Kid's Club House Teardrop Build

[Curryfire]

Hello All,

I've been lurking the site for over a year admiring all the awesome tear drop builds that you guys have put together. After months of talking and pestering, our family's Chief Financial Officer (Wife) has finally agreed that I can proceed with building our own. I've haven't set a deadline on when I want to have the project finished, only that I want to have it planned by the end of year and start fabrication sometime in January. My plan is to build a 5' x9' teardrop with the following items that CFO wants.

1. Water tank with hot water availability- CFO wants to be able to have a shower

Designing with following tank in mind
http://www.plastic-mart.com/product/593 ... tank-rb162

Looking at one of these water heaters
http://www.askforatwood.com/on-demand-water-heaters/

2. Air Conditioner/Heater
Looking at the following climate right system
http://www.climaterightair.com/applicat ... eater.html

3. Ability to connect to water/electricity hookup at campsites

4. Ability to have a queen size mattress

5. Ability to mount a RTT for down the road when the kids get bigger

6. Sink and kitchen storage

So basically, we wanted a Moby 1 XTR but didn't want to pay the $26K for the one we spec'd out. That is how we got here, she's agreed to let me build one.....

For my first ( of many i'm sure) question for the site, I wanted to get you guys too look over my plans for the trailer frame. Working as a project manager in chemical plant, I've made some very awesome connections in the construction group. One of my friends has offered to help me weld up my frame and get it powder coated through another one of our connections. I've based my plans on the frame of a Turtle Back Trailer (something I was lusting over before I decided that a teardrop is the way to go). I "borrowed" my design ideas from the following page:
http://turtlebacktrailers.com/2014/10/0 ... xperience/

One of my concerns on the trailer design is the axle placement. I'm using Dave (DMcCam) plans for his ATMA Travelear Trailer as a guide. He used 37.5% of the frame length for the centerline of axles.

I've attached my drawings below, so let me know what you think.

Thanks,
Annu

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Trailer Components.jpg (250.83 KiB) Viewed 2402 times

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[Curryfire]

Hello All,

Being in Houston, I figured that getting any type of plywood I wanted wasn't going to be hard. We'll, I was almost right. I was able to find plenty of 4'x8' and 4'x10' Okoume marine grade plywood up to 3/4", however there was no 5'x10' available anywhere. After a little google time, I found the following website:

http://www.worldpanel.com/marine-plywoods

They have a great selection and when i priced out 3 sheets of 5'x10' 18mm, 2 sheets of 5'x10' 9mm, and 4 sheets of 5'x10' 3mm, the shipping to Texas was only $185. That seemed pretty reasonable to me. I talked with one of their reps, and he said that they ship it on a pallet, taking care to guard against corner damage and scratches. Also, their 5'x10' sheets are slightly over sized.

I've reached out to a few shops here in town to get my plywood and aluminum skin CNC'd for me. I hope to hear back on prices in the next day or two.

Thanks,

Annu

[lgatlin]

Designing with following tank in mind
http://www.plastic-mart.com/product/593 ... tank-rb162

I got a great deal online for my water tank -- here's pretty much the same one on ebay:http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-30-Gallon-RV-Fresh-Water-Tank-holding-wash-food-Concession-Trailers-30TK-/201652521660?hash=item2ef36d4abc:g:vrIAAOSwu1VW8V3R&vxp=mtr

That's the vendor I used for our water tank - I was happy with the quality and goodness knows the price was soooo reasonable!

[KCStudly]

That's a lot to cram into a 5x9. For the record, 30 gal of water weighs in at 250 lbs.

Don't forget that you can get the hatch skin and roof skin out of separate pieces of ply, so you may not need a full 10 ft sheet for the main roof skins. It's easy to do a butt joint on a spar or framing member, so if you are not doing a full blown woody and your seams will be otherwise covered, the extra expense for 10 ft sheets may not be required.

On the frame, the way you have the center member lighter than the A-frame members, and coped into their underside is not conventional and much harder to fab. Also, under slinging the A-frame (rather than mitered corner joints) is far stronger and much more failure proof. You can also eliminate several of the intermediate xmbr's if you are doing a built up floor and don't intend to dance a jig on it.

[SCwood]

I'd consider moving those mounting tabs into the corners where the frame rails meet. It'll help strengthen the frame. Not that it doesn't already look sturdy!


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[Curryfire]

Hey Guys,

Thanks for all the suggestions.

KCStudly, I see what you are saying about the frame:

"On the frame, the way you have the center member lighter than the A-frame members, and coped into their underside is not conventional and much harder to fab. Also, under slinging the A-frame (rather than mitered corner joints) is far stronger and much more failure proof. You can also eliminate several of the intermediate xmbr's if you are doing a built up floor and don't intend to dance a jig on it."

I was going back and forth on under slinging the a-frame. I really liked the look of the Turtle Back trailer and modeled my with theirs in mind (see attached pic). I'm having a mechanical engineer friend of mine run the stress calculations to make sure the setup will be strong. I was also concerned about that coping, but contacts through work said it shouldn't be a problem for them.

Thanks,

Annu

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[KCStudly]

Okay, done deal.

When in doubt, over build!