AIRSTREAM LIFE: WORKING FROM THE RV | A Day-in-the-Life Working Remote

So, honey, what do you want to do today? I'm thinking sit around, relax, take it easy this weekend. Seriously? I think he missed the memo that we have a baby coming in like less than 60 days. Honey, wouldn't it be so much more fun to work on that honey-do list? I mean, that is certainly an option. But if we are going to do some really cool stuff this weekend, how about some Airstream modifications and maintenance? I think I'm going to have to phone a friend. My friend, the door guy, Phil. Phil, what's going on, buddy? What are you doing this weekend? Want to come hang out? Well, that was certainly fast. What's going on, Phil? How you doing? Y'all ready to knock out some honey-do list stuff? Well, absolutely. We met Phil last year at the Airstream International Rally when he introduced us to one of the coolest modifications ever and is a must-have if you have an Airstream. And that is this handy-dandy little tool that keeps you from getting locked out of your Airstream. And if you have an Airstream, you're quite familiar with the problem of getting locked out. When we first met you, you had just released this. That fear I used to have of getting locked out when I left the Airstream is gone now. I noticed I don't check the lock anymore because I just make sure it's in place. And it's been such a huge mod. And I think that modifications are such a huge part of the automobile industry. And I think they're becoming a huge part of even the RV industry as well. When this is down, your lock will work just like it always did. It's not one-trick pony, as they say. You can put the lock up in this position and your dog can't trigger this, your shirt sleeve. There's various reasons why this gets locked. So with this arm in this position, it is very difficult to lock. Well, Phil, tell us about the next mod. It's been around for a while, but it's actually a step brace for the two-step folding steps that's on an Airstream. When you step on the steps, they will have a certain amount of give to them. I can demonstrate that. If you look at the step, you can see the give that the step has. Okay. And this brace, as I say, it's been around for a while, but I kind of upped the game on it just a little bit as far as quality. This is made out of 6063 aluminum. It does have a certain amount of give to it. So it's not as brittle as some of the 6061. This is all anodized. It has a very nice finish on it. It's also made in America, something that I certainly appreciate. This is a very simple install on an Airstream trailer with these style steps. It just goes up and goes up inside of the step well, and then it rests right here. Now, when we step on the steps, as you can see, there's no give to the step. So it alleviates a little bit of the stress on some of the screws, and these are actually called boomerang arms. It's just good for the steps, and plus it just feels better. They do have a lot, a lot of give. They do. They do. I've also noticed that it's on something with the bottom step, right? Because it's like typically it's tilted. Yes, it did change the angle, which is a more natural feel when you go up on the step to go on up into the Airstream. That added length changes that, and then to remove it, you just drop it out. Oh, nice. But again, you can see the amount of movement that's in that step without the brace. That seems to be reinforced right by the frame there. Yes, it is. So it's not like it's just like setting up against something to give. It's right up against the frame. It goes right up in the step well, right up against the frame, and rests right there. Wow. I love the polished look to it as well. Now you've got a nice solid step. When you're climbing these steps, ascending the steps, you hear a lot of like creaking and crackling and a lot of noise, but I'm noticing none right now. And because I've gained a few extra sympathy pounds, I really do appreciate that extra support on these steps. Growing dads need some extra support on their steps. I understand. I appreciate that a lot. It feels as sturdy as like a set of concrete steps right now. I mean, it's almost like a springboard, you know, like I feel like I'm just going to like springboard off of here usually, but there's no give at all. That's pretty cool. The other thing, people also put little jack stands underneath here. We've seen that many times. Right. That's okay and that works, but that becomes dependent upon the terrain. So if you're in gravel or grass or even mud, then that can become an issue. With the step brace, it's totally independent of terrain. It makes no difference where you're parked. In terms of maintenance, we were headed back into the Airstream to take a look at the setup for another cool mod and Phil noticed that the door wasn't closing properly. Well, when I shut your door, Daniel, it just didn't shut well. See how you have to really push on it to get your second latch. There's one and there's two. Well, that's not normal. And so the first thing I check in those situations is for your hinge. And if you watch up there at your top hinge right here, see how much movement is in that hinge? Yeah. So that allows the door to drop down and then it changes the positioning of your striker with your, this is called a double rotary latch right here. Okay. So it changes the way the striker goes in. It makes the door more difficult to adjust. So it's hitting it at a different angle. Yes. Okay. Is this common? Do you see this a lot in some of the doors? I do see it a lot in the Airstream doors. I've seen both hinges lose. It's just kind of a common problem, but we can definitely show you how to fix it as well. Before you start making adjustments to your door, you need to get the play out of those hinges. The screws are hidden behind these chrome protective strips and these strips are held up with a adhesive tape. So you just cut the down, cut the tape. I noticed now yours has the Torx screws in it. Some of them has Phillips head screws in it. So we will get the tool and tighten up the hinges. The only thing holding it up is just a little bit of glue in the back of this. And that's pretty much it. Yeah. Daniel, if you can just put some tension up on the door that puts it back up in its proper position. Let's see how loose these screws were. Okay. That tells you something right there. So that's, that one's tightening up pretty nice. Now that sounds good. Top screw was almost as loose. Wow. All right. Now shut that down. I think you're going to see a significant difference. Yeah. It doesn't take that much. Oh wow. Okay. Yeah. No, it literally just very little effort. Okay. So I was probably putting way too much effort in it before, but now that's it. Yeah. Let's do the one finger. That's a huge difference. It definitely wasn't engaging in the same way. So there's no need to slam it. Exactly. So the question is, are you a slammer? I guess I'm now a reformed slammer. You're a recovery slammer. Recovery slammer. There you go. Absolutely. I'm excited about this because I think this will probably solve a problem that Daniel and I deal with on a regular basis. What's been happening with our door is it's been really hard to lock it. Like I have to put my whole weight against the door before I can actually just lock it smoothly and it's kind of annoying. So let's see. Yep. So in case you're having issues with figuring out how to get your door to lock easily and putting a lot of weight against it, make sure you check that hinge because now that's really freaking easy. This is some 3M body side molding tape that we use and we applied a new strip to the back and we will put your chrome cover back on. It looks super shiny now that you cleaned it. Yeah, it's nice. So the installation is complete. That is nice. Look at that. Well, the next mod is something really simple. It actually goes on your shower. When you're boondocking, one of the things you want to do is try to conserve water. And so this little device, it's called Kess Keep Efficient Simple. It's a shower valve and it truly is a ball valve. It's very smooth action. And what it allows you to do is set your temperature and everything of your shower. And then when you get ready, if you're taking like a Navy shower, you can just put this in the off position. Your water goes off. You can finish washing or lathering up, then just turn this back on and rinse and you can control the flow of your water. We may even be able to demonstrate it here shortly. Because usually when you're taking a shower, you have to take the handle and turn it all the way off, which also changes the temperature. Correct. That or some models have the push button up on the shower head that you can push off and it's kind of cumbersome to reach and a lot of times it doesn't shut off completely. Also, this is a 100% positive shut off. I mean, when you turn this off, you can leave your water handle on and it's your water's off. Okay. Well then we're going to let the master technician go to work. Absolutely. Yeah. I consider myself a do it yourself-er. Yeah. So if I can install this, then believe me, anybody in the world can install this. Alrighty. Alrighty. We're in the shower here and I'm assuming Phil, this goes, it goes right here at this juncture right here. Correct. Okay, cool. Okay. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to disconnect the hose here. Can you turn the water off? There's no water running through here with this off. Okay. Yeah. At least I don't think so. We'll find out. Yep. Yep. Oh, that's correct. Cool. All right. So now for install tip number one, I'm going to insert this right here. Believe the male meets female section here, right? This is what's happening. Cool. Then coming over here. So, uh, I am 30 seconds into this install and I'm already doing it wrong. Um, mostly because this part, this joint doesn't move. The bottom does. So you actually need to put this part on this first. Correct. Good save Phil. Okay. There we go. So I'm going to twist this. This is a pro install here. Yeah. A wrench would be really helpful. Um, another, uh, do it yourself or tip here is to have your tools ready to go. Um, I did not do that. I'm 0 for 2. 0 for 2. Um, let's see. So I'm going to need a wrench and I don't have that. So I will BRB. All right. Wrench acquired. Now time to finish this install. Cool. Nice. Last little piece here. It's going to connect this and we are good to go. So now just turn it off right there. All right. See what I mean? Yeah. So if you had the hot water going and like right now I've got hot water on, but nothing's coming out. Right? Yeah. Turn this little valve still hot. So I don't have to play with the temperature anymore because I found a perfect temperature. How smooth that is too. One of the things I really like about this valve as well is that I've got the hot water on, but I can control the flow of the water. So it's really like like drizzle and it's like a torrential downpour shower. That's your Florida shower, right? Basically Florida shower rains real hard. And then it's gone five minutes later. That's a Florida shower. Now this next modification is hands down going to be my favorite. If you saw one of our last videos where we have been reorganizing the Airstream in advance of baby, you learned about R2D2 aka the really cool and granted a lot of people have gotten some comments about how everybody really likes this air filtration system. It is really awesome, but it's not space efficient. So Phil told us a little something earlier about Airstream maintenance that we probably should have known considering we've been living in our Airstream classic for 15 months now, but somebody doesn't read the manual. I think that these vents have been neglected. I have maintained lots of other things in this RV that require ongoing maintenance, like for instance, the Aldi heating system, but the vents may have forgotten about that one. Being a full timer, I mean, once a month, I would at least take a look at the filters and see what they look like. That's about what I do. Yeah. Give or take a year or two, right? Give or take about 15 months. Okay. All right. That's good. That's good. This isn't a major issue, but these little Phillips screws are somewhat annoying. So let's just remove one. I mean, they're very tiny. As you can see, they're a very small screw and they're only screwing into the material that is the thickness of your ceiling. So you've got maybe a thread or a thread and a half holding. They're very easily stripped and if they're maintained properly, when you put the screws in and out, they do create a lot of wear and they will. See like that one, it's already stripped. I've put together this little kit that I refer to as the vent kit, primarily referring to your return air vent. And what this kit does is it replaces those Phillips screws with a stainless steel thumbscrew. So instead of dealing with that little guy, you're now going to be dealing with that stainless steel thumbscrew. But more importantly, it requires no tools. Once we do the modification, you won't have to have a Phillips screwdriver. You won't have to worry about scratching your ceiling. You won't have to worry about anything stripping out because we're going to add a threaded insert into your ceiling known as a jack nut. It works very much like a rivet to a certain degree. And we can show you that in the install process. I like that. Yeah, it's in the past, whenever I've gone to clean the filters, the reason I didn't do it is because I didn't have a screwdriver handy. Excuse number one. And excuse number two, well, there's no I just forgot. And they haven't been cleaned. And I can't be alone. I can't be alone and not changing the vent or checking the vent every month. And if you're at least like me and you haven't been changing the vent every month, please, please, please leave a comment below. Let me know that I'm not alone. Phil, how concerned are you that it's going to be really gross when we pull these down? I'm going to say if it hasn't been cleaned in 15 months, we may be surprised. I mean, the good news is that I've got R2D2 here. So hopefully R2D2 has done a decent job of cleaning some of the air, but the rest of it that's gone through the air filtration system, no promises. Okay. Oh, it just fell out. It did. So literally you just got to see a screw fall out because it was that stripped. Okay. We're ready for the reveal. Oh, I mean, that is, what do you think about that? Clear, right? You can see straight through the filter. You can see me, right? That is absolutely disgusting. So much for the baby breathing all that fresh air, huh? Yeah. I mean, I feel like I should be wearing a mask during this procedure. This is disgusting. Are these replaceable? Do you clean them? What's the... The good part about these filters, they are washable. They're like an electro... I think they create a certain amount of a static charge as the dust and materials pass by them, and that's what causes it to accumulate the way it does. So yes, it's absolutely washable. Just wash them out good, dry them, and we'll put them back in. Oh, that is disgusting. Oh, that is not great. 50 shades of filth right there. It is dirty. There's literally just like chunks coming out. Phil, would you suggest using soap and water or just water fine? Oh, you could put a little like Dawn dish washing liquid or something like that on. It'd be fine, but I would go easy with it. Oh, okay. That's grounded. Yep. Nope, it's more gross. Look at the difference, like before and after. Holy moly. Look at the difference there. I feel like no air is getting through there. Yeah, you can almost see like the water just knocking out that dust. Check this out. That's a quick wash. Look at the difference there. That's some high quality O2 filtration right there, as long as you clean them. Daniel, once you get those filters cleaned up so nice, the R2-D2 may get to go on vacation for a while. That is so true. Oh man, these are so bad. What are you seeing out there? Well, I'm looking at your condensate line, which it runs out to your wheel well, and it's actually completely full of water, which indicates the possibility that it's plugged up. It's not an uncommon thing, but we have a small modification that we can do to your drain line and hopefully clear the clog. You can see the water moving in the line, especially right up here. You can see the bubbles. Yeah. So we've got a clogged AC drain line. Yep. And you've got a modification for that? I do. This is the perfect time. This is the perfect time to run it in there too. I've seen, especially at the rallies, when the air conditioners are working really hard, I've seen several of them. An indication of that is when the water starts to run off the roof or when it starts to drip in the trailer, unfortunately, because either one can happen. So hopefully we caught it just in time. Correct. So once we attach these to the ceiling, you are now going to have a threaded insert there that you can put these thumb screws, screw them in and screw them out over and over again. And you're screwing into this insert, not into your ceiling. I don't think anything will ever happen to the insert, but should something happen to the threads, this can be removed and you just install a new one and you start all over again. But this is a one-time install. And then you don't need a tool. You do not need any tools to change the filters, even if you only do it every 15 months. Exactly. Exactly. Hopefully with this install, we would do it a little more frequently than maybe like every like 14 months. Okay, cool. That's great. No, no, no. If this no longer requires a tool, this means I can do it. I mean, granted I could do it with it requiring a tool, but I probably won't. So now I can do this, which I'm really excited about. Everything that you need to do this install with the exception of a drill and a Phillips screwdriver is in the kit. We've got printed instructions. It includes the jack nuts. It includes the screw. It also includes the drill bit. So once it's complete, you will have a drill bit and you will have a molly bolt tool left over for use for different things. But we'll drill a couple of them out and get started. A little pro tip for drilling these out without making a mess inside your Airstream is to just get a paper bowl. I'd like to thank my friend Emilio for suggesting this. It works really well. And basically what you do is just put the drill bit through the bowl, then install the bit into the drill. And then when you're ready to drill, you just hold it up, drill the hole, and most of your shavings is going to go inside the bowl. But we are going to put plastic down because we're in a very, very nice Airstream and we do not want any metal shavings or aluminum shavings on the floor. Also, you will be drilling overhead. So it is suggested to have a pair of safety glasses. These are over-the-glasses safety glasses because I can't see without them. You go up to the second step on the bit, which is a 5 16th hole. When they put the screws in the vents in here, they don't necessarily measure the distance out. Well, you can see that the side of this hole has chunked out right here. That will not hurt a thing. That's the reason that we use jack nuts and not a product called a rivnut. And when you install a rivnut into an aluminum, it expands outward. And that is one of the reasons that once this hole chunks out the way it does, you cannot put a rivnut in it. The jack nut, however, works very similar to what a rivet is. It has three legs on the back of it that expands. So we're going to have two legs holding and one leg sticking out, and it will work in this application perfectly fine. That is the jack nut. And this is one that's preloaded with the screw. All this comes in the kit. What we want to do is turn this to this has three legs on it. One, two, and three. We want this leg facing outward where that area chunked out. Then these two will be the two legs holding. The other three holes are fine. It's just the one. And it's just simply because it's not exactly lined up perfectly. So this goes in the hole just like that. That's good and tight. And then you just release it. And now you have a threaded insert in the hole. And you just repeat that process. So you start with the screw in it? Yes. Yes, because the screw is actually what pulls the... I mean, again, this gun works similar to a rivet gun. So you just insert it in the hole. And then one, two, three. It's good and tight. And then release it. What I did is brought in a sample for you guys that I carry with me that actually shows the backside of a jack nut when it's installed. It shows the three legs that I was referring to and how it has a clamping action. And it is the exact same ones that we're using in the ceiling. That's what it looks like on the backside. This is the rivnut. Okay, now this is a larger diameter. But this actually expands outward. So when you have a hole that chunked out the way that one did, this isn't your best option. This is. And should this ever need to be changed, you can just trim these legs off. It'll drop out. Just put a new one in. It's that simple. The rivets are special for the Airstream because of the aluminum, right? So do you use some of these different types of rivets throughout the Airstream? Yes. Yes. The banana rivet is a very aggressive rivet, as you can see by how the legs fold down. Of course, the buck rivet, which is this one, it's not bucked in this particular instance. That's primarily what the Airstream is constructed of. And then if you drill a buck rivet out, it is normally replaced with an Olympic rivet. This is the dirty side, so it's going to go down. So what I'm going to do now is just add just a tiny drop of bow shield to these screws. This is not something you have to do every time, but it does help on the initial install. This is T9 bow shield. It is a great product for many, many different areas on your Airstream. What's it going to do for the first time to install that? It just applies a small amount of lubrication to the screws. Just makes them easier to screw in. So now we're ready to do the install for the first time. Well, as you can see, it's not too difficult to do. It requires no tools. There's no chance of you scratching your ceiling anymore. And also, the biggest thing is it takes all of Daniel's excuses away. That's true, and I've got a lot. I've got a lot. I mean, when you get ready to remove it, I'm not going to take all these out, but I mean, it is literally as simple as that. You've got threads now to screw into. You tighten these up hand tight, and you're finished. You're finished. Okay, gentlemen, I think before we look at putting this next filter on, we may have to figure out what's going on with that clogged drain. Is it called a drain? It's called a condensate line. The clogged condensate line. Yeah. There is multiple ways to clean that out. I mean, a lot of people will use compressed air in it. That's okay if you're careful. I mean, this line runs from here down through your inner wall, between your inner wall and your outer wall. So if that line gets damaged, it can be a bit difficult to replace. What I like to use, I have a piece of 1 1⁄8 inch stainless steel aircraft cable, and I put these ends on it. It will feed right in from the wheel well out there, and we're going to go and demonstrate that, and we will knock this clog right out. The condensate lines come down through the wall, and they exit at the wheel well. So your front air conditioner exits at the front wheel well. Your rear air conditioner exits at the rear wheel well. The 30 amp trailers with the ducted air, I think it can be either way, but I'm not 100% sure on that. All right, so we'll see if we can feed the cable up into the condensate line, giving that condensate line a colonoscopy of sorts. Yes, so to speak. Yes. So what would happen if the drain got clogged to a point of impact? Would your AC not work? Well, no. The air conditioner will continue to work. You're just either going to have a leak running off your roof, or you're going to have a leak dripping inside. Okay. You can see that there's a ton of water that came out of here once we got the clog out. Honestly, it's just really good timing that Phil's here, because both lines seem like they were clogged, and now they're not. And I think probably the best part of this is that, I mean, this is a very easy thing that I can add to my maintenance to do on a regular basis, just to make sure that there's never any clogs in there. Now that Phil has shown us how many different types of rivets there actually are, it kind of reminded us that, just like every Airstream owner, we have a couple rivets that have popped out along the journey. So Phil has the mac daddy of the rivet gun, and he is going to show that to us. Now, Phil, you said that not everybody needs to get a rivet gun that's this intense. You don't. This is a Milwaukee rivet gun. It is battery operated. If you're doing a lot of hand riveting, I mean, your hand will get tired. What I like about this gun, it releases the mandrel every single time. It has a little area here for the mandrel to drop into. It's just seamless, as you'll see here in a minute, how it operates. We'll get him all loaded up, find some rivets, and we'll go put in a rivet for you. Maybe two. Daniel really needs to find us a rivet gun, because we don't have one yet. What would be your tips, tricks for what we need to look for when we're going to get one? I would look for a Marson rivet gun. It's a M-A-R-S-O-N, Marson. Those are good quality guns. I mean, there's Arrow and some other brands. That'll get the job done for just the occasional use, or a couple rivets here, a couple rivets there. But a Marson is a really good quality gun. I mean, this is absolute overkill for, I mean, 90% of stuff you're going to do on an Airstream. But I mean, I do a lot of messing around at the house and different things, and it just works really, really well. Plus, it's a Milwaukee, so that's a bonus. So in this video, we're going to let Daniel and Lauren actually do the install with the tool. So all we're going to do is insert this. I'm just going to run one here just to show what happens. But you just pull the trigger, and that's how a pop rivet works. So this is the before of a regular rivet indoors, and this is the after. That's pretty nifty. You can see this is what you see on the outside, and that's what it looks like on the back end. What are these rivets actually doing in the Airstream? Because I can see these. These look like there's something holding it together, but for these, or like that one that's currently missing, like it doesn't look like they have function. Oh, they do. There's a rib that goes across a bow, if you will, that's part of the structure of the Airstream. And typically, where the rib is, you can tap. Hear that? Now, over here, there's no rib. Hear the difference? Yeah. That skin is pop riveted to that rib, and that's what creates the inner structure. Okay, now we know. Okay, let's put a rivet in. So who's up first? Me. Okay, do you want to do... they're both about the same height. Now, just keep your finger, kind of like a gun, keep your finger off the trigger until we're ready to go. Okay. Just insert it in there, all the way. Now, just like that, and keep inward pressure, and just pull the trigger and hold it. Keep an inward pressure. There you go. That's it. That was so easy. I feel very proud of myself. I have done my first rivet. I'm an Airstreamer now. If you let it back up any, it won't take well. Okay, so apply a little bit of pressure. Just a little bit of up pressure, and then just pull the trigger and hold it up there until it let the gun do its thing. There you go. There's your mandrel. Winnie. How do you feel? That's real nice. I feel very accomplished. Yeah, that was pretty easy, honestly. Obviously, I mean, I think the gun is amazing, but... It's a bit overkill. It's probably a bit overkill. We never do anything that's overkill. You know, now that we've added all these modifications to the Airstream, it's time to send you on your way. Oh, okay. Well... And hopefully, you're all packed up, and you're not missing anything. Lauren, have you seen my rivet gun? Yeah, where's it? Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Oh, you want this back. Now I know why you were trying to move me out so quickly. Not happening, my friend. Not happening. That thing is awesome. Awesome. Yeah, I really enjoyed getting to use that. Great. Great. Well, it's been fun. Thank you so much. Appreciate the opportunity to come over. Want to learn more about Phil's Airstream modifications and upgrades? You can find his information in this video's description below. And while you're there, don't forget to give this video a big thumbs up and subscribe to our channel if you haven't already joined our Wander Local family. But until next week, my friend, make sure you Wander Local this week. As you know, it's good for the soul.