Damage repair

On the journey here to my present location some significant damage was done to the caravan. I was visiting a place called Chanctonbury Ring on the South Downs. (I will be writing about that in due course.) The caravan had grounded on a badly rutted track. The aluminium sheet I had long ago fitted that runs from the tailboard to the underside had snagged and ripped open the nearside rear corner of my caravan. I had patched it up, but of course, it needed repairing.

I started by lowering the front of the caravan so as to lift the rear for better access. I then unpinned the ali and cut off the mangled section.

I then found a plank of wood and fitted it to the caravan in order to give it extra strength.

Michael managed to find me a nice sheet of aluminium which I pinned into place,

folded

and roughly shaped.

At some point during the repair, a man had stopped by. He was trying to offload his rubbish. One thing that I spotted was one of those pedal bins. Only this one was a double bin. The body of the bin was made of polished aluminium. I took the bin. I stripped the plastic and gubbins from it.

I then decided to improve the rest of the tail by cutting, shaping and pinning the ali to it. In order to make sure that the possibility of damage caused by grounding could never happen again, I wrapped the ali sheets a lot further under the underside. Snagging is now impossible. To make sure, I also clamped wooden blocks to the underside, pinning the ali between.

I then filled the dents and joins with body filler and sanded smooth, shaping contours as I went.

The corner of the tailboard was also badly damaged. So, next, I blanked the end.

Then I made new endcaps for both ends and fitted them.

Originally, when I redesigned the tailboard and painted the tiger stripes, I had shaped a sloping edge with body filler for the rain to drain over. The shock of the impact on the wood had caused it to crack.

I sanded the whole area back.

I then filled the cracks.

With Daniel’s aid, I lagged mastic between the wall and the run-off. The purpose of which is to create a flexible rainproof bond, which allows for the stress on the caravan when in motion.

Once set, I sanded back

and primed. Then sanded back the woodwork.

I also primed the new rear end.

I then restained the tailboard and painted the rear end.

The most difficult part of the repair was reshaping the corner. I had to get it to match the opposite corner. It took weeks and weeks to get it right. Eventually, I was happy.

So painted the corner to complete the repair.

Finally, I tidied up the exterior locker door with a fresh coat of paint and a restain.