?? reducing body weight with PVC pipe

[Ron Dickey]

I plan to have an outside skin and inside skin of 1/8 oak
and a skeliton support of wood around the parimaders
and drill some shallow holes in top and bottom wood reinforcement scrap
and extend PVC pipe along the middle as reinforcement in the middle of each wall.



this will reduce weight, and cost. allow for wiring and insolation.
I plan to glue the pipe to the walls ( I could rivit them too if needed.

Thoughts

[madjack]

...that is an excellent idea

...that is a terrible idea

...hmmmmmmm, food for thought Ron.

...schedule 40 PVC has excellent crush resistance but has very poor resistance to flexing, which is what you would want in the wall of your TD. Once everything was built it may do OK but you might have real problems with warpage in your walls before they are installed. You would probably have to go with 1.5" or 2" to have a hope of avoiding flex problems...furniture made of PVC is usually made of 1.5" or larger sch 40 and is cut into short pieces so as to combat those types of problems.

Another problem would be the tendency of PVC to shatter at lower temperatures(approaching freezing)...in the plumbing industry when temps go below 50F it is recommended that you preheat PVC before gluing

The idea, on the surface, sounds like a good one but in practical application I would have severe reservations about using PVC as a structural component ...the little trailer in the pic is a lawnmower trailer and in that application would probably work fine as long as temperature stays high and it is protected from the UVies

...all this is IMHO and as always YMMV

madjack

[purplepickup]

Maybe you could use galvanized steel conduit instead of plastic. It's a little heavier but a lot stronger and less flexible. They make all sorts of fittings/connectors, it's cheap, it can be bent, and welding is possible if you avoid the fumes from the zinc coating.

I use conduit a lot to make bracing....just smash the ends flat and drill a hole. The end is easily bent to fit the application too.

Edit: Oops...I didn't see the other thread about conduit. Personally I wouldn't use it on a trailer. I don't think the round surface would lend well to attaching wood sides and such.