Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

Well,
I've conferred with the expert at Design Review and have been given the green light. (Thanks Andrew)


I'm going with a copper roof and woody sides, hence the name; Copperwood. (Enough with the patina jokes already)
Remaining drawings of the plans can be seen in my ALBUM.

That will be a beautiful trailer. Might need to mortgage your house to pay for all the copper, though.

I like it. It's purdy!

That will be an outstanding Tear! Will you build the walls in bead-n-cove?

Steve,
My plan is to glue 1/4" bead and cove over at least 1/4" sheathing. (If 1/4" sheathing will lay flat enough)
The sheathing will be glued and screwed to the stud wall. I have enough Western Red Cedar already to go along with the two piece accent stripe made from Redwood and Basswood.
When I glued up my blank to cut the accent strips, I made it wide enough to get one extra set, in case something went afowl on the canoe.
I just wish that extra set was about 2 feet longer so I could go all the way down each side of the trailer. (That's why I came up with the feather feature)
Speaking of that feather feature, what would you do to get a nice red?
Have you ever used aniline dyes? (I see that ruby is available)
My thinking on the dye is, I would probably have to go with clear coat instead of varnish, which would add a little amber color to it.
I'm going to have to find out what the uv protection is with clear coat vs. varnish.
I've also read about fellows using tracing paper to do lettering prior to glassing.
What jacks me up about the dye, is I wouldn't loose the grain of the wood.
As far as hiding all my end grain on the doors and door openings, My plan there is to laminate with edge stripping or just wrap with copper.
I'm stoked about the accent stripe tying the canoe and teardrop to one another.

Dean,
Wow! That is going to be one nice trailer!!

Where can a feller get sheets of copper? I once saw some workers cutting a 4x8 sheet that was 3/4" thick. I thought, wow, that's alot of pennies.

Would copper be too soft to resist dings? Can you get it in a harder alloy?

I think the eventual corroded look will be really cool, but can you keep it from getting out of control? You don't want green stains down the side of your tear.

If your trailer turns out anything like your drawing, it is going to be an instant classic. Very nice.

Dean, that is going to be absolutely stunning!
Amy

Amy & Bev,
Thank You for nice compliments.

Karl,
I'm not too worried about the copper being too soft.
If that's the case, I wonder why I haven't seen any concern about aluminum be too soft.

Dean, that is going to be a very nice looking trailer. I was telling Bob about it this weekend. He says if you bring it north and park by a sour gas well, you will get your patina. Just let us know when you are heading up this way and we'll meet up with you!!!

OK,
I'm probably walking blind right into this one...
...What's a sour gas well?

A natural gas well that is high in Hydrogen Sulfide. Very corosive and poisonous. The smell is like that of rotten eggs and the problem is it dulls the smell sensation and then it kills you. Very dangerous.

I saw recently where someone said that they developed a controlled pantina on a copper roof with urine in a spray bottle.

Further comments will not be made by me!

(Don't tell anyone, but I've been doing some tests, doing exactly that!)
I'm pleased with the results so far and my dogs really get interested when I'm doing these tests out in the back yard (With a spray bottle of course)

.... I'm kinda leaning towards keeping the copper nice and shiny now for some reason...

I still have not found a source to do the front portion of the roof in one piece though.

Keep us posted the concept sounds really nice and different.