My "Too Many Specs" Trailer Build (13 Viewers)

elsensei · Aug 9, 2011

The cage:

I deviated somewhat from my plans...using 1x1 16 ga steel tube, I removed a couple of the uprights and crossbars that i had on my sketchup drawing.

Basic cage:

Added a hinged side door...

Ambulance doors at the rear...

Here's the opening for the fridge slideout...Need to hang a door here...

And the trailer so far, upended from when I was doing the shocks...

One more for the road...

And speaking of the road...took it for a trial rollout down the street with the fridge in place. I since bought a 1" drop for the coupler since I'll not be running with the airbags pumped up so much. Might need a 2" drop...we'll see.

toy4xfun · Aug 9, 2011

nice build!

Hi-jack....

but that 68 Charger caught my eye, all i could do was look for it in the pics. nice charger!

Hi-jack over.

titanpat57 · Aug 9, 2011

WOW...looking great!

I love the first test ride.....just kind of a run around the block confirming what I'm sure the neighbors have figured out a long ago...

Your a Kook!!!!

How much more do need to be able to stand under the tent, now that the wheels are on and she's rolling? (from the ground to the top of the box)

The tank thing sounds crazy cool...can't wait to see it!!

Pat

elsensei · Aug 9, 2011

I'l post up a couple pics in a bit. where you can see the tent and roofrack I'll be working with. i think i'll need about 5-6 inches of height, probably use gas struts to aid in lifting.

cruiserjunkie · Aug 9, 2011

Wow this is impressive cannt hardly wait for more pictures

elsensei · Aug 9, 2011

you know what sucks? running out of MIG shielding gas after 5 pm when you've still got a full head of steam.

This was a long day in the shop...but i got a lot done...

for starters, as promised here is a shot of the eezi awn and cargo rack stored overhead. I'm goign to use the rack and tent on the new trailer and keep the shell for lockable security for oversize items, surfboards, contraband, whatever.

Today was all about doors...Last thign I did yesterday was weld in all the stops for the door to close on. I already have weatherstripped to apply after paint.

First, the side door- to make it possible to grab stuff from the front of the trailer without having to crawl inside. Finished it off out of the same 1x1 steel with crossbraces and skinned the inside with aluminum diamondplate. The whole thing is pianohinged and it will have a locking paddle latch and probably cables to hold it when open.

Next, my slides arrived today. Beefy hettich 34 inchers, supposedly with 500 lb capacity. I believe it after looking at the size of these things. When extended, you have to look twice to see all of them.

I built and installed a door for that compartment and test fitted the sliders:

and I think they'll work perfectly for my fridge. I also added a vertical brace in the angle in the door so the skin will have some backing.

The way I figure it, when cooking you'll pull the fridge out and open it, then fold down this compartment

into position like this:

And possibly there will be a slideout that you can pull out from inside. Not sure about that yet. And I have to confess, I have a piece of granite left over from remodeling my house several years ago...and a diamond saw blade...and I need a food prep workspace...I'm actually laughing out loud at how over the top that would be. Hmmmm...

Anyway, further on to the rear of the trailer where I'm scheming a fold-down slide-out stove idea. I found brand-new slides at the local industrial liquidators for $6 A PAIR!!! I love cheap hardware.

So I grabbed a couple pairs and they're just itching to be used here:

I built both halves of the door frames for one side for this.

I'll do an identical setup for the other side of the trailer where the shower will be contained. Yes, it's on it's way from walmart and it'll fit the space I have for it! Only bummer is I couldn't find one gasoline fired, only propane. Oh well, so now I'll be mounting a bottle somewhere.

Speaking of everything having a place....I also did some work on the ambulance doors, crossbracing them and fabbing bracketry to hold my tool kit...

and a pair of gas lanterns.

Most likely I'll add another bracket to hold a fire extinguisher on the toolkit side too...

I think that's it for now...tomorrow first thing will be a trip to the welding supply...or maybe I'll just start attaching all the tanks with the tig since that is low on gas as well...getting both filled at once. We'll see.\

Give me your comments critiques and ideas!

Thanks-

Sam

BLACKPOLAR · Aug 9, 2011

looking great.

LittleMan · Aug 10, 2011

Rewarding

Don't you love it when the "picture in your head" starts really coming together? Awesome build, thanks for sharing. :cheers:

MANUCHAO · Aug 10, 2011

wow.. mr sensei.. this is going to be one nice set you end up with.....
very well thought-out design....

yeah, thanks for sharing... and keep posting pics...

elsensei · Aug 10, 2011

frame studs

Today spent a number of hours working on the frame and deck.

First, had to drill out the deck to accept the studs I needed to weld on to the frame. Here's the deck with 28 holes drilled.

By the way, 28 x .190 thickness x 11/16" diameter = a hella lot of aluminum all over the place.

Then I tigwelded on 28 individual studs. That was a chore. But I didn't run out of shielding gas. Maybe tomorrow!

Once that was done, the deck slipped into place perfectly.

Amazing that something seemingly small like that can take up most of a day. Tomorrow I'll drill out the cage to fit onto the studs, bolt that down and if I have time, start welding the water tank together.

ranbar02 · Aug 12, 2011

This is an awesome build. I'm loving everything. I can't wait to see it finished. Makes my trailer look like my kids red wagon. Love it, keep the pictures coming.

J-man · Aug 13, 2011

You @ssssholio! Next trip ur ridin in my trailer with your mouth duct-taped open with the dog,.....Looks good man, but im still going to jump mine higher than yours on the washouts

And to update on my trailer, its been about 4 years since i built it, has taken more hits in baja than a cow walking across mex 1 at midnight, the most weight ive put in it has been 3.1 tons of broken up concrete (verified at the dump scale), and survived an entire remodel of my house. She keeps on rolling.......

"To be fair, Jman does absolutely use his stuff. Friendly warning to everyone....don't ever buy ANYTHING used from that guy...truck, trailer, cattledog...it's been beaten to within an inch of it's life!

"

ethernectar · Aug 22, 2011

Great build and ideas! Will be watching.

elsensei · Aug 27, 2011

the fridge!

Hey guys...I was out of town for a little bit but now I'm back and back at it.

Here's the frame of the box bolted to the deck...used acorn nuts and there are 28 studs on the periphery. Once it's bolted tight, you can rock the whole trailer from anywhere on the box. It's burly.

Here's the top layer of the water storage tank in place. Of course, it'll be 1.5" higher than this. I found a guy with a spool gun and all the tanks should be welded in place this tuesday. Just didn't feel like running 70 feet of aluminum bead...i'd end up with skin cancer after all that.

and

I'll post pics of the finished deck with tanks attached once it's done. Again, tuesday. keep your fingers crossed.

That's about all I had that done before I left for my trip. Once I got back, I was in a hurry to get the refrigerator slides mounted but of course I was out of metal so needed to make a quick run for some more 1" square. Once the slides were in and true, next tigged together a tray to mount between the slides. .190 wall diamond plate aluminum. Bolted it in and had to grind down one fastener in a hurry and managed to feed both index fingers into the grinding wheel. Idiot. Haste makes waste but makes for good pics though.

Anyway, here's the finished product...or that part, anyway...

The fridge from the front:

and the side:

The two inches below the tray will be filled up with the water storage tank.

So, you'll roll into camp like this,

swing open the door,

and pull the fridge out. These slides are burly as hell, I'd have no qualms about standing on the edge of the tray when fully extended.

When cooking time rolls around, out comes the fridge-

and then the side door folds down to access dry food and utensils. Still have to build that slideout part.

Only other major thing on that side is the stove door/slideout. Once it's complete, you'll be able to cook surrounded on 3 sides with everything within reach. Under a canopy if I can pull that off. I'm pretty stoked how this is turning out. Thanks for watching. Suggestions/critiques welcome as always.

titanpat57 · Aug 28, 2011

Looking dandy!

Ma, you assulted that finger!.....

Can't wait to see more progress...great work... :beer:

Dcon · Aug 30, 2011

Very nice work! Too bad about your finger. Can you tell me more about the swing arm bushings you used on the suspension? Looking forward to seeing your progress.

elsensei · Sep 1, 2011

Dcon said:
Very nice work! Too bad about your finger. Can you tell me more about the swing arm bushings you used on the suspension? Looking forward to seeing your progress.

Hi...just give ORW a call, they have them in stock. Not dodging the question, there just isn't that much to them .

elsensei · Sep 1, 2011

Going overboard...

Yesterday I took the rack and RTT off my old camper shell and lowered it onto the box frame, just to see how it would look.

It definitely makes the whole thing bigger.

I'm not sure what the tongue weight will be, but I figured if it was too much I'd just slide the tent back within the rack. Then I discovered that in order to clearance the fridge door, it HAS to be moved back. Now it sits directly over the axle.

I called a number of welders to get someone with a spoolgun to stitch up the tanks I made, but when I could get a guy to call back (rarely) they either didn't have the right equipment or were too darned expensive (IMO). So I ended up buying a new mig welder with steel gun and aluminum spoolgun, scheduled to be delivered Friday. Miller 211, my friend has one and I've used it and it's pretty nice. I already sold my old Hobart 135 for $400 so that plus the minimum $550 I'll save on the welding itself and I'm really only out of pocket 300 or so for the complete setup. Hopefully I'll be laying down seams on the tank this weekend and I can finally get that part put to bed.

Today I went a little overboard with the galley. I modified some inexpensive sliders I had and installed them so they fold down and then out from the stove compartment. The stove itself I wanted to attach to the slides, but there wasn't any way I could see to make it work. I ended up modifying the stove itself, riveting aluminum channel and bolting a slide to the bottom of it, and now it'll setup pointed in any of 4 different directions.

Then I had another idea.

Four sections of 1" cut at 45 degrees, 16 inches of piano hinge, some 1/8" strap and a 1" bar made up a framework for a foldout cutting board/food prep surface.

Then I dragged out a piece of granite I salvaged from my house remodel years ago. My circular saw was still setup with a diamond blade from the last time I used it to cut tile. A couple cuts later, viola! offroad granite countertop!