Hybrid Foamie in Southern Alberta

[Shar]

I've been wandering around this website all winter, gathering knowledge so I could attempt my first tt in the spring. I wanted something with a 5 x8 footprint, in the vicinity of 5 ft high, with a v-shaped front. It needed to be very light, because we will be towing it with a Subaru wagon. I didn't want a galley, so the cabin will serve only for sleeping and storage. Here's a cardboard model of what I had in mind.

[Shar]

It was difficult to find any HF or NT style trailer frame in Canada- finally I found a motorsports place in Edmonton that sold a couple of types by the red trailer company. I wanted a new frame because I know very little about trailers and didn't want to buy someone else's trouble (as my mother likes to say). We got the trailer frame in Feb, and because the snow was up to our knees, it sat partially assembled in the living room for 2 months.

[Shar]

Finally the snow began to melt, and with some help from a friend I was able to finish assembling the frame.

[Shar]

I used 2 x 3s to frame the floor, and 1/2 " ply on top.

[Shar]

At an RV dealership, I found some used windows that were 1/3 the cost of new ones. Still not cheap, but they are solid and should work well for me. Here is one of them. I also found some used hatches that will go into the front compartment of the trailer (the v-shaped area).

[Shar]

I had originally planned on a wooden tt, but I became interested in foamies, mainly because they are so much lighter, and our tv is so small. In the last few weeks, I have been madly re-calculating this build along foamie lines. I found that, for me and the materials I was planning to use, the cost of a foam build was the same as the cost of a wood one- partly because foamboard is very expensive here ($55 for a 4 x8 sheet of 2") I decided that it was still worth it, because the finished trailer would be so lightweight. Here is a random pic of my method of bringing plywood home with my Chevy Cavalier.

[Shar]

Ok, that brings us up to the present time. Tonight after work I drilled the holes for the bolts which will connect my floor to the trailer frame, and despite my best efforts they did not line up. Well, half of them did. I spent an hour redrilling all the ones that didn't fit, trying to carefully take off the exact areas of wood that were in the way of the bolts. I am glad my husband doesn't have a smartphone, because there was much rage and swearing and I wouldn't want that caught on film.
My advice to anyone else doing this: go to every extreme you can to make sure you mark the location of the holes properly, and that you drill in the EXACT center of those marks. I thought I did that, but it wasn't accurate enough. By the end of that session, I was sorry I ever heard of trailering, but no doubt a good night's sleep will fix everything. Tomorrow before work I will do some waterproofing on the underside of the floor.

[Junkboy999]

I have placed black shoe polish on the heads of bolts before, Laid wood on top and hit the area where I thought the bolts were on the other side with a hammer. Nice little imprint of where the wood needs to be removed to clear the bolts heads.


Keep at it

[KCStudly]

I am enjoying following your build!

One technique for drilling accurate holes is to prick punch the center mark first and start with a very small bit. That way the drill does not wander and you get a good pilot hole. Step up in size on the drill bit gradually and it will follow the pilot hole well with out wandering.

Another technique is to mark and drill a couple of locating holes first, bolt them up first temporarily and then mark the rest of the holes. That way you know that nothing moves while you are marking.

[Shar]

Thanks for the encouragement and advice, JB and KC! I'm sure that on my next trailer (hahaha!) this part will go easier.
Change of plans for today: they are now predicting showers in the afternoon, so I'd better not try any painting today. Rain predicted for the next couple of days in fact, so I decided that, after work tonight, Mark and I will carry the floor frame into the living room, so that I can work on it indoors tomorrow. I can get the waterproofing and insulating done, methinks.
Here is a pic of the bolt heads that caused me such grief yesterday- tamed now. Mark says he has NEVER seen me that angry before.

[Shar]

Today's perplexing question. This insulating material is thrown out every week at Mark's work, so all winter he has been collecting it, with the thought of my using it as one of the layers of insulation in the walls of the trailer. Now that I have switched to a foamie build, the walls will have all the insulation they need. In his opinion, this is free material and I should use it somehow- maybe as insulation in the floor voids before I close them up. I was thinking of layering the silver sheets in till the void is full, then filling the air pockets along the sides with GS. Any thoughts? Would this be dumb, explosive, biohazardous, etc? My original thought was to use foam in there, but this would save $100.

[KCStudly]

Free is not always the best solution and is sometimes not free at all if it takes more work and/or does not achieve the desired result.

I used blue foam in my floor with 5 mm thin ply skins top and bottom. I plan on using a 3 or 4 inch thick dense foam mattress. If that is not enough cushion I will add some of the dense foam exercise tile/mats under the mattress. You might consider using that as a liner under your mattress (on top of the floor) if you want a little more cushion under your mattress, or if you were building a more traditional wood framed TD I could see trying it in the roof voids, but I wouldn't use it in the floor proper unless you plan on using a thick top skin. I can't remember at the moment if you said what you plan to do there, but you did say you wanted to build light, so having the rigid foam as part of the floor structure is part of that formula.

[Shar]

Thanks KC. My floor is framed with 2x 3s, with 1/2" ply on top, so there are indeed floor voids between those 2x3 "joists", and that is where I was thinking of stuffing/gluing this free insulation (then skinning it with something to cover it). I just wonder if it will work well as insulation- it's experimental. Or maybe just mental.

[Shar]

Here's the floor, now in my living room due to forecasts of snow and rain this week. I am waterproofing the underside of the floor before I put the insulation in. I will be careful to leave the wood unpainted, anywhere I plan to glue & canvas it. My plan is to use layers of that bubble-wrap stuff as insulation, glued/sealed in with GS . Then I intend to skin the bottom of it with sheets of corolan, which is strong, light and waterproof, and should hold up well since it will be out of the UV rads altogether. Fingers crossed, more pics later...

[lthomas987]

The stuff shouldn't be hazardous. It's also pretty decent insulation. I've taken it on airplanes with no explosions. I've built coolers, and cooler liners, and cooler covers out of it. I've got a co-worker who used it to insulate a smoker to maintain temp better (no idea how that worked i suspected it might melt) I should check back in. Other things you can do with it include.. custom fit window blanks for your car. I made a set for my front and back windows, along with the regular folding windshield variety in the windshield and back glass. Put on the sunny side of the car with teh windows open on the other side, I can maintain the temp in the car at the same as the temp under the car in 100% shade. I have contemplated doing the same for my teardrop windows, to resist solar gain.

As for putting it in your floor, since you don't need stability I'd go with the can't hurt, will probably help theory and use it.

Laura