Suggestions wanted

[Marck]

Ok if you check out my scale model idea page:
http://users.adelphia.net/~marckm/teardrop2.html
You will get an idea of what i am thinking of.... The slide out may be dissappearing in favor of something else...anyway, I want honest suggestions.
Should I stick with the 6' wide, 12' long, 4' high idea or switch to 5' high???

You can see alot of what i need to fit...tell me what you think, remember, i don't want to go up to a "canned ham" idea..I want to stay kind of low and sleek.

[mikeschn]

Wait till it gets light out. I'll go out to my teardrop and let you know what I think of your dimensions, especially in the areas of the bunks...

Mike...

[DANL]

Hi Storm,

Wow! Quite the model construction project you have going on there. Looks like a great way to check out ideas.

My trailer is five feet high--actually 4"-8" inside--and I'm glad it is. No need to do a dropped floor to get some headroom for sitting or partially standing to change clothes. It just makes the space feel a lot more comfortable and even allows me to use a raised sleeping platform when camping solo and makes it easy to get the recumbents in and out.

With your bunks and slide-out, will you have space to move around in the main area of the tear or will you have a permanent bed on the floor?

[Marck]

The way it is designed now.. It was going to be a permanent bed on the floor, but some new ideas are floating around in my head...especially after looking at Sums popup teardrop, I am thinking again... which is very dangerous.

[angib]

Marck,

One thing I would check is the height of your lower transverse bunk - or, rather, the clearance underneath it. If you use a 4" mattress you need AT LEAST 16" clearance under this bunk for your feet (I'm assuming your feet go there) - 4" for the mattress and 12" for your feet. Another 4" is better.

You can reduce this figure slightly over your ankles and shins (eg, for a beam supporting the front of the bunk), but shorter sleepers won't thank you when they wedge their foot under the beam...

Andrew

[Marck]

Andrew... BINGO..lol using one of my daughter's dolls, I laid them in the model and that feet clearance is EXACTLY why I began rethinking my design...Damn man, you are godd hehehe

Hmmmm I am thinking more and more of a "popup" idea... dunno yet. let me make a few hundred more drawings hehehe

[angib]

...using one of my daughter's dolls, I laid them in the model and that feet clearance is EXACTLY why I began rethinking my design...

Just in case anyone thinks that computers are the only way to do the "technical" thing, you are demonstrating that 'modelling', whether by computer, pencil-on-paper and balsa-and-dolls, is all about seeing if a design idea works.

Incidentally I worked in the British shipyard that built our Polaris missile subs in the 1960s and their technique then was to use design drawings to build a 1/10th scale model, find out and fix the problems on the model and then use two incredibly expensive telescopes on precision trolleys in the model room to lift corrected dimensions off the model. Not all that different from what you're doing, eh?

Andrew