Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

by **kelly3512** » Sun Aug 01, 2010 7:34 pm

I've officially started my build.. after many years of lurking and learning the huge value and convenience of the tear. There are so many different avenues to follow for styling, build materials, utility, purpose, etc. the list is huge. After spending tons of hours reading through the different builds and reasoning behind the builds I've made my decision on the type of tear for me to build, at least the first one..

I love the weekender idea, quick build and very useful. Since I have a background as a semi-trailer mechanic (quite a few years back) and still have the skills I decided to modify the weekender to use steel tubing exo-skeleton and either steel or aluminum sides applied with VHB tape.

Thus far I've:
Built the bender for the tubing
Bent up the sides following the posted dimensions
Tack welded the x-members into the capsule
Taken a trip to the salvage yard and picked up wheels and tires
Salvaged some excellent tinted windows/screens for the doors from a newer travel trailer

I'll post pictures of what I've accomplished in the next few days, I need to reduce the size of the pics so I don't get flamed..

Next up:
Build the sub-frame that will attach to the salvaged torsion axle and have the capsule mounted to it
Revisit the salvage yard to pick up trim and hatch doors
Weld up the entire rig and paint with POR15

Really, the next thing is to CLEAN THE GARAGE to make room...

What a mouthful and more to come..

by **Greg M** » Wed Aug 04, 2010 10:38 am

Aaarg. The anticipation is killing me. Need pictures

-Greg

by **Miriam C.** » Wed Aug 04, 2010 10:48 pm

Cleaning the garage and keeping it that way was a pain for me. Looking forward to the pictures and thanks for reducing them.....

by **vtx1029** » Wed Aug 04, 2010 10:55 pm

we need pictures man! :twisted:

by **Wolfgang92025** » Wed Aug 04, 2010 11:03 pm

were are the :pictures:

, we want

...............

waiting patiently...........

wolfgang

by **kelly3512** » Fri Aug 06, 2010 7:22 pm

Well, I've been racing the mountain bike and have to race again this weekend so the progress is slow. I have been able to get to the salvage yard and score some great finds and am planning on heading back on Monday for more STUFF!

Side frames Bent up:

A couple pics of the tacked together skeleton:

Tires and wheels:

Windows:

Next up is to build the subframe and mount up the axle. I'll need to paint it up with POR 15 to stop the rust from coming. Then comes the notch for the tires along with the inner wheel well.

Let the questions fly, I know I'll need the support and critique.