How To Make Your Camper Shine

In a previous post we outlined how we removed the decals from our 2007 KZ Frontier camper. It was a vast improvement over the faded and cracked decals but still has some spots where we could see ghosting on the hitch end that you see below.

We pulled out the orbital polisher  and oxidation remover for another round of buffing. It helped remove the oxidation but we still needed a little something extra on the hitch/fiberglass end so we switched to a 105 compound. The sides and back are gel coat and fortunately did not take as much buffing.

After giving the exterior a good scrub and rinse we poured about 2 cups of Zep into a disposable baking pan and used a $2 sponge mop from Dollar Tree to apply.

I definitely do not recommend buying a $2 sponge. Even without pushing hard the sponge broke off before I was a quarter of the way finished with the first coat. Josh was nice enough to make an emergency sponge trip. The Mr. Clean sponge mop worked perfectly through the remainder of the application.

There are several things I consider to be important when applying Zep. 

-You will need several coats. We only did two but that is only because we lost sunlight and were bordering on heat exhaustion.

-On a hot sunny day you will be amazed how fast Zep dries. I watched one spot I covered completely dry in 40 seconds. In the shade it took several minutes.

-Thin even coats with no dripping are important. Drips will dry quickly and lumpy.

-Once you have passed an area with a window or something else you have had to go around keep looking back to make sure no drips have formed underneath.

-The first coat looks a little scary with a bit of streaking not matter how carefully you apply. The second coat is a world of a difference.

-Learn from our error and invest in a decent sponge mop.

-As with pretty much everything online, there are a lot of strong opinions about using Zep on a camper. It works for us and if we want to try another method it’s simple enough to strip off.

Josh was working on adding stabilizer bars while I admire the new shine. New post on the bars soon.