Trailer Conversion
After we got our third horse and knowing that we live in a high fire risk area, and also deciding that it might be time to retire our 1966 two-horse straight load Miley, in September of 2002 we bought ourselves a 3-H Trails West gooseneck trailer. Two of the horses immediately went lame, so I didn't get to use the trailer much for many months. This is the biggest downside of getting a spiffy new trailer - the endurance gods don't want you to be *that* happy.


We got a side tack, which meant that we had a straight wall instead of the sloping wall of the front stall in the "living area". That meant a nice big window on the wall opposite the door and a bigger space to live in.

The living area has a walk-through door to the front stall so we could put a shower/ portapotty in there if we wanted.


Since we opted for the "poor man's LQ" - a bare bones area in the gooseneck, I set to making it a more pleasant place to live in.

The basic trailer came with a small skylight, a box-seat/ step, carpet on the floor, up the side of the gooseneck and covering the gooseneck bed-area floor. It also had a light on either side. Oh, and we splashed out on a sliding mosquito net door.
We took the trailer to a couple of rides and the condensation was bad on the ceiling in the morning, so the first thing to do was to put in insulation.

In October 2003, I bought several 4x8 sheets of foam insulation from Home Depot and spent a happy Saturday afternoon measuring and cutting out panels with the kitchen bread knife. Each panel pushed into the area between the structural ribs of the trailer.

The change was dramatic and the space, while not terribly attractive, was much, much cozier and the condensation problem went away completely.

 
I cut the pieces of foam quite tight for the area they would be pushed into and that held them in place for the most part without any glue. Once the temperature started to change, occasionally I'd find one of the panels had fallen out so I bought some spray glue and would spray them in place as necessary.
For a bed, I stole the mattress out of our sofa-bed in the living room (it was never used anyway, since we have a spare bedroom). I have a flannel sheet, pillows, comforters, and fleece blankies for bedding, just like at home.

And I made curtains (which you do need - as you discover the first time you try to undress in the coziness of your new trailer, lit up inside for all the world to see).

I mounted the curtains on curtain-wire (vinyl covered wire with hooks on each end) which apparently you can't buy in the US, so I had to get my Mumma to send some from England.
The other thing I discovered I needed very quickly was a "bedside table" (trying to climb up into bed carrying a cup of tea showed me that this was a necessity). I made this shelving unit in my woodwork class.

It holds reading books, HRM watch, clock, moisurising lotion, large supply of wet ones (no shower in this trailer), munchies, pens, paper, batteries, bragging-rights thermometer, hair ties, camera, truck keys, etc... etc... - basically all the little stuff you need but gets lost on trips.

 
With the Death Valley ride looming in my mind, as it does every year, in late 2004 I decided it was time to start working on the trailer innards again.

Another trip to Home Depot and we bought five sheets of panelling and a box of screws and countersunk washers and spent the few days over Christmas cutting and screwing panelling in place. This was my husband, Patrick's, Christmas present to me - several days of hard labour. It was about the best present a girl could want.
I filched the grotty mirror out of the old Miley trailer so I would be able to see just how nasty I looked after a week camping.
And best of all Patrick wired a reading light in for me above the bed (before that, I had to get a hernia trying to reach the main light switch on the other side of the shelving unit).

 
Patrick also wired in a two-way switch for the outside light on the trailer, where the horse would be tied. The normal switch is in the tack room, but I wanted to be able to turn it on and off from either location. This meant I could lie in bed and check on the horse through the window without having to move from the bed. Here you can see the wires for the switch that he didn't have time to finish off - we did have to eat on Christmas Day.

One of the more annoying things about the trailer was the way the metal panels under the bed would flex with a loud "flop-flup" noise every time you turned over in bed. To combat this, we bought a big piece of peg board and wedged it in under the bed to make the floor more rigid. It solved the problem.

 
The nose part of the trailer proved to be the hardest to insulate. Instead of wood panelling I used thin plastic sheeting on the curvy upright wall. Then, for the fibreglass area on the ceiling of the nose part, I used foil-covered bubblewrap stuff and taped it in place. I still have to cover this foil stuff, but it did the job perfectly.

If I was to do the panelling again, I might use white panelling on the ceiling, as doing it entirely in wood made the trailer much darker than originally - but it's pretty cozy.
This far wall is the next thing that needs work (perhaps towards the end of the year, given my speed at such projects).

I'd like to put in a counter top, small sink, and more shelving/drawer space. A fridge would be nice too. A friend suggested raiding the Pick-n-Pack yards for old camper equipment. A heater would also be nice, but at $235 it's going to have to wait - for now the camping stove does a reasonable job of warming up the living area - until you open the door and all the warm air blows out.

Right now, my living equipment consists of a large cooler, the white Rubbermaid drawer unit (pantry foods in the top, cooking equipment in the bottom), a two-burner camping stove (I crack the window open) which sits on top of the drawer unit when in use and stows away in the box-step (hinged lid on top), the folding table you see against the wall, various other tubs for stowing "stuff" in, and a couple of folding camping chairs.

And I still have to finish the trickier parts of the panelling around the windows and on the ceiling of the nose.

All in all, though, I'm really happy with my trailer and it has been fun working on it as we go along. It has taken using it to figure out exactly what was needed.