Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

It seem some people build their sandwich wall (ply/stick & foam/ply) separately and when done mount it on the floor.

Others do it in place, as in they create the wall frame on the floor and then skin it, like here:
http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?t=17745&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=45

I was gonna do it separate but because I'm lacking a large flat work surface and might have to handle the wall all on my own, it seem "in place" might be easier.

Any reason to prefer one over the other ?

The only minus i see with "in place" would be that it might be more difficult to apply pressure to the skin while the adhesive sets since it's vertical.

comments ?

A couple of sturdy saw horses, a few straight 2x4's, & a couple of sheets of plywood or OSB & you've got a large flat surface - Here's my right side wall laid out on a few 2x's (after assembly on the 'flat' surface), clamped & weighted while the Titebond-II dries -



Once the glue has dried you have a pretty sturdy assembly. Here I'm applying stain to the same sidewall, you can see the left wall already set in place temporarily in the background


Plywood 'pattern' laying on my 'flat' surface

I built mine in place. If I get the chance to do it again, I would build it inside out, like Steve Frederick describes in his famous manual.

http://tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?t=6397

Two solutions.

1> Use the floor of the trailer as a work surface; just lay out a plastic drop cloth to protect.

2. Move the trailer outside and use the area under where the trailer sat.

My garage floor is not flat at all ... the trailer not too bad but not perfect.

so what i'm doing now is i laid down plastic on my living room floor (flat hardwood floor) and gotta glue the main frame elements to one skin there to get a nice square frame ... then once set will move it to the trailer floor to finish it.

I think it's my safest bet to get a straight wall .


Better finish that before the wife & kids come back from grandma ... guessing that wouldn't fly !

I built mine on the floor.

Starting like this:

I think if you can find or build a flat table (using the floor is a pretty good idea), it's probably easier to get a structural sandwich building it seperately as you could draw a vacuum on it -- that's kind of hard to do when it's already standing up.

I built my walls on a work bench I made of 1/2 inch MDF and legs made of 2x4s. I would it it the same way on the next one. If you have a small space to build in, first have a good plan of what you are going to do ( don't do it like I do ) Build a work bench build your walls. tear down the bench and start on the trailer/floor. Tops are almost always built in place ( though not all ).

Randy

tcolar wrote:My garage floor is not flat at all ... the trailer not too bad but not perfect.

so what i'm doing now is i laid down plastic on my living room floor (flat hardwood floor) and gotta glue the main frame elements to one skin there to get a nice square frame ... then once set will move it to the trailer floor to finish it.

I think it's my safest bet to get a straight wall .


Better finish that before the wife & kids come back from grandma ... guessing that wouldn't fly !

I built my sidewalls on my trailer floor. I used 4 jackstands and a level to make sure that it was level (ie flat) in both directions and it worked great. I guess that I should add the fact that I used shims in conjuction with the jackstands to level everything.

I built my two sides, my bulkhead and my galley wall all separate. Then one day I put them all together and fortunately it all fit like a glove.

The sides were much easier to finish on their sides. Paint doesn't run and you don't have to crawl in and out of the door to finish the inside. It's also easier to mount the doors when the walls are flat. I highly recommend it.

Is that a stolen street sign in the garage of a cop???

planovet wrote:

Busted !

I'm to old and fat to stand on my head that long ( gotta breath ya know) her is a good answer.........