Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

New to the forum have looked and haven't found if any one has tried aluminum honeycomb panels. Like the ones in the site listed below.

http://www.universalmetaltek.com/honeycomb_panel.htm

Checked them out and even the PDF file on working with these seems to answer most of the questions I had? The even make ones with SS which I thought might even work for the gallery.

These things are light in relation to plywood and have some R value.

Any help would be great as this is my first build and I'm looking to go ultra lite and strong. What to pull it behind my 11' VW Jetta TDI.

how much do they cost?

I'm using similar stuff to make a set of drawers for the back of my 4WD Mitsubishi. Easy to use and very light. My thoughts are the same as you, they would be excellent if you wanted a light weight TD. At $300.00 for an 8X4 sheet down here, expensive but would save heaps of weight.
Cheers
Paul

What is your target weight? Isn't the Jetta rated to tow 1500lbs? Not saying it isn't a good idea, just a little pricy when standard construction techniques can get you within your tow rating.

Well the target weight is at max 750lbs or less and mostly thatbis because the TDI Jetta is only rated for 1000lbs and a tounge weight of 200 lbs. The panels I know are going to be pricey but for me to go and buy a little guy TD rascal is around $7000. So my goal is in that price range but I want a bigger size.

There are other composite/honeycomb... panels of everything from Kevlar and carbon fiber to who knows what, that are probably less money and less vulnerable to being damaged though I do see marine hull aluminum material. It is good that you are thinking airplane rather than tank in construction and consider other materials i.e. http://fvvleck.com

I've used a somewhat similar product called Ultra Aluminum on my personal TD. It's foam core, not honeycomb core- still pretty strong and stiff though, and cheaper. The only downside is fastening it to other material... it's not like wood, it won't hold a screw for normal fastening methods. If you can get around that, it's cool stuff. I have also played with a aluminum honeycomb product...it is incredibly stiff and strong... and super light. But I've never gotten around to using it on a TD. I'll be real interested in watching your build if you choose to use this material! Another cool product I've seen in this category is also an aluminum honeycomb structure but has an epoxy-like outer skin on both sides. - Cool because it lets light through! And still Very Strong.

I looked into aluminum honeycomb and got some quotes from various sources.

Connecting the panels to each other, and fastening other things to the panels is where the problem lay for me... can't glue because the aluminum will oxidize and not provide a good clean surface for adhesion.

At temperatures and pressures I could achieve (room temp, 1 atmosphere pressure), even using epoxy wouldn't provide an air-tight layer even if I was able to clear off all the oxide before gluing (mircro-pores in the epoxy allows air to migrate to the aluminum surface and it progressively oxidizes and then peels away).

I was thinking of bolting, but then have to figure out what kind of closeouta to order. Closeouts cost extra $$$ too.

In the end I decided to build (relatively) cheap and rickety with wood, see where everything gets attached, and only then re-measure and get quotes for the exact size/shape/reinforced bits of aluminum honeycomb.

The quotes for the honeycomb were in the $3000-$5000 range. Before crating and shipping costs.

Couldn't you build the ''practice'' tear out of cardboard to get the measurements and reinforcement locations?

You could use 3M VHB tape to fasten it. There is a cleaner used and it is used structurally with aluminum.

dh wrote:Couldn't you build the ''practice'' tear out of cardboard to get the measurements and reinforcement locations?

Call me crazy, but I want to use my (tiny) travel trailer a few times, see what I did wrong, what I need to add, subtract, or modify. Before pony'ing up the big money for the honeycomb panels. I don't even know where I'm putting windows/vents yet!

For me, I am building something that is assembled before use, and disassembles after use. Something that will fit in a two-car garage with two cars in it. So it will be bolt-n-fold. Kind of like a hard-sided tent trailer, but since it is 4x8, not quite so spacious

I got quotes for the panels from Teklam and Paneltec. I looked around for overstock and "stock" panels (paneltec used to advertise them on their web site), but couldn't find anything. Everyone I talked to just builds the panels one-off to customers' specs. They would all love a CAD drawing to make their life easier (and more accurate) when doing any shapes other than rectangles (cutouts, holes, etc).

Anyone who lives in an aerospace manufacturing center (southern cali, SF Bay, wichita? CT?) can probably find interesting scrap.

Here in Las Vegas, nothing is available. I didn't want to over-engineer ($$$$$$) with the honeycomb; I am thinking now that my initial ideas were way way over-burly. I initially tried estimating using beam deflection formulas, but not eveyone publishes modulus of elasticity/moment of inertia, especially for the more exotic honeycomb materials and facing sheets. I used the calculators here at Engineer's Edge

Now my calculations go like this: build in wood as light as possible, see how it turns out. If it's all good, then the wood thickness will be the maximum thickness of honeycomb I'll need.

When I make mistakes in wood (too short/too long) it is relatively cheaper and easier to remedy than a breathtakingly expensive bit of honeycomb panel.