Making a rock tamer

[Drew]

So back in August the wife and I were pulling our Argosy to my mother in laws house some 60 miles due north. Unfortunately my wife's father had passed so we were going prepared to stay for the weekend. We didn't leave home until after dark on a Thursday evening. So in a construction zone of a two lane stretch of the journey we ran over what appeared to be a painted 2x6x8 laid across our lane of traffic.

I heard and felt all four axles go over the board so I didn't stop as we were only 5 to 10 miles from the in laws. When we stepped out of the truck we were horrified to find out it wasn't as clean of a crossing as I had thought.

Turns out that the 2x6 was a red fiberglass side rail cover from a big rig. It punctured the outer and inner shells as well as the fresh water tank. Note the puddles under her in the photo above.

All is repaired now and our beloved Argosy is back to being camp ready. I will add a blog post of the repair process once I have time to get all of the pictures and my thoughts organized.

In order to keep my fresh new paint from getting rock dings and hopefully stop another road debris accident I set my mind to getting a rock tamer for the hitch.  Being a tight wad, I couldn't see spending 250 to 300 bucks that couldn't cost more than 50 to make my self. I started by looking through the garages and came up with an old rubber shop mat, two metal channel pieces that went to an old riding mower bagger, and 3 bags of bolts, washers,  and nuts left over from some previous project. I went to tractor supply and bought 2 pieces of 3/4" angle and 2 of 3/4" flat iron.

The first measurement I made was across the top of my hitch to make sure the top piece of channel would clear my 7 way on the truck side. Determined I needed 10" so the cut was next.

I wound up using the left over piece for my bottom of the hitch brace. I lined the two pieces up the way I wanted them clamped them down with vice grips and drilled 4 mounting holes. The two pieces will straddle the hitch shank held together by 4 bolts and nuts.

Next was to get the angle iron attached to the main body of the hitch mount.

Next came lining the mat up on the angle iron and clamping down the flat sandwiching the mat between the angle and the flat. Once I had it lined up and clamped I drilled though all three layers and bolted it together.

I will probably wind up adding two pieces of flat iron bolted to the bottom of each flap to add weight. The finished product looks good and cost less than 30 bucks after finding some materials laying around.

[Drew]

Thanks Angie, we sure love her. Once you pour your heart and soul into a vintage trailer it's hard to imagine life with out it.

Looks as if you have gotten a hold of rare bird yourself. I've only seen a couple of vintage Winnebago travel trailers. When you hear winnebago the mind goes straight to a motorhome. Think it's been like 30 years since they made a travel trailer and to my understanding they didn't produce a tremendous number of them back in the day. The fact that they have started making towables again should add to the coolness factor of your rig.

Dig on in on yours and get out on the road! Camping in a trailer/rv is so much easier and much more enjoyable than tent camping. My body doesn't handle sleeping on the ground very well anymore. Funny how time changes you. 30 years ago I never thought I'd be camping in an rv, heck I use to tell rv`ers that they weren't really camping :).

[Angie Castro]

OH no. What a shame. Your RV is awesome BTW.  She's a beauty!!

[Drew]

Thanks guys and gals.

I feel I need to add that I was obeying the posted speed limit of 35 when this occured. Had on coming traffic with their lights on, by the time my headlights hit it I was going over it. I know all it takes is a hard sharp pointed object but our speed was pretty slow for the damage received imo.

If you tow a "bumper pull" trailer/camper that you value/love, you need a rock tamer and insurance. If you can't build one buy one. I had a good experience with Progressive RV insurance on this accident, even told the adjuster that we planned to repair her ourselves. When I set up the policy a few years ago I did an agreed value policy and they didn't inspect for the value I wanted insured. I bought my old girl before vintage rvs were gaining value, this coming year we've had her for 18years. We put in a crap ton of work to make her usable and then a crap ton more to make her what we wanted but didn't spend an awful amount money doing it because we did it ourselves. I'm pretty sure the settlement paid out more than I have in her dollar wise and she kept a clean title.

[Russell E Johnson]

That is awesome.  Gives me a plan to do the same thing. 

[Dawn Michelle]

Looks great!

[Lakota Wolf]

Awesome D.I.Y. job,,,, That will help save the nose of the trailer,,, Good job and thanks for the pictures for reference,,