Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

My Woodie teardrop just turned 10 years old in July.
When I stared building the teardrop pictured below http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?t=28640 in 2009 I had spent my whole adult life (30 yrs) living in San Diego. The built reflected what I knew, which was campgrounds with a little gravel or dirt roads in for good measure to go that last mile and my original design served me well. Space wise I really like the layout, but the trailer is pretty heavy @ about 2000 lbs.
2012 forced a work relocation to Salt Lake City and I got an introduction to boon-docking.
My 1st "Land of Mordor v2.0" trip http://www.tnttt.com/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=66953&start=75#p1209038 trip I ended up bending my running boards. Was able to fix the running boards, but decided to leave them off the trailer. To get more ground clearance, I put some 2x2 spacers between the axle and trailer frame.
You can see the beating a trailer takes in the clip that George posted on U-Tube from the last Mordor trip. The clip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN81cmFLJ7c shows what the road (if that what you want to call it ) can be like. George just happened to follow me for a bit.
During “land of Mordor v3.0 & v4.0 I got to see Goerge’s Foamie viewtopic.php?f=55&t=65033 an action and I was impressed with its performance and strength. That got the wheels in my head turning.

1st pass on the design.


Built a model out of foam board.




Needed more work. Since my trailer was still holding up, I shelved that design and kept working in revisions in my head.

Looks great! I like the "rounded" front end. Other than the mattress I can't quite make out the numbers in your diagram, what are the total dimensions you are looking at?

I'll definitely be following your foamie build. Your woodie was what inspired me to build my first TD. Can't wait to see how the foamie turns out.

Tim

It should be fun to watch a woodie build his 1st foamie and what/how he transitions what.

It will be fun to follow along your journey!
Cheers!

Looking forward to it.
I have been pounding the pavement and a few weeks ago spotted a little trailer on I 5 going the other direction,
The shape of a old step van and painted as such Someone else's Idea I liked it .

rjgimp wrote:what are the total dimensions you are looking at?

Rob,

For the initial design it was roughly 5 x 10 x 5 with wheels matching my Chevy Colorado

Wolfgang,

Your current trailer is very nice, I look forward to seeing what you can build with foam.

Bruce

Love that Nose …. Brilliant , aerodynamic !!!

I know this second trailer will be a beauty, keep us posted.

Wolfgang:

Give it up. How long has your brain been churning on this new project?



Tony

Wolfgang - I am absolutely excited about this! I know the Foamie will be a success and you will be a "devoted convert"!!

Will be watching your build!

Cheers!

.

This should be interesting.

...Watching....

tony.latham wrote:Wolfgang:

Give it up. How long has your brain been churning on this new project?



Tony

Tony,

The model was built in April last year. So it has had time to cook.......

A couple of years after I was done with the Woodie, my wife said the the trailer was ok, but she wanted something with a real bathroom and heater. After a lot of looking we ended up with a 15 1/2' Lance.
Now we kind of split the time camping using both trailers and all my solo trips are with the teardrop. Had several solo (or with Beau, canine) trips some with over a 100 miles of dirt road and I came to the conclusion that I really like the Woodie's layout. Off-road performance and ground clearance would need some work.

Over the winter is was back on the computer to improve the design. I would work on it a little bit at a time and just work through the design over time.
While I was at it I played around with foam pieces to see what was possible.

Sometime in February I used some card board I had saved for several years to create a full scale profile in the basement since winters in SLC can get cold. Picture was taken later in the year.



Some more tweaking and this is what I got so far.







So the body is 12' long, 68" wide and about 66" tall.

So it has had time to cook.......

Figured.

Tony