About to begin my teardrop in NY

[ArtsBuild]

Greetings from Orange County, NY. I recently completed an unrelated 5 year project and sold it so that I could move on. Over the past 2 months I have spent untold hours on this forum and many of the places that the links sent me to. What started a few years ago as a desire to own a commercially sold teardrop (Little Guy) has become a desire to build one of my own. I just could never get past the $6 - $10,000 price tag on the pre-built models.

So far, I have decided on a basic design (Grumman 2) and that I will build it on a 5' X 8' Northern Tools utility trailer kit - I have no welding experience at all. The kit just arrived today. Unlike some of the threads I followed here and elsewhere, it came in very good condition. But I have a question already: do you recommend having this trailer "touched up" by a welder after I have assembled it with the included nuts and bolts? I have several friends that are recommending that I take it to a welder once assembled. They believe that it would then be more strong, reliable and prone to stay square over time. I don't think I ever saw a build in this forum that did that with one of the bolt together trailer kits.

I appreciate any feedback you have to offer and thanks already for getting me this far.

Art

[bobhenry]

Here goes another can of worms......

Opinions WILL vary !

My very 1st build was in 07 and was a bolt together Harbor Freight 40 x 48.



Eggbert tagged along behind the Goldwing and other tow vehicles for 2 years. I later removed the body and built the chuckwagon on the same frame. It is simply bolted together, I also lengthened and replaced the tongue with heavier wall 2x2 by simply drilling and bolting it to each crossmember. It had never seen a welder and after 6+ years on the road is still following along dutifully.






As to staying square simply make sure its square when you assemble it and when the floor is bolted on it can not get out of square.