Where or When Jr. --Paint & New Tow Vehicle--update 5/17/15

[cracker39]

Mike, you've done a great job. The Compact was part of the inspiration for my Pop Top. I like that propane tank "cage". Where did you get it? And, can you tell me exactly what connections you have to connect the tank to your cook top unit? I have a two burner Wedgewppd Vision that I haven't installed yet and have no idea where or how to get the hoses with the right connectors. I suppose I'll go to one of the RV dealers around Lakeland.

[myoung]

The trailer is roadworthy so it is time to try it out. On Thursday when all but some small stuff (except the big three items of flooring, counter tops, and fabric and screen popup) had been finished, I decided to go up early to the start of the 24th Annual Route 66 Fun Run.

Here are a few photos of the first camp site a few miles east of Seligman, AZ, just off Historic Route 66 at the 5,700-foot elevation.






Naturally, there are many small items to buy and to fix and to finish. Are trailers ever really complete? Didn't think so.

I forgot to buy a can opener, dish detergent, sponges, and a few other useful items.

The three days on the road gave me time to try out most of the systems and to make a list of things that need tweaking or completing.

I was pleasantly surprised how little the strong cross winds or passing trucks affected the trailer. I had expected more drama from the slab sides but nothing happened.

The fridge was a big disappointment. It is one of those absorption types that runs on AC, DC, or gas. I didn't have the opportunity to test the AC mode, but the DC mode consumes too much juice for the paltry amount of cooling gained. The gas mode was just as disappointing. It's hard to tell whether the flame is lit and what you can see is miniscule. Gas and electricity work beautifully on our Airstream but that has a real fridge not one of these pretenders.

Also, unlike the Airstream, I don't have a weight distribution hitch on this trailer because it would seem unnecessary. However, one useful aspect of the weight distribution hitch setup is that it puts the trailer and the tow vehicle in the same horizontal plane. In this way, the dips or bumps between road and curb at entrances to gas stations, for example, seldom cause the hitch to drop down much.

I have to be more careful and mindful of bumps and dips now, because the flexing that takes place at the hitch ball cause scraping on two occasions. I carved a pair of grooves in the pavement with the angle bracket that holds my grey water tank in place. I'll bevel or round the front edges of the brackets to lessen the problem a bit.

The blue glow from the digital voltmeter was a terrific nightlight. The LED lights (2) are perfect for illuminating the galley counter, stove, and sink. The other three ceiling lights are placed just right for reading. I now have ribbons to hold the window coverings up, which look and work well.

Before my next trip, I'll have to put an anchor or two on the gaucho because the road bumps caused it to slide out too easily. Also, I want to add an adjustable screw to hold the rotating table in place while traveling. I knew these had to be done, but didn't expect as much movement as I got especially from the gaucho.

Lastly, there must be quite a bit of bouncing at the extreme rear end of the trailer because on three occasions all the hangers including those with a coat and a robe jumped off the closet rod. Hmmm.

[cracker39]

Mike, you sure did yourself proud. That's a beautiful piece of work, inside and outside. And, it sure looks right at home in a camping setting.

It appears to be roughly the same size as my PT that is nearing completion. Do you know how much it weighs overall and the tongue weight? Your axle looks like it is a little farther back than mine is, so I’d suspect that the tongue weight is heavier than mine will be. I haven’t put the wheels and tires on mine yet, so I don’t know yet what my tongue weight will be but I estimated that it will be between 180 and 210 lbs. With the Squidget weighing 1400 lbs with a 190 lb tongue weight, I didn’t have any problems with scraping as it had about 11â€

[aggie79]

Mike -

Your TTT is beautiful! It looks really looks fantastic in those campground pictures.

I appreciate your comments about the refrigerator and load-leveling hitch. While I haven't finished my teardrop, I am considering something larger - probably pushing the envelope as a TTT - for build #2.

Take care,
Tom

[fromeo]

Congrats Mike!!!

The fridge was a big disappointment. It is one of those absorption types that runs on AC, DC, or gas. I didn't have the opportunity to test the AC mode, but the DC mode consumes too much juice for the paltry amount of cooling gained. The gas mode was just as disappointing. It's hard to tell whether the flame is lit and what you can see is miniscule. Gas and electricity work beautifully on our Airstream but that has a real fridge not one of these pretenders.

Something's obviously not right. You should have no issues with that baby cooling.. The basic design is actually the same as what is in your Airstream (just with the addition of the 12V heating element).

You are correct they do chew up the 12V power, so it's probably best to save that mode for when you are cruising down the highway. Then use LP when you are off-grid. The LP flame should indeed be pretty small, it doesn't take much flame to make them work.

I'm not sure which make or model you have there, although it looks like a Dometic. Either way they tend to take maybe 12 hours or so to get cold and stabilize. Aside from maybe not having it turned down enough (depending on model there may be multiple/seperate controls for LP/110/12V operation). Yours looks like a new unit so it may have electronic control. Post up the model # and we can take a look at the documentation.

With these types of reefers the enclosure they sit in is important for venting. Not sure what your enclosure looks like, but dead air pockets can be a real problem, and things like vent height is also very important. The manual should show how they want the fridge enclosed. I believe there are also different grilles for lower and upper, but that may also depend on make/model.

For reference, here's what I was able to get out of the 3-way we used with the controls set ~midway.

Fridge:


Freezer Compartment:


You should expect similar results!

Happy to help anyway I can.

- Frank

[S. Heisley]

Mike, your trailer is very professional and good looking. Congratulations on your maiden voyage with her.

[myoung]

I like that propane tank "cage". Where did you get it? And, can you tell me exactly what connections you have to connect the tank to your cook top unit? I have a two burner Wedgewppd Vision that I haven't installed yet and have no idea where or how to get the hoses with the right connectors. I suppose I'll go to one of the RV dealers around Lakeland.

The tank is a so-called "Lite Cylinder Transparent, 20 lb. LP Tank" that I purchased from RVupgrades.com for $84. It is fiberglass so you can see the gas level in the tank. The "cage" is an enclosure for the tank that comes attached.

I used standard 2-foot rubber gas hose that I got at an RV store for the first link. That threaded into an iron tee. From one leg of the tee, we attached a 3/4 to 1/2 adapter that threaded into a flexible stainless steel hose that then connected directly to the stove. The flexible stainless steel hose is standard stuff, which along with all the other connectors, was found at Home Depot.

[myoung]

Frank,

Thanks for your comments about the fridge. This one performs worse than the 3-way Dometic in my 1990 VW Westfalia.

The model is Dometic RM 4223 Americana. It does not have a freezer compartment, just a fridge. The ignition is piezoelectric manual. I did get reasonable cooling overnight in our garage with AC, but still not up to my hopes and expectations. Cooling below 20 degrees from ambient air temp seems to be the limit, but even that didn't happen while camped in mid-60s daytime temps and night time lows down into the high 30s.

I set the thermostat to the coldest setting, number 5.

Any suggestions would most welcome. Thanks.

[myoung]

Mike, your trailer is very professional and good looking. Congratulations on your maiden voyage with her.

Thanks, Sharon. It's fun and satisfying to see the plans become real. It can only get better with age, just like people.

[Woodstramp]

Myoung, Outstanding work! Love the roof hatch thing. Looks really good. When you going to start #2?

Where did you get the drip rail that you mounted over the door?

[myoung]

Myoung, Outstanding work! Love the roof hatch thing. Looks really good. When you going to start #2?

Where did you get the drip rail that you mounted over the door?

Thanks. Yes, the roof hatch always surprises and pleases people.

Don't think there will be a #2 unless I discover some new ideas that can't be incorporated into this platform.

The drip edge is a fairly common item at metal fabricators/suppliers. I've heard of several places around here that carry them. I got mine at a place that fabricates awnings and ramadas and other specialized fabrications.

[myoung]

On the maiden voyage I traveled about 500 miles up and down from 1,000 to 6,000 feet elevation. The average gas mileage for the Dodge Durango Hemi with over 85,000 miles on the odo was 17.4 mpg.

By way of comparison, we get about 17 mpg driving around town without a trailer in tow; 23 mpg on flat highways at 55 mph; 13.5 to 15 mpg while pulling a 6,000 pound Airstream.

When I finish building, I'll take the trailer to a truck scale and see how much I've been hauling about. I'm guessing about 1,500 pounds, which is more than I had originally estimated.

[fromeo]

Frank,

Thanks for your comments about the fridge. This one performs worse than the 3-way Dometic in my 1990 VW Westfalia.

The model is Dometic RM 4223 Americana. It does not have a freezer compartment, just a fridge. The ignition is piezoelectric manual. I did get reasonable cooling overnight in our garage with AC, but still not up to my hopes and expectations. Cooling below 20 degrees from ambient air temp seems to be the limit, but even that didn't happen while camped in mid-60s daytime temps and night time lows down into the high 30s.

I set the thermostat to the coldest setting, number 5.

Any suggestions would most welcome. Thanks.

No sweat Mike. I'm sure you can get this thing working just fine. For reference, the temps I had pictures of above were on a pretty warm day, about 85 as I recall.

Since you had the control cranked to the max, how does your fridge enclosure look? Is it enclosed or just kind of sitting in a cabinet? There's some pretty specific guidelines on the enclosure, and if there aren't followed it won't cool well at all.

I took a peek at the manual here: http://www.dometic.com/bd9a3459-6490-4ea9-9fa2-6ce1c53895e9.fodoc

There's also a more generic venting guide which will give some additional insight here: http://bryantrv.com/docs2/docs/dometicventing.pdf

Basically, the cabinet should enclose the fridge completely. The sides should be pretty much exactly the necessary width. There's a minimum height of 22" from the bottom of the lower vent to the top of the upper vent on your model. More is OK (and actually encouraged for more draft), less not so much. Looking at the pictures you have got to be close. If you are actually short in height, the only solution might be a small fan in the upper vent to force the airflow.

You don't want dead air space open over the fridge. If you have some, you want to partition it off, at an angle, from the upper rear corner of the fridge to the top of the upper vent. Basically you are building a miniature chimney here, so smooth airflow makes for good draft.

Another "critical" dimension is the back of the fridge to the wall. If you exceed that one, you can put a small angled piece right above the lower vent to achieve the correct distance. This is illustrated in that venting guide.

Another thought. For your model they spec two different plastic vents, one for the lower and one for the upper. I'm not sure what the difference is between the two, but you might want to make sure you have the right one in the right place.

If you have some pics of your enclosure that could be helpful. Dimensions would also help to figure out if there's an issue with the enclosure. Now if you have the enclosure dead on, and the control is cranked to the max, I'd suspect something is wrong with the unit itself.

Just for some more reference, here's how I wound up doing the enclosure on my build..

From above, the rear of the enclosure top is angled from the rear top corner of the fridge to the top of the upper vent:




The inside of the enclosure:




Here's from outside, you can see how tight the enclosure is, and also see the angled piece to the vent opening:




Let us know how yours looks and we'll go from there.

- Frank

[myoung]

Frank,

I followed the installation instructions in the manual to the letter. The space for the fridge beneath an under counter drawer is completely enclosed on four sides. (You can't see the enclosure in these pictures, but the sides and top of the fridge are within an inch or less of the box.) I also sealed the joints with caulk.




You can see the openings on the outside skin for the two vents that are standard fridge vents from a Dometic dealer. I asked for two different vents but he said these were appropriate.

At the top of the enclosure and behind the drawer, I added a curved sheet metal piece to direct the upward draft toward the outside. The height of the "chimney" is 30 inches.



The fridge has trim pieces around the front to compete the seal of the box.



I just turned the AC on for an overnight check once again. We'll see how things cool down by morning.

[myoung]

Frank,

Thanks for the reference to the supplemental Dometic installation guide. I had not seen this before.

My installation is most similar to Option 2 with two plastic side vents. The vendor supplied me with two identical vents with a part number of 3109492.003 that is not shown on the installation guide. It looks just like the vents identified as numbers 10 and 11, but as I say the two vents are identical rather than designated upper or lower.

I will have to check the "E" dimension and the gap between the wall and the condenser. I believe that the gap is more than zero, which seems to be the preferred installation. It wouldn't be hard to fit a baffle above the lower vent and the condenser coil, presumably to enhance the chimney effect.

I'll also look to see whether air can flow above the fridge where the gap is about an inch. I could fill in this space to smooth the flow toward the sheet metal baffle.

Looks like I need to be more careful about the clearances on the rear of the fridge.