in while we were painting. As it was, we were at the mercy of Mother Nature to provide rain-free, LOW wind days with which to work. Paint completed March 2016

The next project to tackle was the flooring. We discovered a leak in the bathroom and found that a significant portion of our subfloor was rotted and needed replacing. There were also support boards and wall panels that had been ruined from years of neglect by previous owners in regards to the leak. So we tore up the floor, replaced the cheap MDF with plywood, put down vinyl tile floors, cut out and replaced the ruined supports, and then stained and replaced the wall boards. We decided to change the walls in the bathroom to a plastic wall board that was MUCH cleaner looking, as well as easier to maintain in the bathroom than wallpapered walls. While we had everything torn apart we also installed a new porcelain toilet. It was quite the investment, but it is taller than a standard RV toilet and far more sturdy than the one that was there originally. This renovation completed December 2015.

The next problem we found was sway when we traveled down the road, plus roughness of the overall ride. So hubby installed new shocks and a track-bar underneath the coach, and replaced the bushings on the rear of the MH. He also order and installed automatic wheel balancers on all four tires. He also discovered we had a bent wheel. We replaced it with the spare (also a full sized tire) and are happy to report we no longer shimmy at 60 MPH going down the road and have FAR less instability overall! Sadly, no pictures of these improvements. Completed August 2016.

I will post more next week. I need to go through all of our receipts and figure out the timeline on everything so I don't forget anything... *grin*