Remove Steam Trunk Interior

Finally, a part of this project that was fairly simple. I removed the interior of the steam trunk the other day. It was a pretty easy part of the project and only took about an hour.

Ugly old steam trunk interior. Just hideous ! If this was the original interior I would of never removed it.

 I removed the interior for a number of reasons. One, it was pretty ugly ! Two, it wasn't the original interior. Three, I wanted to see if the bottom of the trunk was dry rotted, (something I should of done before I got into doing all this sanding, luckily it looks good). Finally, it's a pretty old trunk, it sat in an attic, a basement, a garage and God knows where else, so I wanted to make sure no creepy crawly things were living in there. Luckily, no creepy things. If you have an original interior in your trunk, I wouldn't remove it unless it's in really bad shape. The original interior would increase the value of your steam trunk considerably.

Cut along the bottom edge and one side. I couldn't believe how easy this was.

So, I got my razor knife and cut along the edge of the bottom and the one side. I pulled up the edge and it came out in almost one piece. Finally, a part of this project that I think I got lucky on.

Once you cut the edges, just pull up.

Any stubborn stuff that didn't come off on the first pull, I scraped with an old putty knife or paint scraper. The stubborn stuff really wasn't that stubborn.

Take a putty knife or paint scrapper and remove any stubborn stuff that doesn't pull up on the first try.

Some of the original interior was still under the replacement interior. It was tan with purple pin stripes. I left this, though I may ruff it up a bit with sandpaper before I install the new interior. Both interiors seemed to be nothing more than wallpaper and was really easy to remove.

This was the original interior, still ugly but I would of never removed this if it wasn't already ruined by the replacement interior.

A word of warning, the wallpaper interior in my trunk was pretty sharp on the edges and I got a small boo boo on my hand, a paper cut really, but it shocked me and could of been worse had I moved my hand just a little bit quicker. 

That wallpapers sharp, luckily I was working slowly, if I would of moved my  hand just a little bit quicker this could of been nasty.

For the next post, I plan on removing the broken leather handle straps.

Broken steam trunk handle, this is the next part of the project.Then I'm back to sanding :(

Project time for this post : 1 hour
Total time spent on project so far : 31 hours 45 minutes
Total project cost so far : $33.62 USD

Steam trunk, now awaiting a new interior for its new life.