Coleman Colorado Frankenstein Trailer Project

[Mark Harley]

Sweet transformation!
I like the extra details you have thought up.

 

[sgiandubh]

The access door came from ColawRV on I44 near Carthage Missouri.

http://colawrvsalvage.com/

It’s sort of a Valhalla of a place to someone cobbling together an RV or pop-up camper. It’s like a pick and pull salvage yard but with every size, shape and configuration of camping vessel. I went to the office and asked if they had any access panels. The guy grinned and took me out back to a pile of no less than 1200 access doors and frames. I really didn’t have in mind what size I wanted, I just went in to see what they had. About an hour later and $16.00; I left with two panels that I thought might work. No idea what they are off of. The one I ended up using measures about 13x13”. The other one measures about 12x20”.

dd

Thank you! As someone who is cobbling together a pop-up camper/trailer, what a great resource.

 

[dcollier32]

Cool build... a true off road camper

 

[jah310]

Looks awesome!

 

[DblD]

Hey.
Thanks for the kind words.

I feel like I’m making some progress. I got the new Bear Creek canvas stretched out and installed today. I’m very happy with the quality of the tent canvas. An added surprise was that three of the four zip open windows have plastic inserts to allow for warmer winter camping.

Here you can see the slide out bed supports and the leveling jacks.

My next stumbling block is the door. I cannot figure out how to remove the structural frame from the old canvas. I’ve been trying to work this out for sometime but the only way I can figure Coleman installed the door frame was to sew it into the canvas.

I would love to hear any thoughts about the canvas tent door from folks who have tackled Colorado projects.


dd

 

[jagular7]

For those front stabilizers, look into an inner sleeve that is pinned to the bottom of the outer shaft. The outer shaft would go up/down through the crank process, but you can drop the inner sleeve (base on bottom) so that you're not cranking the 2'. I have an equipment trailer set that way for a trailer tongue.

Looks nice, real nice.

About that rear door hardware, Jeep did similar with 1/2 door window frame. It was sewn into the canvas window originally. Replacement is velcro but you do have to cut the old canvas off the frame.

 

[TexasTJ]

Soapy water and elbow grease. I took my door frame off the rest of the frame to install it.

 

[java]

Very cool transformation!

 

[jerdog53]

Nice!!

 

[hansrober]

I love this build! Excellent work! I have not stopped by to check on in in a while. Awesome! Thanks for sharing.

 

[lostagain]

Nice work. Makes me want to dig my Colorado out and start working on it again.

 

[Ghost65]

Great work...this is a project I will follow, as the marriage of a military/pop up trailer is my nirvana.

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Wow, this looks amazing with the new canvas installed. Wicked job!

 

[DblD]

Soapy water and elbow grease. I took my door frame off the rest of the frame to install it.

Ah yes, soapy water and more than a few expletives does the trick. Thank you to everyone for the encouragement and for following along. The Colorado is just about camp-ready and I can see nights spent around a roaring fire in the not so distance future.

dd

 

[k9lestat]

Dang clean enough to take to the prom now

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