1967 Dodge Travco Build (Polly Luna)

[TravcoJosh]

Hi everyone, I'm typically over at the Facebook pages but I really wanted to find a place to fully document the journey we have been making on out newly aquired 1967 Dodge Travco.

The wife and I have been camping for years, started tent camping on both coasts in the early 2000's. We then went on to purchase a solid 1972 VW Bus. We tinkered on the VW and generally tooled around the Midwest for a few years until the the kids came. Unfortunately, the little bus is tight for two and impossible for 4 so we quickly moved on to a pop-up camper. While our Fleetwood is very nice and huge (2 king beds), it just isn't to our liking. When the Third child came last year we decided it was time to move into a motorhome again. The ease of travel and setup will easily pay for the gas expenses, plus Class A's are just plain cool.

I've been in to classic cars since I was 13 and purchased my first vehicle (a 1950 Dodge Ram). As long as I have been into old cars, the wife has been into Disney. So this year we decided we would combine the two, restoring an old RV to head for a two week trip from Wisconsin to Florida at the end of November. (I know we are crazy right!)

We looked high and low, saw several older GMC motorhomes but nothing felt right. Then we saw this 1967 Dodge Travco and we were hooked.








Growing up my parents had a 1971 Travco and I had many fond memories of that old rig that it just made sense. The old girl was located 2 hours from our house and had spent her whole life in the area. Polly Luna has a 318CI Poly motor, it is a strong engine (good for a little over 200hp) with approximately 10K on a rebuild. The plan for the foreseeable future is to fix up the interior and paint the exterior. Mechanically she seems very solid, but we have some work to do on that end. She ran strong on the way home. We purchased her in early June and have made a lot of headway in the last few months, but more of that to come later. For now Here's a video to show you what she was like when we picked her up.

[joanfenn]

Great video.  Even watched the second one on the interior remodel.  Looking good.  You are all going to have fun with that.  Keep up the good work.

[sasktrini]

Very cool videos, and an awesome rig!  Congrats!

[M & J]

Supurb. We were too scared driving ours home to even think about documenting.

Well Done.

[TravcoJosh]

Here's a walk around video that shows the state of the rig

Boy were we optimistic when we shot this video. You see our small remodel went to near gut quickly

Before




After




What led from a simple floor replacement to the above photo you ask? Well a storm, no not the regular water damage or water infiltration but a poop storm. When I was pulling down the ceiling panels to replace them it rained mouse poop, tons and tons of mouse poop. You could even say I may have had a mouse poop shower. The smell was horrible and there wasn't much left for me to do but gut. The wife wouldn't sleep in it until it was all gone. So out came everything!

[DonD]

Mouse poop=hantavirus BE CAREFUL!

[TravcoJosh]

After taking down the first ceiling panel we moved on to the refinishing the cabinets. It was a good thing too as when we removed the trim the upper cabinet tried to fall down. Apparently, the upper screws had broken over the years resulting in the chrome trim being the only thing holding it up. We re-secured the cabinet to the metal structure, sanded all of the green off and painted.





Then it was off to the store for some wood. We went with 4X8 Sheets of 1/4" 3 ply Birch for the walls and 1/8" 4x8 Birch door skins for the ceiling.


Once all the wood was back and all the interior panels were removed, the work of fitting the new birch began. I cut out the panels using a router to trace the old panel at the same time as cutting it out. It worked pretty well (note that the wavy edges in the new panels are the same as the old)








The next update will show what the panels look like when they are finished.

[sasktrini]

Sorry about your luck.  Yes, be very mindful if you feel nauseous in the next couple days.  I have personally known people who succumbed to Hantavirus.  So far in mine, my dirtiest area was over the dinette in the false bottom in the overhead cupboard on the same side as the kitchen cabinet.  I know that as I rebuild, I will be sealing off the different cabinets and compartments to try to limit any opportunities for rodents to contaminate the whole thing again.  But yours looked very good… I didn't expect your findings.

[TravcoJosh]

Thanks for the concern. However, these pictures are a few months old, so I don't think I have much to worry about.


Any ways, with the interior remodeling full swing the yard soon looked like this:





With everything cut out we began sanding and polyurethaning.





then assembly after all insulation was replaced











Next we started working on the floors. We used a thick felt underlayment that adds a ton of insulation and sound reading. As an added bonus it makes the floor feel super soft











Then we started trimming it out (still have to finish trim as we moved to body work after this)

[DonD]

Excellent!

[M & J]

 

[TravcoJosh]

Here's a video tour of the inside after the remodel.

[TravcoJosh]

With the majority of the interior work done, we switched gears to doing the body work. The paint was not in the best shape and there were very large crazing cracks running down all of the red areas in of the body. I suspect that what ever the Previous Owner used to paint was not compatible with the body work. There was little to no crazing in most of the white areas. We've never done body work so this is all new to us, but we figured we needed to start with sanding.





During the sanding process we uncovered the reason why some of the areas in the rear were unsightly.







Seeing the holes in the bondo and the fact that I could move the fiberglass under neath it I decided to dig it out and investigate. This is what I found underneath:







Yikes!!

[Elandan2]

That's the nice thing about fiberglass.  You can make repairs and will not even be able to tell they have been fixed.  Rick

[TravcoJosh]

And that is about what we have done. I'll post later with pictures of the fiberglass repairs being completed. In the next post or two I'll be caught up to our present day.

[Froggy1936]

Note: Fiberglass must be repaired useing fiberglass cloth and fiberglass liquid. You cannot make repairs with Bondo  Though that can be used to make a smooth surface after repair  Frank

[TravcoJosh]

Yup Frank    This is why all the old Bondo was dug out. I still can't believe that one of the previous owners thought it was ok....  

[TravcoJosh]

Here's a picture of the driver's side Before, During, Fiberglass and Buildup.




















It still needs a bit more work, but it is coming along.

[acenjason]

Nice work. Will you do body work on mine next? 

[TravcoJosh]

Acenjason,

I'd love to, but I'm not cheap or fast....lol 

[PwrWgnWalt]

Very nice!  Travco's have a great look, and your build is awesome - great work by all!
Looking forward to seeing more...

[Rickf1985]

Previous owner must have been quite a driver! W%

[TravcoJosh]

Thanks for the comments. I've really enjoyed the work thus far, even when it is more than a little frustrating.


So at some point a Previous owner went out and bought a cheap-o door handle because the nice sleek original door handle broke. I know what your thinking, but TravcoJosh the PO could have just went out and purchased a replacement door handle for $60. But where would the fun in that be for the next couple of guys down the line. Needless to say I bought a correct replacement and got to work.


The original handle is the one on top





After removing all of the paint I welded a panel in behind the door skin then another filler panel on top. I know this is ugly, but it holds and plugged the massive hole.





With things near level the filler stage began. This door had been "dinged" a few times so it was some work to get it flat.





But little by little we got there





Until it was at the point that we added the Slick Sand





After the Slick Sand we sanded the entire door to 320grit, then shot it with 2K urethane and sanded to 400 grit. Just today we were able to start shooting paint.

[TravcoJosh]

Previous owner must have been quite a driver! W%

Rick you have no idea D:oH!  But as bad as a drive they must have been they were worse at body work.

[Rickf1985]

Oh I have seen much worse than that. Bondo over rust is my favorite.