New Guy from Ephrata Washington

[badplasma]

Hello Im Scott.... nice to meet everyone..... Here are my thoughts and why im here.....I am a wildland fire fighter... 90 percent of the time Im on the fire Im sleeping on the ground, in a tent, and needless to say at the end of the day, I can sleep anywhere. but that sleep lasts about three hours, and from there its toss and turn time, and that sucks. And then there are the days where I end up on night shift and we have to sleep during the day..Let me set the stage for you..Your in camp there are some 5 to 600 tents all around you and surounding this camp are trailers all running refers you got the general public milling around, cars and trucks coming and going all day long...Oh, its sunny and it hot....ok not just hot its F-ING HOT...and in a tent...its even more F-ING HOT... ok then I get about an hour or two of sleep while the temp is still cool enough to sleep...and then you would think it toss and turn time but nope.. your just up. Fatigue kills fire fighters. I know the out come comes back at heart attack and they crash their truck... but chances are its because they are tired...

So why do I want to built a Teardrop Trailer... Mainly listed in the ramble above. I need somesthing that is easy to setup.. sometimes we are setting up camp in the middle of the night after being on the last 16 hours. And then I need something that is small enough that can be towed behind a small truck or car because I sometimes have no idea what truck I am going to be going in and may need my wife to follow in the car..plus my wife and I want something we can go camping in for a weekend with out spending most of our time setting up a large trailer...My parents have a 34 foot trailer and with all the stuff he needs since he is in a wheelchair it takes him hours to setup even with help...

By the way my father may be in a wheelchair...but have you ever seen a guy who cant walk replace a roof on a house....Ill send you a picture of one...Ill also send you a picture of a guy who cant walk build a tri-level shop bigger than most peoples houses..seriously... Oh did I mention that he will be building this with my help...trust me I wont be much help..

I am a father, I am a grandfather, I am a husband, I work hard, and I love every aspect of my life.. I enjoy the time I get off and I love being busy.. I work a full time job for a newspaper I am the circulation manager, I am also a volunteer Firefighter/EMT. And I work for a Motor Speedway, I also leave home for weeks on end to fight wildland fires....

I have 4 KIds and 4 grandkids and one more one the way..

[corymike756]

Welcome Scott

I know from personal experience what you mean about being exhausted yet unable to sleep in a staging area. I was a firefighter in west Texas for many years and have seen my share of wildfires. A TD would have been nirvana for us, especially if there was a/c involved. But yeah, anything that offered the least bit of privacy and a sense of separation from the throngs of people and noisy equipment.
I look forward to seeing your build as it progresses, be sure to post plenty of pics

[pchast]

Welcome Scott. I'd love to see what you do.

[badplasma]

Thanks everyone... Pictures of the build will be posted.. Im kinda like a tourist from japan, qwk question though.... I thought I had the perfect trailer base to use... it was an old 68 apache golden eagle tent trailer...I had thought that it measured 4x8 turns out it measures 5'10 x 6'10...I dont know much about balnce of trailers.. could I simply at length to the trailer to make it 8 foot long? I can adjust my plans for it being wider.

[PKCSPT]

Welcome and thank you for being put there to keep my family and home safe as a firefighter. You are appreciated

[Vedette]

Hi Scott
Have you stripped the tent trailer body off of the frame yet?
Post a picture if you have.
Trailers like 60% of their length ahead of the wheels and 40% behind.
Most tent trailers are extra wide and have the body hanging over the wheels, where as most Teardrops have the body sides inside the wheels and tires, with external fenders.
It is common to take the outside extensions (usually just angle iron) off of the tent trailer frame to narrow it and to add more framing to the rear for the desired width and length.
Good Roads
Brian & Sandi

[tony.latham]

Scott:

I spent fifteen years "on the line." The last eleven were in Alaska. You didn't (couldn't) drive to fire camp. We'd make our "hootch" out of a 10' square piece of black visqueen, tie it up with a ridge pole between a pair of trees, hang some mosquito net from it, and use the ubiquitous moss for a mattress.

C-rats for dinner.

If you're going to use a teardrop to camp with your wife, make sure you go with a five-wide (unless you two are as skinny as IV lines), two doors, and a fan. These little campers are great but they need ventilation and a one-doored teardrop is a marriage counselor's dream.

I'm a big devotee of the build method outlined in Steve Fredrick's Teardrop Shop Manual. It's 270 well-illustrated pages. (No, I'm not associated with Steve, just appreciate his manual.)

Here's a quick video on my first of three 'drop builds:



Tony

[Vedette]

Great Video Tony!
Every Newbie should watch tis video before they jump right in??
Shows just how much work and equipment is really required to build a Teardrop Trailer from scratch.
Good Roads
Brian & Sandi
PS
You should scoot across the state to Post Falls on the 19th to meet up with us at the Phuddy Duddy Car Show & Trailer Rally at the end of our Fall Crawl.