BEULA - a foam Winter Warrior with aero front

[cpowell243]

I'm finally taking the plunge and starting my first journal. I'm Charlie from Wyoming and this journal will describe my building of BEULA.
My first tear, completed in 2012, was a modified Cub that was christened by my wife as BELLA - Best Ever Little Luxurious Accomodations.
BELLA was - and is - great. We have taken numerous trips and she has performed well. A few major limitations, though, had me thinking about a 2nd build.
1. Weight with e plywood put BELLA at 1200 lbs. loaded.
2. Changing difficult with 4' ceiling
3. Access via doors OK for now, but likely to get more difficult with declining joints and mobility, and
4. No place to sit down or cook when weather an issue
I found Gary's Winter Warrior design and it looked like a good option that would fix problems 2, 3, and 4, but even heavier given additonal plywood.
Then I discovered the "big thread" on the foamie forum and #1 (potentially) solved.
I also looked at some sites on aerodynamics and decided to try an aero front. When my first effort at kerfing failed, I came up with alternate method using layers of thin polystyrene glued together with Great Stuff.
Thus BEULA - Best Ever Ultralight Luxurious Accomodations. I'll follow with pics. Wish me luck and thanks in advance for the feedback.
Charlie

[KCStudly]

Welcome. I am looking forward to seeing more details about your build. It sounds interesting.

[GPW]

Good Luck !!!

[cpowell243]

GPW and KCStudly,
Means alot to have the guy who started the big thread and the poet express builder check in. Been following your builds and discussion for some time. Will have many questions about gluing foam and attaching canvas as I move along.
Still trying to figure out how to move pics from my album to the build thread. My pics are in the cpowell243 album.
Charlie

[OP827]

Good Luck and great idea. I will be following with interest. !

You can place pictures in at least two ways:
First by clicking Gallery tab in post edit window and then click [insert image] button from your album that will pop up.
Second way is to copy URL address from your album picture and place it inside the post by clicking "Img" tab and then paste the pciture URL inside - "[img]Picture_URL_pasted_here[/img]"

[GPW]

CP, Just copy and paste the album picture code ( Image BBCode: ) into your text .... Pics come right up ...

[S. Heisley]

This will be an interesting build!

[cpowell243]

GPW,
I'm doing something wrong. When I try to post the BBImage code this happens:



I've also tried to enter the URL code inside the image prompt based on OP827's reply and I get:

http://www.tnttt.com/gallery/image.php?album_id=3840&image_id=128326

Am looking forward to posting pics in my album once I figure this out.

Th - Ch





Ch

[cpowell243]

Never mnd (obviously) - didn't realize they don;t show up until after you post reply.
Ch

[cpowell243]

Let's start over.
My initial graphing of BEULA shows floor plan and side view. Floor plan uses a 50" wide bed situated lengthwise. The bottom half of the bed converts to a dinette as Gary accomplished in his Winter Warrior design.
Plan for the hatch is to build sides with 2" polystyrene from the nose to the hatch. The back half of the box will use 1" poly attached to the inside half of the 2", thus creating a "nest" for the 3/4" poly hatch.
The actual height of BEULA is now 58" following some consultation with Gary about the hatch design requirements.
My journal then moves to the nose section, since I needed to determine whether my plan would work before going forward with the remainder of the project.
Ch

[cpowell243]

I decided to to start my build with a form using the (admittedly flimsy) beaded styrofoam, since it is much more plyable than the stronger polystyrene.
[img][/img]

[cpowell243]

Next step was to add a horizontal piece of 1" styrofoam forced by the form to bend out about 18". I fashioned a wood bracket to hold the styrofoam in place while I glued another piece of 3/4" styrofoam to the back of the first section in the bent position to hold its shape. These pieces will gradually be expanded to create a 1 3/4" thick curved form made of styrofoam that will then allow me to add the stronger polystyrene to the exterior.

[cpowell243]

Next came the toe plate - if anyone knows a more correct term let me know. This 3/4" plywood piece was cut in a curved shape with 70" radius. Its purpose is to receive the bottom edge of the curved form. I added about 20 short pieces of angled 2X4 glued and screwed to the toe plate to follow the curve and create a gluing surface for the styrofoam. The toe plate will provide a positive attachment to the floor, since the floor will be a sandwich and the toe plate with meet the styrofoam center of the floor between the plywood top and bottom, thus gluing the bottom of the nose to the floor. Better explanation will follow.
Starts with a better pic of my bracket.
[img][/img]
[img][/img]
[img][/img]
and, backtracking a little, another view of the 2-layer horizontal form.
[img][/img]

[OP827]

I think your ideas are very interesting.

Two questions:
Is there going to be enough headroom with lifted roof to seat at the table or you may want to move hinge further in front above the headboard?
Having side access to the bed pedestal is certainly a great feature, but is the cantelivered side wall will be rigid and strong enough with such setup, so how are you additionally brace and enforce the side walls from not flexing and stressing too much on the sides?

[cpowell243]

Next I placed the form upside down so I could begin creating the bottom half of the form. Pieces of 3/4" styrofoam were glued from the horizontal pieces to the toe plate surface using Great Stuff.
[img][/img]
Finished the bottom section then glued up the top half. Used 1/2" X 3" X 3" plywood pieces in back of each of the screw/fender washer assemblies - sorry that was not shown.
[img][/img]