building Plan B....

[mike_c]

Just dropped a hundred bucks on CPES to coat the teardrop with magical protective juju against water damage! I bought 2 quarts of each component, so here's hoping that a gallon of liquid will be enough to saturate the teardrop with epoxy sealant!

BTW, if anyone is interested, I got two 2 quart Smiths CPES orders for $109 from Jamestown Distributors, with free shipping. Rot Doctors charges $122 plus shipping.

--Mike C.

[mike_c]

It's been a beautiful norcal winter for working on the teardrop trailer, mostly. Not this week though. This week, while I was on spring break, and could have spent most days working on the trailer from morning 'till night, it rained with typical pacific northwest coastal storm intensity. As someone noted up thread, my shop is virtually outdoors, being just two 10 x 20 carport tents strapped together. There is a gutter between them, but it's an imperfect solution at best, and runs over copiously when it rains hard. It pounded rain most of this week. It's not a pleasant environment to work in when it's storming, both because of the wet and the noise. Hard rain on that plastic sheet roof is NOISY!

Case in point. Yes, that's a stepping stone. Does your workshop have stepping stones over the deep mud holes? I thought not.




Poodle bites, poodle chews it. I wonder if anyone will recognize THAT?! Anyway, more mud and dripping ceilings. The power tools and the trailer have so far kept dry. That wet spot in the center is precisely where I had to stand to cut up the half inch baltic birch sheet for the galley drawer boxes. It was great fun balancing a 5 x 5 sheet on that contractor's saw with water running down my face and neck....




Despite the wet conditions, I managed to insulate and skin the galley side of the rear bulkhead. The seams will all be concealed later, and in fact the skin was probably unnecessary since it'll mostly be covered by other stuff, but this way I know the rear bulkhead insulation is secure and sealed.




Here is a set of drawer boxes in progress for the galley. My galley is going to be quite different from the Kuffel Creek specs, both because we wanted to build things a bit differently and because we have to-- our trailer has MUCH higher ground clearance than the specs, and that would put the galley counter up around chest level. Not good. So we're winging it. Drawer boxes:




Adding maple face frames to the drawer boxes:




I also milled out a top shelf for the front cabin headboard/closet, shown here, with beveled-to-fit back edge, crown molding front profile, and a dado to capture the face frames. One hundred percent table saw work. The rest is in various stages of finish. Soon, grasshopper, I shall glue that all up to the sub-frame and mount the doors, which are made and ready to go. They're frame and panel maple to match the center panel. We'll mount an electronics console above the top shelf, primarily to supply reading lights but also some other stuff. There's still a lot of interior work to go.




Here's the cherry top shelf, wetted out with mineral spirits. It's a beautiful piece of wood, with tan, brown, pink, orange, and olive green grain swirls. This photo doesn't do it justice. I'm an utter wood slut. Beautiful grain and figure makes my knees weak.

Who puts stuff like this into a CAMPER, for cryin' out loud?




I also got the 12v panel built and ready to wire, along with a few other electrical chores. I'll show pics of those in a later update. Oh, and I graded a hundred or so midterm exams in Zoology, with some very much appreciated help from Kathy on the multiple choice bits ( and she also helped me cut the crown molding profile on the front edge of the headboard top shelf, which definitely needed a second set of hands without a level outfeed table). Thank you, sweetie!

Thanks for watching. More to come.

--Mike C.

[KCStudly]

Nice Cabinets and finish work! Way to persevere!

[mike_c]

Wahhhh! It's raining. It's cold out. I think I'll go buy some supplies at the nice warm and dry hardware store rather than standing in mud puddles out in the shop. Yeah, THAT'S the ticket!

--Mike C.

[WhitneyK]

Movin' along nicely Mike, lookin' good

Help me out, what's the purpose of "wetted out with mineral spirits"?

[KCStudly]

I have virtually no experience with wood finishing, but if I had to guess I would say that 'wetting out with mineral spirits' gives the opprotunity to see what the wood grain will look like when finished, w/o committing to the finish. Just a guess.

[iDave]

Beautiful build Mike. The beauty is in the details! Wonderful wood selection. Two questions:

What's the process for titling and tagging a home built trailer in Cali? I'm sure you've investigated the process, and it's probably the last thing on your mind right now, but I'm curious as to whether it's just a matter of filing paperwork, or is an inspection involved? Here in VA, we can purchase a permenant tag for trailers which constitutes a one time fee.

Also, when and where do you anticipate your maiden voyage to take place? You and Kathy must be euphoric dreaming of that day! Keep up the great work.

I'm following your thread closely, and looking forward to your next update .

[mike_c]

Movin' along nicely Mike, lookin' good

Help me out, what's the purpose of "wetted out with mineral spirits"?

KCStudly nailed it-- to preview what the grain will look like when it's finished. I'm using an oil based finish. It's done now, and it's beautiful. Ironically, I was at the hardwood seller's this weekend and one of the guys working there saw me choosing a lovely piece of curly maple with great grain figure (for another project) and he said "Dude, if you like that board you should see what we've been uncovering in this pile of cherry over here...." Turns out I bought the first board from that pile a few weeks ago, and that's what I'm gonna use for the headboard top shelf-- that piece that I wetted out to gloat over.

--Mike C.

[mike_c]

Beautiful build Mike. The beauty is in the details! Wonderful wood selection. Two questions:

What's the process for titling and tagging a home built trailer in Cali? I'm sure you've investigated the process, and it's probably the last thing on your mind right now, but I'm curious as to whether it's just a matter of filing paperwork, or is an inspection involved? Here in VA, we can purchase a permenant tag for trailers which constitutes a one time fee.

Also, when and where do you anticipate your maiden voyage to take place? You and Kathy must be euphoric dreaming of that day! Keep up the great work.

I'm following your thread closely, and looking forward to your next update .

Hi Dave! Well, there's titling and there's titling, LOL. So we have another small utility trailer that's also a home build that Kathy brought with her from Colorado-- that little orange trailer you might remember sitting out front, full of firewood. It didn't have any title when she arrived here, so registering it required a visit to the local state police, who inspected it, then gave it a brand new VIN number, and issued a title and license plate. In California, that's a PERMANENT license plate. Says right on it, "California Permanent Trailer."

So that gives us two possibilities, one legal and the other not so. The first is that we simply take the teardrop to the state police after we finish and repeat the process. Since it's also on a light axle, I don't anticipate any problems, although you have to make an appt in advance, etc, and that takes scheduling.

The second possibility is that, well, we have this license plate that says California Permanent Trailer, LOL. AND, if we want to get technical about it, we have a VIN number for a "light utility trailer" on a little metal plate pop-riveted to the other trailer. I have a pop riveter, too.

As for the maiden voyage, we were hoping to have it ready for spring break and take it to the Mojave, but no go. The next projected maiden voyage is in mid June, to Texas. Kathy's daughter is graduating from college, so we're HOPING to have it at least towable and campable by then, even if not entirely finished. I'm skeptical-- K and I both have lots of busy stuff coming up this month, and the weather has been awful so far this spring, slowing progress somewhat, but when I project out the time and the remaining tasks it looks just barely doable, so we're gonna try.

Update, such as it is, below!

--Mike C.

[mike_c]

OK, here's a bit of an update.

There's actually been a reasonable amount of progress, although most of it is in my head, LOL, and not yet sawdust on the shop floor. We've got a gallon of CPES, ready to apply. I've been doing slow interior finish work, for both the cabin and the galley. Last Friday I ordered one of these, because I'm tired of trying to prep rough cut lumber on my table saw (and the lower drawer fronts in the galley are just too deep to make it work-- I mean, I can do it, but by the time I finish I might as well hand plane all the boards anyway, and as I keep telling myself, "Dude, it's a CAMPER, not a Chippendale buffet."):




That's a LOW END combo jointer/planer, and I've read some horrible reviews, but I think I can make it work in my decidedly non-production el-cheapo environment. And I have this pile of nice rough sawn curly maple that I have to do SOMETHING with....

The weather has been pretty crappy the last few weeks, with the crappiest days corresponding nicely with my spare time. Not too surprising, that. It is spring in norcal, so this is expected. And we did have a lovely winter, mostly. But I can FEEL completion getting close, so the weather has been particularly frustrating. And Kathy and I both have exceptionally busy schedules this month.

Anyway, some progress has been made recently. Recall that the 12v electrical panel goes behind this front cabin headboard/closet:




Got that done this weekend, although there was zero sun for testing the solar panel (which is too small in any event, but it will at least tell me whether the solar charger is working):




I used all six circuits in the fuse block, but there's still plenty of load capacity, as most circuits are just LED lighting in various parts of the trailer.

Work on the galley is proceeding-- and what's missing from this pic is lots of discussion about the final layout of counters and cabinets, which I think we've finally nailed down. Given the working height of the galley deck, we decided that there just isn't room for Kathy's Camp Chef or a cooler in the galley, so those will go in the back of the truck, with the stove in a chuck box that will open beside the galley. Also visible in this pic are the Kuffel Creek plans, which I haven't opened much since about Thanksgiving because everything has changed more-or-less, the universal make-it-fit tool, and a handful of hardwood kindling, just in case we get to go camping sometime this decade! Not pictured are the drawers, which are made and awaiting their fronts, which in turn are waiting for the JET to arrive.




So that's where we left off today. We dragged the welder out again so I can fabricate the battery and propane tank rack for the tongue. I bought a new tank of MIG gas last October but haven't cracked the valve yet, so here's hoping there's still gas in that sucker!




PLEASE! Just a couple of weeks of dry, sunny weather! Is that too much to ask for?

--Mike C.

[mike_c]

We're back! After a long late winter hiatus, or at least what felt like a long break-- couple of months or so, because work and life interfered, and the late winter weather didn't cooperate either. But spring semester is over, my schedule is much looser now, and the weather has become sweet northern California summer. So Kathy and I are back out in the shop again, making sawdust and some long delayed progress on the teardrop trailer.




I found one of these on my front porch:




It's hard to recommend this for anyone, although I did eventually get it working reasonably well. It will joint and plane, with minimal snipe, if you take shallow passes. It is light duty. Really light duty. And I won't repeat most of the expletives that accompanied assembling it, setting it up per the instructions, and finding that I had to readjust the infeed and outfeed tables which were neither parallel nor coplanar. Much contortion and cursing ensued. And I don't yet know how frequently I'll have to do that. If you have a better budget than I do, don't buy this jointer/planer. This is an aggravating tool.

I did use it to make the fronts of these drawers though, which will be beneath a counter top in the galley. I liked the board so I stretched it all the way across, LOL The outer two drawers have covers to act as pull out counter space, albeit not for heavy duty work. The drawer slides are 150 lb. I might add an extra support out near the hatch lip-- just make that high enough-- to provide a resting place for the drawer bottom if it droops.








We got these:






I finished up the front head board/closet sort of thing:








It's hard photographing the interior through the narrow doors!






We're going to install a wooden raceway above the head board with fixed reading lights made from warm white LED pucks.






Edge banding a piece of plywood for that will be the counter top over those drawers in the galley:




And cutting a piece of laminate for the top:




We started finishing the pieces of the reading light raceway this morning. We're making progress again!

Until next time--

Mike C.

[Colemancooler]

Very Nice!!

[KCStudly]

Love the headboard cabinets. Excellent cabinetry!

[parnold]

Good to see you back "at it". The headboard/closet thingy is beautiful! You do very nice work sir!

[mike_c]

Good to see you back "at it". The headboard/closet thingy is beautiful! You do very nice work sir!

Thank you-- it's a learning experience! Hey, is that a long pull out drawer in the design you posted (part of your sig, I think), or does it hang from the outside of the trailer? We're thinking about an external chuck box for the stove and some additional space, mainly because I moved the rear bulkhead back nearly a foot-- I'm tall and don't like to sleep scrunched up-- and didn't leave enough room to install the Camp Chef in the galley. But since our TV is a Ford Ranger, there's room in the back for the stove, and a chuck box will both store it and create a stand to set it up on. But outside the galley proper, similar to your design.

--Mike C.