Coming Home
[Note, I have since sold the Yellowstone in favor of a 1969 Dodge Travco Motorhome. I’m leaving this here for posterity, but if you’re interested in Yellowstones, alas luxagraf turns out to be a poor resource.]
I finally brought the 1969 Yellowstone trailer to the house. Many thanks to my in-laws for storing it at their place for the last six months.
I am happy to report that, despite a sketchy tow hookup that doesn’t lock to the ball, some last-minute wiring snafus, a considerable amount of dry rot on the tire and of course the fact that it still isn’t registered, I did nevertheless succeed in getting it to the house.
I need to get the tire off and replaced, but so far the lug nuts, they just won’t budge.
Instead I decided to pull out the oven and some cabinet hardware and few other things I plan to keep. I bought a respirator, some goggles (pretty sure there’s a good amount of black mold in the insulation, I get a bad headache without the respirator) and was all set to tear it apart only to discover… the Clutch Head.
The Clutch Head is a peculiar screw head that was — according to Wikipedia — popular with automobile manufacturers in the 1940s, and, wait for it, “mobile homes and recreational vehicles.”
So… it’s home, but I still haven’t gotten to tear anything out yet. I ordered a clutch head bit set from Vintage Trailer Supply and it arrived a couple of days ago, which means soon I can get started. Soon, always soon.
2 Comments
I am looking into buying a 1969 Yellowstone. It is pretty rough on the inside. Was just wondering how far along you have come on yours.
@Kimberly-
Sorry but I sold the Yellowstone before I really had a chance to do any restoration (I added a note to the top of the post for posterity). Nothing against the Yellowstone, we just decided we wanted to go the motorhome route instead.
So I can’t offer any specifics about Yellowstones, but having passed the halfway point on the Travco, I can say that in general plan on doing a complete teardown no matter what you buy. If you’re not prepared to tear it down to the bare walls and rebuild it from there I would not suggest going the vintage route.
The other thing I can say is no matter how well you plan it seems to take twice as long as you think and cost twice as much.
All that said I would still suggest giving it a try. It’s a lot of fun.
Thoughts?
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