Airstream Repair For Lake Forest Owners

Interior removal required for correct rivet installation

A buck rivet needs a bucking bar held against the inside of the panel while it is driven, which means the interior skin, insulation and often cabinetry have to come out before a panel can be replaced properly. Shops without that access resort to blind fasteners across the whole repair, which changes the joint stiffness and shows as a different rivet head pattern from three feet away. On a marque where owners and enthusiasts read rivet patterns, that is a visible failure. We plan interior access into the estimate rather than avoiding it.

Dent repair on alclad aluminum without filler

Airstream skin is a clad aluminum sheet with a thin corrosion resistant surface layer, and sanding through that layer to feather a filler repair removes the protection permanently. Because the exterior is polished or clear coated rather than painted, filler would be visible anyway. Correct repair is metal shaping, working the dent out with shrinking and planishing until the panel is true, which is slow, skilled work and is the only method that leaves the surface intact.

Beltline seam sealant failure and the water path it creates

The horizontal seam where the upper and lower shell halves meet runs the full length of the trailer and is sealed rather than welded. When that sealant fatigues, water enters at the seam and runs along the inside of the shell before appearing somewhere entirely different, frequently at a floor edge many feet away. Owners chase a window or a vent. Resealing a beltline properly means removing the old sealant along a full run rather than spot repairing, because a patched seam simply relocates the entry point.

Segmented end cap replacement and panel indexing

The front and rear caps are built from several curved segments riveted together, which is an advantage because one damaged segment can be replaced without rebuilding the whole cap. It is also a trap, because those segments were indexed to each other during assembly and a replacement segment has to be positioned to match its neighbours before a single rivet goes in. Getting the indexing wrong produces a cap where every seam is a fraction off and the reflection down the curve breaks. We clamp and check the full cap dry before any fastener is set.

Frame to shell separation at the outrigger line

The shell is attached to a steel frame along an outrigger line, and on older trailers that attachment corrodes where the aluminum shell meets steel. The trailer then flexes more than the shell was designed to accept and the rivet lines along the lower panels begin to work, showing as smoking rivets with grey streaks running down from them. Rebucking those rivets without addressing the frame attachment treats a symptom. The outrigger line has to be assessed and restored first.