Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

Im in the process of having some aluminum and stainless delivered home for my Kits.

I noticed on the teardown process of the Kits that the aluminum had been basically floated and held on with the corner moulding.

My question is, Can Stainless be floated as Aluminum can be. Held on by the edge moulding? Or should it be glued or secured with my favorite product Sikaflex?

Does stainless expand the same as aluminum even though its a harder material.

The stainless is 0.06 or 0.08mm in thickness so its not real tough to work with.

By this chart, the thermal expansion of stainless steel is about 50% to 75% of that for aluminum.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/thermal-expansion-metals-d_859.html

Hiya, Heikki!

I'm not sure if Sikaflex (or any other glue, for that matter) will stick to stainless steel ... I've never tried it ...

I think "floating" it will be O.K. in your environment, since I doubt it reaches 100º F anywhere near your neck of the woods! I generally recommend gluing the sides and floating the top, though.

KIT originally glued all their aluminum, but it was more like contact cement, and it either didn't hold at all or it held too well and the expansion/contraction of the metal ripped the first layer of the plywood right off, whereby the aluminum ended up "floating", anyway. And, don't forget ... the tan trailer was an early rebuild, anyway, so I'm not surprised that there wasn't any glue under its skins!

Continued Good Luck, my Friend, and as always ..

CHEERS!

Grant

grant whipp wrote:Hiya, Heikki!

I'm not sure if Sikaflex (or any other glue, for that matter) will stick to stainless steel ... I've never tried it ...

I think "floating" it will be O.K. in your environment, since I doubt it reaches 100º F anywhere near your neck of the woods! I generally recommend gluing the sides and floating the top, though.

KIT originally glued all their aluminum, but it was more like contact cement, and it either didn't hold at all or it held too well and the expansion/contraction of the metal ripped the first layer of the plywood right off, whereby the aluminum ended up "floating", anyway. And, don't forget ... the tan trailer was an early rebuild, anyway, so I'm not surprised that there wasn't any glue under its skins!

Continued Good Luck, my Friend, and as always ..

CHEERS!

Grant

Hello Grant, Its Finntastic to hear from you. Hope your doing fine. Greetings to you and your family there.

Nope the Tan Tear which Im working on at the moment Grant didnt have any glue or if there was it didnt hold. Well considering its age Im not surprised.

I will find out as to what my aluminum supplier has on hand at the moment this coming week.

The side aluminum just fell off after I dismantled the moulding. Anywho I really am curious to see if the stainless can be glued or not. I sent a question to Sikaflex Finland to find out.

Reckon I,ll find out sure enough. Grant I,ll let you know. As you say I should at least float the ceiling on it.

I have a nice anodized aluminum for it and lots of ideas to make it look quite nice.

Thank You Grant for your input.

Wishing you all our best.

Ok I had received email from Sikaflex.

There are 2 Sikaflex Products that are recommended.

SikaBond® AT-Metal

Based on a new type of hybrid polymer, AT (Advanced Technology) is a combination of the powerful Sika polyurethane technology (PU) and the well known modified silicone technology (MS). The advantage of this hybrid chemistry is the combination of the best properties of both technologies, ensuring a high quality, multi-purpose, elastic adhesive specifically suitable for metal.

Close Details Use
Multi-purpose and suitable for internal and external bonding and sealing of:



Aluminium, copper, galvanised steel and stainless steel
Metal façade and roof elements
Roof coverings
Metal sheets
Sealing of metal cladding
PVC and powder coatings
Coverage / Usage Approx: 14.5m of 5mm bead
Characteristics and Advantages
Excellent gunning and tooling properties
Good adhesion on porous substrates (i.e. concrete, roof tiles and mortar)
Good initial tack and fast curing
Non corrosive, good weathering and water resistant
Silicone and solvent free
Primerless adhesion on many substrates


Sikabond 500 - kuten ruostumattoman teräksen, galvanoidun pellin ja alumiinin Translation from Finnish to English - For Stainless Steel, Galvanized Metal & Aluminum

Still will need to try with floating the stainless or with Sikaflex as above. Most likely dont need much of it on it.

Another possible material to use on this is what we call Alufibre. Also quite nice.

Having gone through the exercise of finding what to stick the ABS solar panel mounts to the Filon exterior of our trailer, I became familiar with 3M VHB (very high bond) tape. This used to stick the sides of semi trailers on and the reason is that it is viscoelastic and can accommodate some movement, one of the requirements is that only the top and sides are anchored using whatever and the VHB which can flex used in between. No mater what the expansion rate is for the SS it is going to be way different than the wood. I don't know that you could use the VHB with out it printing through the skin and being visible as faint lines. It could however be used around windows and doors etc.
The original skin was allowed to float for a reason.