Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

My plan is to build a true woody teardrop and I was wondering if anyone has had luck applying paper backed wood veneers to the outside or their trailers? I wanted to have a darker color on the exterior and found out that birch is a pain to stain, especially with the limitations introduced by later applying epoxy, mainly no conditioner and only water based stains.

To give some more detail, I will be skinning the exterior walls and roof with 1/8" birch and applying the veneer to that. I will also be using epoxy and spar varnish to protect and finish the exterior after the veneers are attached.

One problem I can foresee is applying pressure to the veneers which will need to have very even and total coverage. I was thinking I could use veneer glue which after being applied to both surfaces could be reactivated with an iron. I have heard this is a very effective technique.

Again, thanks ahead of time for your suggestions.

Cheers,
Ryan

Sorry, I don't have any answers to your questions, but early in my build thread Linuxmanxxx recommended a laminate product called envirawood.

Here's a link to his post with a link to the website http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?p=909338#p909338.

KCStudly wrote:Sorry, I don't have any answers to your questions, but early in my build thread Linuxmanxxx recommended a laminate product called envirawood.

Here's a link to his post with a link to the website http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?p=909338#p909338.

I had a look and called their help line and it looks very nice although it is 3x the price of a wood veneer. They are technically rated for indoor use but are waterproof and have significant UV protection and the rep I spoke with said it would probably work although they couldn't back up the warranty. Because of my trailer dimensions I would have to splice a couple sheets together so I would still need to epoxy at the very least.

Thanks for the info!

Rather than the price of the veneer and work associated with it to cover the material...why not just get a sheet of veneered ply to begin with. I don't know about 1/8" but you can easily get 1/4" material that is already veneered. 1/8" might not have much "punch resistance". I've used an aniline dye on my woodies rather than a stain, it's easy to apply and you can doctor it up for as light or as dark as you want with a damp rag. It's more UV resistant, but over time will lighten a bit, even under an epoxy with UV protectant and auto clear over it all. Just a suggestion. Doug

I'm with Doug, why make what you can buy? But, if you have to veneer, I would us vacuum clamping. Its how I installed the filon on our camper and it worked very well.



Bruce

doug hodder wrote:Rather than the price of the veneer and work associated with it to cover the material...why not just get a sheet of veneered ply to begin with. I don't know about 1/8" but you can easily get 1/4" material that is already veneered. 1/8" might not have much "punch resistance". I've used an aniline dye on my woodies rather than a stain, it's easy to apply and you can doctor it up for as light or as dark as you want with a damp rag. It's more UV resistant, but over time will lighten a bit, even under an epoxy with UV protectant and auto clear over it all. Just a suggestion. Doug

Thanks for in info on the aniline dyes, I might have to experiment with some scratch birch and see what I can do.

I did think about using 1/4" ply but since my walls and roof will be the same I don't see how I could bend something that thick to the curves in my profile. Vacuum bagging might work for the walls but the roof would be to large. I could possibly apply the veneer to the birch roof panel beforehand and then attach to the roof but I would be afraid of it cracking.

Why do the roof and walls need to be the same? We use vennered 3/4 ply on the walls and 1/8 ply on the roof, two layers.

nevadatear wrote:Why do the roof and walls need to be the same? We use vennered 3/4 ply on the walls and 1/8 ply on the roof, two layers.

I was referring to the veneer and not the thickness of the underlayment skin. I would like them to match in color, grain, etc, but maybe that is a tall order.