Galley Demolition

First up on the Project list is to renovate the galley. here's how it looked when the previous owner refurbished it:

On the left is the original stove (or, I think it's the original stove based on pictures of other canned ham trailers from the early 60s). Under the stove is what appears to be storage. Open that door and you're confronted with the wheel well. There's not much room in there for much of anything. In the center section is the sink and two drawers. The door at the bottom, like the one next to it, has the remainder of the wheel well as well as the electronic connections for the refrigerator and A/C unit. On the right is the air conditioner over the college dorm room sized fridge. While it's nice to have air conditioning, the associated ducting eats up a lot of space. And, that fridge is too small for our needs.

The sink has two faucets; the left one is for direct hook-up to water service (like at a camp ground with facilities) and the right one has a built-in pump for use with a fresh water tank (which I will need to obtain).

At some point, the original title was lost and the trailer was re-titled and given a Kentucky Vehicle Identification Number. I'm under the impression that the original VIN may be buried under layers of paint on the trailer tongue. However, the previous owner said that he tried to uncover it, to no avail. At this point, if I do discover the VIN, I am not going to try to re-title the trailer. The person at the DMV said it would be a waste of my time. I'm inclined to agree.

As part of the re-titling, Kentucky required an inspection and certification process. Part of the inspection is done by local Fire Department personnel. I'm a little fuzzy on the reasoning but the FD inspector highly suggested that the stove and propane lamp be disconnected. So, the trailer came with a non-operational stove and propane lamp. It does have a 20 lb. propane bottle that is not connected to anything, it just rides on the tongue. The soft copper gas lines are in-place, just disconnected.

The stove will be replaced with a cook top and the area below converted to kitchen storage. So, I will be connecting the propane bottle to the cook top and, if I can find the parts, I may (re)connect the propane lamp, too.

The small fridge will be replaced with a larger unit. And, I will swap locations of the air conditioner and the fridge. In this manner, the top of the fridge will be higher than the counter top while the air conditioner will sit such that it can drain (condensate) and vent better (wait until you see the support structure behind the a/c and fridge).

Remove the Stove - pretty simple as it was just sitting there. I picked it up and took it out:

You can clearly see the soft copper propane line above the wheel well. You can also see some electrical cords and the plumbing lines for the sink. I will most likely sell the stove but need to determine if it works. That shouldn't be too hard to do.

Next, I simply pulled the air conditioner from its slot in the galley:

It's a little hard to determine the orientation of things here but I'll try to explain; the back of the a/c unit vents warm air (from inside the trailer). The square-ish hole to the right is actually the top of the exhaust vent shaft. The hot air is then blown down and outside under the trailer. Cool outside air is drawn in from the far right and above that exhaust plenum. At the very bottom of the picture, you can see the exhaust vent shaft (right) and the supply air hose (silver, to the left). The black stuff you see is Flex-Seal (that stuff you can spray on the inside of gutters to stop them from leaking). That's a (pitiful) attempt to seal the plywood shelf from condensate damage. There was also about three tubes worth of clear silicone caulk on every possible wooden angle joint, in an effort to keep water from leaking into the galley. We'll be using a galvanized metal drip pan and galvanized duct work to properly handle exhaust air and any condensate.

The fridge was also just sitting in place. I pulled that out revealing the rest of the ducting for the a/c:

On the left is (cool) 'supply' air ducting. A bathroom vent fan, that blows air in, from under the trailer, is just out of the shot, to the left. On the right is the exhaust air duct which vents hot air out. The intake and exhaust 'ports' are less than 12 inches apart. That needs to be addressed.

Here's a shot of the vent fan and associated electrical connections for the fan, fridge and a/c. The wheel well is quite intrusive:

Time for the counter top and sink to be removed:

This was pretty simple because I only had to disconnect the faucet on the left (one compression fitting), the sink drain (one hose clamp) and two wood screws (that held the counter top down - one by each front corner of the sink).

Counter top removed:

Now, I need to disconnect the framework from the back wall. Interestingly, there are nails that come through, from the outside, that hold the framework. I'll need to use one of those hacksaw blade holders to cut the nails and staples from between the frame and the wall.

Some of those nails were pretty big.....

I didn't take any pictures while cutting nails and staples. For the most part, that hacksaw blade holder worked pretty well. Of course if you have a reciprocating saw, that's the better tool to use. The removed support structure is on the left with the top pointed toward you. The top of the exhaust plenum is at the bottom and the rear (unused) counter top brackets are visible (on the 1 x 2 wood that's pointing toward the ceiling).

Here, you can plainly see the Flex-Seal that was sprayed on in an effort to waterproof the paneling. The rectangular hole, in the back corner, is the exhaust port in the floor.

The air supply fan sat on the plywood curb attached to the floor. That hole is currently covered by some thin sheet metal (to keep animals out).

The coiled soft copper line is the propane line to the stove (soon to be cook top). The grey hose is the sink drain and the soft copper line that's back against the wall is the supply tube for the faucet. There currently isn't any line for the pump faucet (nor is there a fresh water tank, yet).

The wheel well is clearly visible and you can see it's a space hog. That green thing, to the left of the water supply line, is the "fuse box". It's one thirty (30) amp fuse that feeds the 120 volt light fixtures in the trailer. The electrical supply for the a/c and fridge (the power strip) went through the circular hole in the floor (above the fan curb). We'll be pretty much switching everything over to 12 volt with the exception of the a/c unit. In this manner, we can run off of 120 volt power or 12 volt battery.

Update: my wife was kind enough to forward her drawing for what the galley will look like, when complete:

Stay tuned for more.