Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

I meet a lot of "Home built trailer people" in both my business, Private and on line life.

And I hear all kinds of responses to this.

How long did it take you to actively start building once you decided to? IE the planning stage.

Not finished the trailer just to get started.

I'll try to post a second question on a poll as well.

What influenced your start more? Skill, Tools, a place to do it, money etc.

My reason for asking is because I am asked all the time "How long does it take"? And I am not the right one to answer that question.

Happy Trails

Len

With my first trailer I spent the night on the internet reading about them. I ordered plans and parts withing the first 2 weeks after making the decision.

The research for me took between 6 and 9 months. When I found Larry Sorensens build I knew that I had it. I started my first build within a couple of weeks after that.
Cheers
Paul

Pre-planning took about 2 months. Most of that time was spent finding out where I could get things. The rest of the planning happened while I was building. I'd plan my next step while finishing the one prior.

I lurked around the forum for about a year, then visited a tearjerker gathering one Saturday afternoon, came home joined the forum, and started learning in earnest here on the forum about what I was getting ready to embark on. About 6 months later I got my torsion axle, wheels and tires and steel to build the frame. We were camping 4 months later.

I decided "I wanted to build" and then spent about a year working out the design.
Once it was all clear in my head, the building started right away, and took another year.

Rob

I spent about six months gathering info and designing the teardrop in CAD. Once I got the go ahead from the boss, I began building immediately, and had it finished it in ten weeks. Changes and improvements are still going on! We're never actually done, are we?

I first became aquainted with the concept in April '08 through a friend who's a member of the same car owners club as me. He was in the process of the building his and I got bit by the bug. Within 1 month I'd bought an old travel trailer and started stripping it!

It took about 4 months to get the Escapod to a usable condition and we first camped in it in September. Project now officially declared complete (although I did add a few more finishing touches last night )

IanJ

I put 3 months, but it really isn't a clear cut answer. We had thought about building a teardrop some years back when we first saw the Huell Howser program on them. The trailer frames I found were all very expensive and I found very little build info.

The summer of 2006 David discovered his brother had an old teardrop trailer frame which set everything in motion. He had his uncle get the frame in working order as he has welding and sand blasting equipment.

Immediately I started researching but didn't find this site right away. Of course not knowing anything or what decisions would be best to make I ordered Desert Teardrop plans as I liked the shape of the Kit. Not worth the money but gave us the general idea of how to build a teardrop, plus had a resource page and full pattern which in the end we modified.

So in some ways we started jumping in straight away but I quickly discovered I needed to do more research and changed my mind on some of the stuff we had started once I found this site. In reality the main building part got going at about 6 months.

Probably everyone has a slightly different story.

Still ongoing for me... I've got a donor trailer/caravan with a lot of the parts I need, got all the timber, a decent sized build area and the majority of the tools I think I'll need, but I'm being a bit picky over the design. Until I'm happy that I've covered all the different aspects I doubt I'll create any sawdust.

Kind of wish I was the type of person to just get on with it without all the planning to be honest, it'd be half built by now.

Cheers, Dewi

I'm still in the study/deciding/financing/making room stage....I think....




at least I made one positive step. I joined this group

I remember way back when that I was trying to over think myself.

I kept worrying about things so far off in the future that it halted my even getting tools out.

Finally I just said the hey with it, and started. After getting started and actually seeing REAL things..that you could measure and see in real life. All the details that were stopping me were all clear and were no longer problems.

Plans can't show or tell you everything.

You need to sit back and look at things, a little personal Research & Development.

Or as my wife calls it "drinking Beer and listening to that old 60's music"

Happy Trails

Len

Jumped in with both feet I waited about a month then started to build .
Now I have done all the research over the winter ... Hmmm .... I guess I should have done that first . LOL.. No worries all is good ... I guess I should have researched a little more first ! But now I" know" for the next one
Dave

When looking for a small camper to pull behind my classic 53 F100, I came across the Aussie teardrop site. The teardown of the old pop-up started the same day. I found this site about half-way through the build and the rest is history.......