Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

Got my trailer did some work on it today
1st I cut off the brackets that you are supposed to bolt on those caster wheels in the background then I threw away all the crap that allows the trailer to fold then added some Monroe trailer shocks to it after removing the shortest leaf spring
Still trying to figure out how to make my wiring work if I put on an extendable bumper oh well I can do that after the trailer is built if I have to. It is still way to cold to work with any glue yet oh yea very important to repack the wheel bearing in the harber freight trailers mine had no grease inside the bearing dab on the outside

Here is a close up of what I did with the shocks

Cool idea using that angle iron as a bottom plate and shock mount !!!

Nice!!

I'm Joans'n bad, Wish the weather would warm up, just got another 4 inches of snow again yesterday does any one know offhand at what temp it needs for TB2 to harden? It is supposed to be near 60 here on Sunday
Anyway I am going to order my canvas from Big Duck today
I was going to try my hand at making a telescoping bumper with the taillight mounted in the bumper. So I thought I would see if I can find some old spotlights with that coily cigarette plug in cord might need two in order to get the four wires that I need I' ll show if I can get it all figured out

It says above 55F on the gal. bottle ...

Congratulations on starting your build!

Now down to business. Did you use shock mounting studs or plain bolts to mount those shocks? The washers make it look suspiciously like you may have used ordinary bolts. If so no beuno.

Because the rubber busing are in compression, ordinary bolts will never be tight in the mounting holes and they will wallow out in short order. Shock mounting studs on the other hand, are a shoulder bolt, sometimes with a spacer washer that allows the bolt part to get tight to the mounting point while compressing the the shock bushing just enough.

Not trying to rain on your parade, but I would hate to see you have problems down the road.

KC
I did not think of that, as I am a carpenter not a bodyman so do I need to run a smaller bolt with a bushing through the shock or can I simply put some square tubing over the end of the shock with a washer to take up the extra space?
And then weld the tubing in place? That way when I put the bolt through everything is held secure with no pinching?

Gizzmo

Not following you exactly. What you need is for the part that holds the shock to get tight w/o crushing the shock, and the part that anchors to the trailer to get tight and not move despite the shock only being sort of tight.

Take a close look at the pic in this link.
This is a thru bolt style where the stud anchors through a hole with the nut on the back side. The thick washer is compressed between the mounting surface and a step on the stud so that the space for the shock is fixed between the large washer and the flange of the button head. The button head has wrench flats on it so that you can hold the stud while tightening the nut.

Compare that to this style (#75-5100).
The stud is double ended and has an integral hex in the center with a thread and nut on one end for securing to the anchor point, and a smaller diameter thread with shoulder and washer on the other end to prevent over crushing the shock bushing when the retainer nut is securely tightened.

Both of these designs have two things in common; the stud mounts securely to the anchor point with no chance of relative motion, and the shock is maintained securely without crushing it or allowing it to become loose.

The links are just sites that had good pictures of what I was trying to explain. I have no affiliation and have not looked for better pricing (although Speedway is usually pretty good).

I don't think it is worth it to try and bodge something together. I think I paid around $5 each at my local parts store.

I redid my shocks today. I went to town to find some shoulder bolts but couldn't find any that would work so I bought some bushings that fit inside the grommet then I cut some square tubing that the shock would fit in, cut out the front so I could squeeze it together tight up to the bushing everything tight and secure with the rubber being squeezed just a bit.

I also welded up the corners so that I could take the camper on and off, if I just bolted it to the frame either the walls would cover the bolts or I would have to bolt just on the cross members, I didn't like them options so I welded corners in, that I can get at from the inside

Your new setup should work. For future reference, just go to an auto parts store and ask for "shock absorber bolts".

I did go to the parts store for bolts but the problem I had was they had to be 5 inches long to go through that Mickey Mouse setup I had before so I caned the whole thing and started over. I just want to thank you guys for pointing that out to me as I would much rather spend a little more time now than to have trouble down the road

Finally got some decent weather and some time to work on my teardrop. So today I cut out the sides put the floor on and Kerfed the ceiling and glued in some hard points coming

Just Kerfed with a skill saw