Spending My Money Upfront

Two of my Connecticut Airstream buddies, Skip and Annette, basically gave me the same advice: it is better to pay more for a trailer you can use right away rather than spending lots of time and money restoring a wreck. (Skip followed the advice, Annette and her husband spent months doing an excellent restoration of a 70s Tradewind.)

Sure, lots of people enjoy the thought and effort of restoration. But right now, I don't really have the skills or patience (my Gen-X-ness coming through) to do that. So, it was awesome that I found a trailer that was so solid.

It helped that CanAm thoroughly went through it, and that the trailer had been little used but well cared for through its 32 year history. I even found asales receipt from 1982 in the trailer. The previous owners traded in an Argosy 24' trailer on this Minet. Shockingly, my Minuet and tow vehicle work cost a princely $12,500 (Canadian) in 1982!! Let's just say that I paid quite a bit less (even without factoring in inflation), despite having CanAm do a bunch of work for me before delivery.


Since the old bias-ply tires were done for, I got a new set of tires installed. My vanity dictated getting a new set of wheels - I like these because they look like the Alcoa aluminium wheels Airstream used in the 70s. The bearings and brakes were also serviced.

My trailer doesn't have an air conditioner, so I got a Fantastic Fan installed in one of the vents. It is, indeed, Fantastic. My biggest regret is that I didn't pay to have a second one installed. Instead, the original powered vent fan is there. It pretty much works when it wants to, shutting off randomly.

I also got front window guards installed. These are similar to those found on new Airstreams, but here they needed to be cut down to fit the narrower Minuet front window. They protect against thrown stones, but they also look cool. Another neat thing - since the front window in the trailer is clear (not smoked like in newer Airstreams), I can see straight through the coach when towing to see the line of traffic forming behind me, even with the dark window guard.

You can also see the spare tire I had installed on the tongue. Not having a spare on a single axle trailer seemed like bad voodoo to me.


A bit of a disappointment - I had a low-profile German deadbolt installed. It works OK, but water dribbles through it when towing in the rain. Got to think of a fix for that.

One thing that I didn't realize until I got home, and a very welcome surprise - the original Univolt converter (for converting 120V AC to 12V DC to charge the coach battery and run the 12volt systems in the trailer) was replaced with a modern Intellipower converter. The old electronics were heavy, loud, and tended to cook batteries. Glad not to have to spend $200 of my money, or my time fiddling with wiring under the dinette.

Next post: the tour inside.