10. Interior Work Begins

It's been quite a while since my last post.  I've been working slowly on the trailer as money has allowed.  The first project was building a bed that could be opened up to store supplies.  I took photos of the construction, but I can't put my hands on them.  I'll revise this post if I find them later.  I changed my mind on the electrical pigtail that I used to get across the country and properly wired the trailer for both 120v house current and 12v accessories.  This took quite a while to complete but really works very well.

I've been living in the trailer as I'm working in it, and for anyone that's ever done remodeling in their bedroom while sleeping there knows what I've been going thru.  Lots of moving things in and out of the trailer and cleanup is the last task of every day.  I'm almost done installing 1" insulation foam on the walls and ceiling.  Over this I'm hanging 1/4" birch plywood and screwing them down with 3/4" Lathe screws.  Here are a few recent photos.

I've wired the trailer for three overhead lights and one exterior light by the door.  After installing all the lights, I switched out the normal bulbs included with the lights for L.E.D. light bulbs that use 1/10th the power and last over 100,000 hrs.  They are very blue in cast however,  and I'm still considering whether or not to keep using them.  They do use almost no energy to run and my battery still registers as 100% full after 5 hrs use per night for over a week.  At 1/2 amp per hour, the battery could last almost two months.  That would be great since I plan to leave San Diego for the California desert on the 28th of this month (Sept. 2011) and a good deal of my camping will be dry camping (Camping without services like shore power).

I won't be able to buy and install flooring before leaving for the winter, so I'll finish what's left to do on the trailer in the spring.  I did invest in a 1000 watt inverter to power my laptop during the day to allow me to continue working on my first novel.  The inverter will run off the truck battery while the engine idles.  This will also allow me to run my 120v fridge while the truck is running, keeping my lunch meat and condiments cool.