CapeBuild Build Journal

[noseoil]

John, this is beautiful, can't wait to see it rolling!

[Capebuild]

5.24.22

Tim (Noseoil) and Shadow Catcher, thanks so much for your nice comments. Appreciate hearing that!

WELL.... BIG DAY TODAY!!

Fired up the grill-oven and tackled the front window. Picts attached. I found the form (the buck) had been affected by
the moisture sitting in the garage since I had built it in February. There was a bunch of unevenness. Went back to belt sanding some high spots and then covered the whole thing in aluminum to kind of even everything out. The oven worked well. Probably could have left the acrylic in the oven a bit longer...
the heat could have been a bit more evenly distributed. We (my wife and I) turned the acrylic once in the oven 180° to try and get the heat to affect all the surfaces evenly.....
but worked well. The hardest part was trimming the acrylic to be the correct size to fit the gasket. Put it in place and pulled it out 3 or 4 times, removing a bit of material each time.
I certainly didn't want to trim it too small. It still seemed to be oversized a bit.... but went ahead and imbedded the locking gasket and all kind of snapped into place. Satisfaction!
Very happy to have this part done.

John

[JasenC]

The window looks awesome John.

[Staryder61]

John, absolutely beautiful job on your teardrop.. and that front window is just unbelievable..
The time and workmanship that you have put into this build set a new standard of building teardrops on this forum..

[lfhoward]

That curved window is so awesome!!! I have never seen it done like this, but you did it. Congratulations John!

[Tom&Shelly]

Great job John!

Tom

[Capebuild]

Thanks so much for the encouraging comments, Jasen, Tom, Lauren and David. Nice and I appreciate them.
That window was a big challenge and ever since designing the trailer that was really my main concern on how to do it.
So really glad to now have that in the rear view mirror. Now I need to figure out what to do with that grill-oven. If anyone wants to
bend some acrylic, it's yours.


I think I'm at the point where I can call the state police and apply for a VIN#. And get insurance..... and look to register it.
It's been just about a year since I started the building part..... almost done! (or as is said, "campable")..........

Thanks again!!

John

[Capebuild]

5.26.22


This morning hitched up the trailer and took it out on the road for its maiden voyage to the town dump where they have a scale. First weighed the car and the trailer and then just the car and subtracted the difference. Trailer (dry weight plus the Dometic fridge) came in at 1,760 pounds. So a little over than what I would have liked (was hoping for 1600 #s). So be it. When we returned I weighed the tongue weight and that came in at 207 pounds. So around 12% of the total dry weight. I figure with our bikes on the back and the future tongue box of some sort loaded with all its stuff.... we should be okay, weight wise.

Drove nice and nice to have brakes on the trailer.

John

[Staryder61]

5.26.22


This morning hitched up the trailer and took it out on the road for its maiden voyage to the town dump where they have a scale. First weighed the car and the trailer and then just the car and subtracted the difference. Trailer (dry weight plus the Dometic fridge) came in at 1,760 pounds. So a little over than what I would have liked (was hoping for 1600 #s). So be it. When we returned I weighed the tongue weight and that came in at 207 pounds. So around 12% of the total dry weight. I figure with our bikes on the back and the future tongue box of some sort loaded with all its stuff.... we should be okay, weight wise.

Drove nice and nice to have brakes on the trailer.

John

John, great looking duo you have there. You'll be giving all kinds of tours, and the questions. Oh gheeeesh, Where'd you buy that? How did you do that? Do you make them to sell?
A work of art it definitely is.. You should do a book..

Be safe always, David

[Onajourney]

WOW! Incredibly fantastic John!!!

Did you use the spacing guide from TrimLok for the acrylic cut size?

Have you water tested it?

Brother..You are done. Congratulations on an amazing build. You got to do a walk around video. As someone here said, you are going to get stopped everywhere you go with this and asked all kinds of questions.

[S. Heisley]

CONGRATULATIONS!

It's beautiful and more than road-worthy!

Give yourself a well deserved pat on the back.

[GarthB]

Every time I read one of your updates I feel the inspiration to start another build due to your many great ideas and excellent craftsmanship.

Excellent work John! I hope you have a great time making use of it this summer!

[Capebuild]

Geeezz.... thank you so much for your encouraging comments, David, Sharon, Onajourney and Garth. Very nice of you all to say this. Appreciated!!!

This forum has been so encouraging and helpful. I can't imagine taking on a project like this without the helpful sharing of experiences others have had building these trailers.

I've got a long punch list of areas I need to go back to and rethink, revise, fix and otherwise, make better. With that said, we are hoping to take the trailer out camping sometime soon. I've been talking with my insurance agent to get coverage and they start the ball rolling with application paperwork for the DMV as far as registration, VIN, title and all that good stuff.

Onajourney, I'm not sure of your question about Trimlok's "spacing guide". I installed the gasket and cut the acrylic to the size I measured it should be. I installed it ....and took it out,.... trimmed it a bit more and reinstalled .... repeating this a few times. Kind of 'gingerly' sneaking up on the finished size that I eventually settled on. Also, no, I have not yet water tested it. On my punch list are a bunch of seals I yet have to finalize. The hatch needs to be adjusted. I'm probably going to have to unscrew the hurricane hinge and put a shim under it (like maybe 1/8" to 3/16"). The hatch fits nice on the top of the curve but there's a bit of space between molding and seal as it works its way down to the bottom. I think a spacer at the hurricane hinge (raising the hatch up slightly) might solve this.

Garth, I remember the troubles you had with your finishing with the Monstaliner and I did appreciate your persistence with getting satisfaction and getting it work "right'...... so inspiration there. Thanks.

Thank you all again for the nice comments.

John

[Indiana Rambler]

Wow! That looks great! Bet you feel relieved that it’s ready to use very soon! You’ve put a lot of time, effort, and forward thinking in that camper! I’m in awe my friend! Great job! Looking forward to pics in the wild soon!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bdosborn]

Great job John!

Bruce