Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

I am not an engineer (and despite the fact that I own a drafting board, several engineers squares, and precision calipers, I am not any where close . . .), so I thought I'd broach this one here.

Is there a reason why a body couldn't build up the bed of a 4x8 trailer and extend the floor of ones TTT out to 5', effectively enclosing the wheels. I'd like a 5' TTT, but I'm having a hard time finding a 5' trailer locally that is within my modest budget.

Thoughts?

Chris

Go for it!
They do it all the time with bigger trailers.

I was thinking perhaps some 6" I-beam style floor joists on 18"-24" centers to cut down on weight.

Six Inch!

Overkill.

You'll find numerous trailers here that built 5 wide on a 4' frame, and the majority of them used 2x4 or even 2x4's ripped in half.

Do what I did, ignore your family and spend weeks reading through the build threads!

Oh, I've been reading . . .

what type of clearance do you need above the wheel?

Benhamtroll wrote:Oh, I've been reading . . .

what type of clearance do you need above the wheel?

The easy answer would be to measure the clearance from the top of the axle to the frame, but in most cases this is overkill. I mounted my axle on top of my springs leaving a clearance of about 1 1/2 inches. The axle has hit the frame a couple times. Probably a good rule of thumb would be between 3 and 4 inches.

I'm building 5' wide 10' long on a 4x8. Used 2x4's to get the deck above the wheels. Should give me plenty of clearance.

I did what you are asking about. Here is my build thread. May be more then you need but it should help. Good luck!

http://tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?t=39036

Lol. At this point I don't think there is 'more than I need' . . .

This is really helpful! I would really like to avoid the interior wheel wells, but I'm not sure how high I'd have to go to do that, and if it would be safe.

I'll be reading your journal, for certain.

You most certainly can build 5' wide on a 4' frame as I did on the 4x8 HF frame. I used wheel wells in my build, but you can't even tell that they are there after cutting a foam mattress to fit around and over them. The bed surface is a full 5 wide even in the wheel well area.

Good Luck,

Mike

Why stop at 60". I went to 65' and raised the deck a bit so as not to have ANY Fender wells in the cabin and not have to worry about any external fenders at all.





BTW, 62" wide (inside) is the exact dimension of 2 Junior Twin Mattresses also.

Happy Trails

Len

You all rock. I'm going to have to think long and hard.

I love the fender look, and think it is one of the hallmarks of the teardrop look. I may have to build some faux fenders into mine to get some of that.

I'm with you! I do like the fender look too. On my new one, my sides are flush with my tires, so no fenders for me. I may do something with the paint scheme to accent the wheel well though.

Anyway... here's what my trailer deck looked like before the sides went on...



And here's with my sidewalls on. Interior dimension is 60.5" wide. Outside width is 62" (3/4" sidewalls). I beveled the cutout for the wheel well arch to give the tire a hair more clearance. My overall weight should be about 1/2 of the trailers total capacity, so I'm not too worried about my tire clearance (about 2")



I would have posted pictures and more detail with my previous post, but I was posting from my cell phone.

Teardrop bodies automatically come with two enormous I-beams built into them - one is the galley bulkhead and the other is the front wall.

Make sure those land across the frame (so, no hanging the front wall in front of the frame) and are fixed into the body and you then require no floor framing - the sidewalls will hold up the floor edges because they are held up by the bulkhead and front wall.

George Teague did this with his Compact GT (admittedly with 1/2" ply floor) and it worked fine - http://home.earthlink.net/~g.teague/

(so, no hanging the front wall in front of the frame)


oops !