Coast Resorts Open Roads Forum: Anyone interested in 83 Pace Arrow Tear down and Rebuild?


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fulltimin

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Posted: 10/15/17 07:48pm

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And now for the corner. As you can see, when this was welded together, they ended up with a hole.

The fact that this was exposed to the weather didn't help at all. You can see the bottom part is discolored from road debris, so no doubt some of that water and possibly salt, (on the roadway if run during the winter), entered this hole and just laid in there until it rusted out.

The extra holes in the outside of the steel didn't help either.

As far as why the plastic brace in the corner is partially melted, I dunno.... This corner was nowhere near the exhaust from the genny, so your guess is as good as mine.

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If you want to do something, you will find a way.
If you don't, you will find an excuse.

-------------------------------------------------

Good judgement comes from experience.
A lot of experience, comes from bad judgement.

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/15/17 07:53pm

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Looks like it is time to order some more steel for this project.

I am going to need some for the roof, and a little more for this sidewall.

Hopefully, they will be able to get it in in a couple of days, and I can continue to cut, grind, and weld.

And then it will be time to glue aluminum to the bottom of the floor joists, insulate the floor, and put down some plywood. It will be nice to have a flat surface to walk on again.

It's a real trip (no pun intended) trying to walk on floor joists, instead of flooring.

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:39pm

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This stool is another one of those items, whose importance cannot be overstated.

If you are working around the exterior of a vehicle, and have a smooth, or semi smooth surface to roll on, these are great.

Trying to use them in the grass or stones, is worthless.

Being able to move about somewhat, is a wonderful thing. This particular one is adjustable up and down, which helps.

I like it.

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:43pm

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And if you are tearing one of these coaches apart, another thing to consider is this.

Make sure you have a few spare impact driver phillips heads bits. Sooner or later, you are going to need one of those extras.

Mostly number 2 bits, but number 1, and 3, also can come in handy at times.

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:47pm

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So, after looking at the rear passenger side wall steel from the outside, behind the door, (red) I decided, maybe I should look at the area in front of the door also, (yellow).

Even though it looked good from the inside, I am not sure that will be the case on the outside.

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:50pm

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First step is (drum roll.....), you guessed it. Remove rivets.

So, I started punching out the pop rivet centers, and drilling off the heads. This is what holds the piece of trim on. (red arrows)

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:53pm

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After removing the rivets, I started taking the screws out that hold the door frame in place, for the storage bin.

As I started at the bottom, all of those screws came out nicely.

The top area, circled in red, every single one of them was super rusty inside, and every one snapped off.

Well, this isn't going to end well, was my thought.

The yellow circle, is where the awning bracket is bolted to the coach, at the front. More on that shortly.

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 07:58pm

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In this shot, the red circles are where the awning bracket was screwed to the side.

The blue circle is where a prior installation of a different awning was anchored.

Not sure why they had 4 different holes there, but someone decided that silicone would be the best bet for sealing these up. Yea, right. Lol.

At the bottom, in the yellow circles, you can see 2 of the top screws holding that door frame in place. Yea, we are looking at rusty jones there. On the bright side, they came off easily. No, I didn't say they came out easily. They snapped off, so they came off easily.

[image]

fulltimin

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Posted: 10/16/17 08:02pm

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And this is a shot in front of the right front tire.

The red circle shows that just like at the back wheels, the bottom of the fiberglass is secured by a steel brace.

Bolted fast with a 1/4" bolt, at the bottom, that twisted off as well.

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