Designing the hatch

[SFischer]

Hey folks, newbie here. I haven't had a chance to post yet as we're still in dreaming and design land! I'm currently laying out the camper on Rhino with a coworker, and had a question about the hinging point of the hatch. Originally, I just figured it would hinge where the cabinets happen to land, where ever that may be. I'm wondering though if there is a sweet spot where it should hinge from, and adjusting the cabinetry to follow? On the drawing, if you follow along the counter top line, the hinge point would be roughly 33" from the back of the camper. Hope this makes sense!

[bobhenry]

I took the time to print out a couple copies of your drawing and cut out the hatch profile and then laid it on top at the hinge point in the up position. In my opinion (and we know what opinions are like) you are too far forward. Try the forehead method if you can't bump your forehead on the hinge point it's located as far back as you dare. The positive point of this is that the further back the hinge point is located the more rain protection the open hatch will afford you in inclement weather ( yes it happens) . Try making several copies and try alternate hinge points and I think you will see what happens. Some of the design will be based on you and your and your height also. Let me see if I can find a pic of mine open.........

[tony.latham]

Bob knows what he's talking about.

You might also keep your available material size in mind. I use 1/8" 5'x'5' Baltic Birch (it's probably a special order at a lumber yard or from cabinet maker). I wouldn't get too enthusiastic about making a hatch that a 5' sheet wouldn't cover without a butt seam. I butt-join my roof and ceiling pieces where it's close to being flat.



I don't think you can over plan these projects so keep it up.

Tony

[SFischer]

Thanks guys, I really appreciate the input. It's been a long journey since we fell in love with teardrops. Bounced back and forth on buying vs. building for about a year before we decided to build. As a cabinet maker, I'm not really intimidated by the actual build, I just want to make sure I cover as many bases as possible.

[Andrew Herrick]

Speaking of overplanning ... you might also consider how you want to lift the hatch. If you plan on using some sort of wood support, you definitely want to be able to easily reach it when you're holding up the hatch by one hand. 'Course it depends how tall you are, but I wouldn't place the wood supports any farther than 24-30" inches from the rearmost point of the camper.

If you use gas props, the above point is moot. If you keep the hinge point that far back, though, you'll have to use stronger struts to lift the hatch. Shouldn't be a big deal - just something to plan for.

[brx017]

You're profile looks very similar to mine. All tangent curves and no flat spot on the roof. Mine is going to be 5x10.



I should note this isn't my final cabinet layout and it doesn't show my hatch hinge point. This is just the only picture I have on my phone of my profile.

Since I'm going to have a front closet wall practically as far forward as i can, I just offset it by 80" (for queen mattress length) to locate my rear wall. Then I think I tweaked both walls an inch or two forward so that I'll have enough room to put my proposed cooler on a slide out drawer front to back. I did this to minimize wasted under cabinet space. I didn't want my cooler taking up half the width of my galley.

Once I had the wall location locked down then I bumped back the hinge point a smidge so I could skin it without much material waste.

Finally, I figured based on my proposed ride height how much headroom I needed when opened. This will come into play when I need to calculate what gas struts I need and where I need them.

I enjoy the design challenge of how one thing affects another, and trying to come to a functional compromise. I bet I tweaked my design a hundred times before I made any sawdust... And I have a feeling ill probably tweak a thing or two before I'm done.

If you would like for me to share my CAD files with you for comparison, I would be glad to. Just let me know.

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[SFischer]

We will have about 15" of flat on the roof for where the skylight will be. We really wanted something that would pop open, but after weeks of looking and emailing window manufactures and not finding what wanted, we decided to just make it fixed, something like 15"x45". The cabinetry is laid out, just not in that drawing. I'm working with a co-worker to lay everything out in Rhino before we put it on the CNC. It's been a long process and we still have a while left to go before we start cutting and assembling. I'll be keeping a build journal once the ball starts rolling.