Chateau Le Cargo. "Done..with pics to prove it"

[TurboandMe]

Alright here is the start of my build journal. Seems a little premature since I don't even have the trailer yet.....oh well. I'll post up some drawings and keep all of you up to date as things progress.
This will be a cold weather build so insulation and heat are key for me. Weight is another concern since we will be towing with a V6 Nissan Frontier.
The trailer is a Haulmark V-nose 7'x12'x6'6". The factory will be insulating the floor and ramp door along with putting in the three windows and a vent.
Trailer should be ready in Waco Tx right after thanksgiving.

I've just started playing with Google SketchUp and here is the concept.

In the front center is a shower stall. 30" deep at the V by 36" wide. On either side will be storage. On the right is a 32" door and just to the rear of that is more storage and the 5.5cu/ft refrig. On the left side will be 6' of counter space containing a small sink and a 21" range. In the back is a fold down dinette for sleeping and eating.
Heat will be supplied by a standard RV furnace and more then likely A/C by a roof top unit. Our pups will be living here full time also so we need to keep the interior a good temp for them.
AC power will come via a 2000watt generator or 1000watt inverter and DC by a 100-200ah battery system.
Fresh water will be from two seven gallon water jugs with one for the sink and one for the shower. Water will be supplied by foot pumps just to keep things simple and less drain on the batteries.
Sheesh....that sure seems like a lot of work once I wrote it all out!

Just a quick recap on what we plan on doing. We will be living full time in our conversion for at least six months starting sometime after the first of the year. We will be traveling around the country, parts of Canada, maybe Alaska and, if things calm down, Mexico. We love skiing, climbing, hiking, surfing, pretty much anything outdoors. We also plan on visiting friends and family and at some point get in a little relaxing. Occupants will be myself, girlfriend and our 85lb Gordan Setter.

More to come......

[pete42]

Seems like a lot to fit into a 7X12
I, like others will be waiting to see lots of pictures, me because I too want a 7X12
I also want a ramp door so I can carry my mobility scooter.
Now I have to unhitch the trailer from the truck unload the scooter then reload everything.
some will tell you they like 6 foot wide because it's easier to see around, me I want the room the extra foot gives you.
I do wonder about running an air conditioner using a 2000w generator.
lots of luck to you and your friend keep us up to date.

Ol'Pete

[TurboandMe]

Ol' Pete,
Yup it seems to be alot and the more I think about it the more I'm not quite sure if I want to fill it up that much. On top of that is the weight issue...might need a double axle to haul all that stuff. So the debate rages in my head and it probably won't end till I start building it. Any suggestions or insight would be greatly appreciated!

[d30gaijin]

TurboandMe,

That's a great looking CT setup on a very nice trailer but your build is rather aggressive. For starters, if you're planning a roof type typical RV air conditioning unit you'll need more than a 2000 Watt generator. A 3000 Watt would be minimum. You might want to reconsider going with a window type home AC unit from Home Depot or Lowe's, or something along that line in about an 8000 BTU unit, they can be powered by a 2000 Watt generator and something you'll find a fraction of the price of any RV roof top type unit, RV roof tops types seem prone to failure too often considering what they cost.

In the words of "GPW" a great poster here, and a practician of simple i.e., "Keep it simple." Avoid RV specific appliances, rather go for small appliances you can find at Home Depot at 1/4 or less the cost of RV specific stuff. If you mostly plan to camp/park where you have 110v power buy a cheap Sears 5.5 or 6 cu. ft. dorm style reefer. You can buy five or six of them for the cost of a single RV reefer of the same size (I paid $149 for my Sears reefer). The same with a water heater. I paid under $200 for a 4/6 gallon "At point of use" water heater. An RV specific water heater costs two, closer to three times that.

Just some things to keep in mind for your CT conversion.

Don

[TurboandMe]

So that's why GPW is selling me his appliances! Actually I am very greatful to him for doing that cause your right they are stupid expensive otherwise. Since we are going to be living full time in it they are a necessity.
We will rarely be camping where there is electricity so standard appliances are not even an option.
Your right on the window A/C over roof top and will probably go that direction. I could get a roof top for cheap but don't really want the added drag and I think 13,000btu is a little overkill for an 84 sq/ft trailer.
Thanks for the ideas and keep them coming!

[digimark]

It seems like it will be a nice trailer once you get to the other side of a lot of work on it!

Having a fixed stove inside the trailer takes a lot of counter room, requires more propane piping, backsplash heat control and sometime a range hood. If you'll have a 2KW generator, you might consider a single burner hot plate or induction hot plate (my current favorite) that you can store out of sight when not using, or move outside to a table when the weather is nice. (A 2KW gen covers a lot of sins, just turn the AC off when using the hot plate, etc.) A propane grill stores small but cooks quite well. On rainy days a small microwave oven can be useful for drinks and snacks, or even full meals in a pinch.

Where do you think you might install the clean/gray/black water tanks, and how often will you need to dump/clean/refill them?

Is the factory installing the AC and DC and the shoreline also?

[TurboandMe]

I know the stove will take up a lot of space but since we will be full timing in our creation and we love cooking/baking its worth the space to us. We have 6' of counter space minus the stove and sink so we should have 2' or so left.
We will not be doing any grey or black tanks. We will be boondocking 90+% of the time so grey water will be piped out onto the ground and when we are in an established camp we will be using their showers. A bucket will catch the sink water.
The factory will only be installing the windows/vents and insulating the floor.
We are going to plan space for the generator and AC but won't be installing those till we decide we need them.

It's kinda interesting because what we are planning is so different from what most people do with these trailers. Pretty much we are building a full blown RV from a trailer to live in instead of the usual multipurpose campers. Should be interesting

[TurboandMe]

Ok the final D-day is tomorrow and I still have no idea how much this trailer is going to weigh. What I need is help deciding if I should get a single axle rated at 3,500lbs or chicken out and get double axles for 7,000lbs.
I'm pretty sure the trailer will weigh in at 2,000lbs from the factory which includes all windows so if i can keep the interior down to 1,000lbs we will be good leaving us 500lb under the axles rated ability. If not we will be in trouble.

What do you think....single....double.....12hrs to decide!!!!

[vtx1029]

The only time you'll regret having dual axles is when you pay for it the first time and when you buy new tires.

[TurboandMe]

So we have our trailer.....and its not new. We talked and looked and finally decided to try and find a used one. After calculating the expense of a new trailer it just seemed unreasonably expensive. So we searched craigslist for weeks trying to find the perfect trailer and finally one appeared. It is a 2003 H&H 7x12 with a 2' V-nose, ramp and single torsion axle. In its previous life it was a motorcycle trailer hauling dirt bikes to the track and back. The owner managed a spectacular fall and after fracturing his neck was getting out of the sport.
Without further ado....here is our, soon to be, new home!


And an interior shot before I tore it apart

Well I purchased the trailer on Thursday night at about 10:00pm. After getting it home and inhaling dinner I set about removing the diamond plate and E track from the floor. The diamond plate was glued down with gallons of liquid nails and the E track had at least 10,000 screws in it so by 3:45am the next morning here is the finished result.

And here is the stuff that was removed....somehow I'm not sure the garage is going to be of much use for the next few months


That's all for now. But on Monday I will be pulling the 3/8 ply from the walls and the treated 3/4 from the floors. I will be replacing the floors with 5/8 and the walls will get the usual insulation treatment.

On a side note we took it to the CAT scale down the street and weighted the beast.....you get where this is going. We were hoping be sub 2,000lb but sadly we were at 2,400.....OUCH! Hopefully downsizing the plywood will help our weight issue.
All in all we are very happy with our new house and are quite excited to get going on the project.

MUCH MUCH more to come.....

[Miriam C.]

You've got a great start to a wonderful design...

[S. Heisley]

Congratulations on finding a trailer that you like. It looks like you got a good buy and have a speedy start on remodeling it to what you want.

Looking forward to more progress and pictures!

[Weirdnerd]

You can sell the aluminum to a recycling center, they pay well, and you can finance part of the build that way.

PS, there is one good place at Oxford and Santa Fe, about five blocks west of Santa Fe, I had a couple hundred pounds of metal stuff I thought I would use on mt teardrop, and got some good beer money for it.

[TurboandMe]

Thanks for the encouragement! More is happening tonight but I'll post progress tomorrow.
Thanks for the tip Nerd. The diamond plate is already spoken for so it won't be headed to the recycling at least not by me.

[TurboandMe]

As planned monday was a good day. More precisely monday night was good. Started by stripping out the 3/8 from the walls and the 3/4 from the floor. I weighed a piece of 3/4 and at 4x6 it was 85lbs. Hopefully we will loose some weight by not reusing that again. Then it was on to installing the insulation. We went earlier to HD and got foil faced 1" and the pink board 1/2". The plan is to start with 1" in between the studs and then cover that with the 1/2" for a total of 1.5" of insulation. We will not be covering that with anything other then wall paper or possibly the Titebond II and bedsheet mix I've read about here.
On to the photos.....

Here's how it looks as of now

It would have been much easier with a floor but oh well!

I figured out that I could bend the foil faced 1" foam by hand and have it match the curves of the ceiling. If you worked at it slowly it actually wasn't too hard.

If you tried to stretch the shiny side it did this....only the duller side with stretch and not break. I found that out on accident.

Once in place it turned our pretty good I think


Hope to get the floor in tomorrow but working nights is really messing with my trailer schedule! Oh yeah windows should be here in the next two weeks.

Till next time...