Replaced Galley Lid Spring Supports with Gas Struts...Nice!

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Replaced Galley Lid Spring Supports with Gas Struts...Nice!

Postby Dusty Mark » Mon Jun 26, 2017 7:36 am

I installed spring supports for the galley lid when I built my teardrop in 2016. These sounded good in the product descriptions, but we had nothing but trouble with them. The passenger side spring was always tripping and that forced us to back it up with a manual support. My wife had a tough time holding the lid up while inserting the pins in the manual support since she was a little too short.

While giving a tour of the camper last summer, one "special" person pushed a spring in and the lid collapsed onto my head. My neck was sore for a few days even though the lid only fell about 4" before contacting the back of my head. I know there must be an underlying reason in my hatch build that was causing the spring supports to trip, but I'd give them three thumbs down if I had three thumbs. :thumbdown: :thumbdown: :thumbdown:

During our last trip, I ordered gas struts and installed them yesterday. Even though my lid only weighs 45 pounds, the gas struts are a super improvement over the spring supports. Opening and closing the galley lid is factors easier now. :thumbsup: We can still use the manual support as a backup if a gas strut seal ever fails during a trip.
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Re: Replaced Galley Lid Spring Supports with Gas Struts...Ni

Postby working on it » Mon Jun 26, 2017 12:03 pm

Dusty Mark wrote:I installed spring supports for the galley lid when I built my teardrop in 2016. These sounded good in the product descriptions, but we had nothing but trouble with them. The passenger side spring was always tripping and that forced us to back it up with a manual support. My wife had a tough time holding the lid up while inserting the pins in the manual support since she was a little too short.

While giving a tour of the camper last summer, one "special" person pushed a spring in and the lid collapsed onto my head. My neck was sore for a few days even though the lid only fell about 4" before contacting the back of my head. I know there must be an underlying reason in my hatch build that was causing the spring supports to trip, but I'd give them three thumbs down if I had three thumbs. :thumbdown: :thumbdown: :thumbdown:

During our last trip, I ordered gas struts and installed them yesterday. Even though my lid only weighs 45 pounds, the gas struts are a super improvement over the spring supports. Opening and closing the galley lid is factors easier now. :thumbsup: We can still use the manual support as a backup if a gas strut seal ever fails during a trip.
  • +1 for using gas struts. It's not a simple thing to do, for everyone, so congrats on getting it done!
  • Though I didn't previously use spring-type supports on my heavy, vertical hatch (my squareback TTT uses a 48"x 49" piece of 3/4" plywood as a hatch door), I do have to use manually-inserted 1" dowels to support it (and lock it in place, to secure it against the wind seizing it). After a few thousand? lift-install-tighten operations (actually, a dozen or so different hand operations are involved), while holding the hatch overhead, and the same reversed movements taking it down, I grew weary of it all. Not only did I have to insert and tighten the dowels in place (using variable-angle flagpole mounts), I had to use extra pieces to lengthen them, to account for topography (I lengthen the dowels to allow more clearance underneath), so that required even more effort and holding up the hatch for a longer time.
  • I envisaged using a linear actuator, to replace the dowel supports entirely, but couldn't find a good place to mount it, a convenient switch location, nor an ideal length at my desired price-point. And, I didn't really want more wiring to deal with. So, I switched to using a gas spring.
  • It took a little trial and error doing, some calculating (using seldom-used old math skills), and my accustomed redneck engineering, to find the proper placement and strength of the strut to be used, but it worked out well for me.
  • My hatch is heavy, and requires opening to 105-110 degrees, well past the range of movement of most trailer hatches, usually teardrops. And, most hatches are skins over a framework, and lighter than the solid plywood (with heavy steel hardware attached low on it) I used. The calculators I found here, and on the web, weren't entirely accurate for my needs, but helped me get "into the ballpark" as to how long, and of what strength, of gas spring(s) I might need. Plus, to complicate things, I was undecided on whether to use them as stand-alone supports, or as helpers/temporary holders for my hatch, while still using the dowel system.
  • Further complications were the lack of free space to mount the springs inside the galley, and the the proper attachment hardware need to get it to work. So, I came up with a multi-part, cunning plan. I bought two springs of sufficient strength to be able to raise the hatch all the way overhead (to 110 degrees angle) when used as a pair, or halfway up, when only one is used, centrally-mounted. I bought curved mounting brackets to gain extra mechanical advantage when in use, to lessen the apparent load to the spring(s), for longevity.
  • As it turned out, I couldn't clear the need space for twin mounts, so I went to the "single" strut option. The curved bracket bent too easily, when pulling the (slightly offset from center) single strut closed, so I recalculated mounting point for the hatch-side clevis, and got it to work without the bracket (though later, I realized I could've use both, in tandem, to work). So, now, the single gas spring works great, opening the hatch automatically to 90 degrees, where I easily raise it overhead, and leisurely attach the dowels and fittings, with little or no effort. Reversing the operation, it requires no more than one hand to close.
  • Overall, the gas spring is a success, saving me a lot of effort (a good thing now, especially since my left arm has a bad rotator cuff and other injuries-I'm getting old-), and I have the other gas spring standing by, for when it fails (they eventually do). Well worth the time and money spent on this project! The full process I followed is here: http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=61432
  • 125896 dowels and extensions as hatch supports
  • 125894 using various calculators during planning stage
  • 125904 final planning stage placement sketch
  • 125895 single gas spring, offset central placement
  • dimensional weight analysis graph- gas spring.gif
    dimensional weight analysis graph- gas spring.gif (110.7 KiB) Viewed 715 times

    I used math and dimensional graphing to determine spring mounting points
Last edited by working on it on Fri Aug 04, 2017 11:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Wow!

Postby Dusty Mark » Tue Jun 27, 2017 8:15 am

Wow! Your install was a lot more complicated than mine...well done. I wouldn't have known where to start on the calculations. I modeled my galley lid after the shape of Frank Bear's at Vintage Technologies, so I called him and he recommended 100 pound struts. I mounted the top bracket to the lid using screw holes from the previous spring support and tacked in a scrap piece of plywood to the wall to experiment with bottom bracket placement. The top bracket didn't clear my galley shelf lip, so I used the previous top screw hole as the bottom hole. It took three tries on the bottom bracket placement to get it right in the scrap plywood. I then went "final" by drilling holes in the actual galley walls.
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