Just a newbie and introducing myself. So glad to be here!

[jessicagypsyjane]

Hi T&TTT members! My name is Jessica and I live in Santa Barbara, CA. I love trailers, and tiny travel trailers. I partly refinished a 15ft Vintage Shasta w/wings back in 2004, but unfortunately it burned down during the San Bernadino fires. I have wanted another one ever since!
I have obsessed about getting another one, but for some reason felt I needed to wait. I am so glad I did, now that I have come across this wonderful site I want to build one. Yes, build one. I know with maybe a little help it can be done.
I have had a blast looking at everything on this site, but I have much more investigating to do, and how will I ever pick what style of teardrop to build?

Peace out,

Jessica

[Gage]

Hello Jessica, welcome aboard. I have a sister that lives in Santa Barbara. Mater of fact I just finished rebuilding a teardrop for her. You can see how I went about it HERE. In the pic below, that's my '56 Dalton in the back ground.

[jessicagypsyjane]

Thanks for being the first one to welcome me to the group. Seeing your rebulid of the teardrop was completely exciting, and fun. It got me motivated to want to do mine. I was curious how long it took you to do the rebuild?

Thanks again and talk soon,
Jessica

[nevadatear]

Yup, it is certainly possible to build it by yourself. Many women on the forum have done so. My husband and I built ours. I was as involved as he was. Although he did the heavy lifting, including interpreting the design into metal and wood construction, I was responsible for the the finishing. So I learned about fiberglass, epoxy, varnish and the like. After some looking, you will realized what you like best in the looks department. check out the design library for the basic names of the types and then go looking! One of your big decisions is size. Is just you or to share? The 4 wide vs 5 wide preference goes on ad nauseum, but you just need to decide what YOU like. welcome and have fun. The designing and making is as much fun as the camping. We are still adding ours, new drip caps and awning coming up soon.

[jessicagypsyjane]

Dear Debby and Randy,

Thanks you the inspiration. I love love your woody style teardrop, it's classic and really pretty. I love the way the back opens up, and how you the coffee mugs hanging there in the back, very cool.

It's hard to know where to start so I appreciate your tips. I am spending some time each day checking it out. Can I ask you this though? I would like to know how long it took to built yours, and approx what the cost was? So far, and I have not looked at all the posts as it will take some time to wade thur everything....but I have not come across that information yet.

Thanks again for the nice post...
Jessica in CA

[Gage]

I was curious how long it took you to do the rebuild?

Thanks again and talk soon,
Jessica

For those that know me, that's kind of a loaded question. The KIT is a real simple teardrop and should take only 6 to 8 months to build. With my lung condition, it takes me two to three times as long to do something. That rebuild took me just over two years to complete. The one thing to remember is to take your time and think things out. Grant of Lil' Bear offers full size layouts of different teardrops and is well worth getting one once you decide on the style you want to go with.

[nevadatear]

Ours took just about a year. We started in October and it was campable in May, but we didn't work on it every weekend. Then we worked on it almost every night from April to memorial day, to make it campable. Then another 6-10 weeks to get it "finished" which of course it wasn't. We took it pretty slow, sometimes not working on it for 3 or 4 weeks, then sometimes every night when we had a camping deadline. Because of the "woody" it was longer than most. Painting would be a lot faster than epoxy and varnish, inside and out. As for cost, again the woody added cost, and I spared no expense for my decor (new speckle metal dishware (the coffee cups you mention), plus my material for quilt, curtains, pillows, etc, as we consider this our "high end RV". All in all the trailer with everything, inlcuidng batteries, decor, charger, portable solar etc, was about $3500. For just the trailer, probably about $2500-$2800. Ours is 5 wide and 10 long and my husband built the frame himself. He is a welder.