I have for the Elite trailer the Hard lid and the Camper top......so I swap out as needed. The trailer was fitted with its original piano hinge for the lids but it was becoming worn.
Elite now produce their campers with 3 Stainless steel marine grade hinges......they are easy enough to retrofit but require 3 plates to be made to support the trailer side as the trailer is 16 gauge alloy only.
Some 2mm steel sheeting laying in my steel collection found its way into the equation with 2x 300x200 plates and a smaller 200x180 over the wheel arch for the middle hinge. A additional set of 3 male parts of the hinge were added to the camper top and to the hard lid, I can change over by myself in about 10min with a couple of saw horses for the camper top to sit upon, it's only 3 bolts and 2 gas struts to disconnect and re connect.
Now that the piano hinge was removed that left a 60mm strip of bright aluminium along the side of the trailer and approx 40 unpainted waterproof rivets to tidy up......I just used the waterproof rivets to fill the holes from the piano hinge rivets.......mig welding the holes was an option, but laziness had set in by this time
Automotive painting was the old family business, but I didn't wish to paint the entire trailer...... so the bright alloy strip was prepared with steel wool and lemon juice (great for etching alloy).....masked up and etched under coated, rubbed back and under coated again......followed by 2 topcoats of gloss black that I matched and mixed using some old charts I had.....
Next came an external 12volt point.
The trailer is made by Elite but accessories are by eBay
grabbed a 12volt chassis mount cig plug and USB outlet. The trailer has a 28Ah gel cell battery on board charged by a Redarc 12v to 12v from the bike trailer plug.....the battery is only used for lights and charging phones, iPads etc. and a small inverter occasionally. But current points are inside the trailer so we needed some external ports.
On the off side I fitted a sealed female Merit plug and the Cig/USB on the near side......this gives me a few charging options....my main light is Merit and the remainder USB/Cig.
Using a jigsaw wasn't an option as I didn't have the room to manoeuvre.......so with nessesity being the mother of invention.....enter the cordless drill and file.
The job came up great
