Bruiser the Adventure Cargo Trailer

Adventurous

Explorer
never seen an enclosed trailer with a single man door as the only rear door, i may have overlooked it but is it custom ordered?

It is custom ordered. :)

We knew ahead of time that we wouldn't need a ramp door or swinging doors in the back; something that could have a screen and locked from the inside was more important. Likewise, having a door up towards the front was going to spoil our floor plan, so we requested only the single door at the rear of the trailer. This will relegate it it camper status as it takes away the utility of having a bigger door, but for our purposes it was worth the tradeoff.
 

Adventurous

Explorer
Made a bit of progress on the trailer over this past week. I will be adding a few exterior accessories that require a bit of work to the frame, namely the awning and a skylight above the bed area. In preparation for the structural changes I pulled off the walls, the ceiling, and all of the insulation. This also exposed the wiring which will receive some attention of its own.

The interior came out pretty easily after I removed an estimated 10 billion screws. The aluminum skin was screwed to the plywood sub-wall that was screwed to the studs. Once those two were removed I was able to label and pull the insulation. Looking awfully empty in there…

DSC_3848 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

Wiring is currently dangling all over. I'll do a better job organizing and securing it as I run wiring to other stuffs.

DSC_3847 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

My biggest accomplishment however was figuring out how I wanted to secure a few miscellaneous items, namely the spare tire, the battery, and the propane tank. My dilemma was such, I wanted the battery to be tucked away in a locked box safe from the elements and prying hands. It would also need enough space to mount a resettable breaker next to it as I want the shortest unprotected cable run I could muster. For the propane tank and spare tire, they just needed to be in a place that offered them secure passage without having to resort to major structural changes to the shell of the trailer to accommodate. Like most trailers, the tongue stood out as being the best place to fit all of this.

Note that the trailer originally came with a generator platform up front. 20 minutes with a BFH and an angle grinder and it was off. I was left with this real estate to work with.

DSC_3831 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

And my proposed configuration:

DSC_3832 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

I will build a pre-runner type cradle for the spare tire so it can be held down with a ratchet strap. Propane tank will have it's own platform that will span two of the frame rails. They will both be shielded by a locking, weatherproof metal box that I purchased from Harbor Freight to house the battery. My only concern with this configuration is the amount of weight added to the tongue. If I am doing my maths correctly, it is an estimated 190 lbs (70 lb battery, 40 lb tongue box, 50 lb spare tire, 30 lb propane tank). Tongue weight must have been in the neighborhood of 150 lbs or so empty, so I'm sitting a bit north of 300lbs before building out the inside. With the kitchen, main storage closet, and water tank (5 gals) sitting behind the rear axle, I'm hoping that the tongue weight evens out a bit more relative to my proposed 2,200 lbs'ish gross trailer weight. We shall see…

A few more pics of the proposed configuration:

DSC_3833 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

DSC_3837 by Tim Souza, on Flickr
Look at all that space! I'm hoping the layout is compact enough that I can store other items such as wheel chocks in here as well.
DSC_3835 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

There is adequate space between the propane tank/trailer, spare tire/trailer, and propane tank/spare tire/tongue box to ensure that shifting during operation doesn't let them contact. Propane tank and spare tire will be offset outboard enough to let the battery cables run unencumbered out of the back of the tongue box and into the trailer along the centerline.
Now, I could have mounted the tongue box by grabbing some self-tapping sheet metal screws and rammed them home. But that would be sloppy, ugly, and have relatively little thread engagement for holding down a 100 lb box that could be bouncing all over. Instead I did it in what I thought was a more elegant way, rivnuts. Step 1 was to get the trailer box in the proper position and evenly spaced on both sides of the frame rails (it hangs over by 1.5”), square to the frame and square to the trailer. Once this was done I traced the frame rails on the underside of the box with a silver Sharpie. With my frame rails positioned I marked out locations of the holes. I chose to go with 6 holes utilizing M8 fasteners.

DSC_3840 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

I was using step drill bits to drill these holes as it gave me a nice chamfered edge. My shop tip, mark the flat of the hole size you want to achieve with a Sharpie. That way when the sharpied line disappears you know you are at the right size.

Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

With the holes in my box drilled I went back to the trailer and replaced it in the desired location. I transferred the bolt pattern in the box to the trailer frame, checked once, checked twice, then started drilling into the trailer frame. For an M8 rivnut, the hole had to be a 7/16”. The two outer frame rails I was able to bore through with the step bits while the center section was double thick and required a second pass with a 7/16” drill bit. After all holes were drilled I shot them with a quick coat of primer and paint.

DSC_3842 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

Given that the middle of winter in CO isn't the best place to ask paint to dry, I hit it with the heat gun after to try and get the paint to dry quicker. It was moderately successful, I think as long as I give it a bit of time to dry out it will eventually. Then came the rivnuts. I hadn't had an opportunity to use this tool yet, but it was quick and easy to set all 6 nuts.

DSC_3843 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

Before inserting them I coated the outside with black RTV. This should minimize the ingress of water from the rivnut/frame rail interface.

DSC_3846 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

All in all things went smoothly. My bolt holes lined up and the box is very secure on there. No pictures of it mounted as I picked up a group 31 Diehard deep cycle battery that will be going in there shortly and it seemed easier to mount the battery tray and breaker with the tongue box off the truck.
 

DanCooper

Adventurer
"I was using step drill bits to drill these holes as it gave me a nice chamfered edge. My shop tip, mark the flat of the hole size you want to achieve with a Sharpie. That way when the sharpied line disappears you know you are at the right size."


Great tip!
 

Adventurous

Explorer
Part of the plan has been to hang an 8' ARB awning off the side of the trailer. In non-windy situations, it does a great job at providing protection from the elements or a nice place to hang out in the evening. Deployed it looks like so:

29195217522_03f9ffd11d_z.jpg
20160528-IMG_1374 by Tim Souza, on Flickr

For those unfamiliar, the back of the awning is a slotted aluminum extrusion that accepts M6 hex head bolts.

Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

The slots are sized to provide the bolt head with anti-rotation when a nut is installed, however, this also means that the awning needs a bracket of some sort to mount. I haven't seen a ton of awnings on trailers like this, but when I do, the most common way of mounting seems to be extending L-brackets from the roof line down and attaching the awning to those. To me, they never look streamlined, necessitate that the awning is spaced out from the trailer body, and don't provide an interface that I'd trust to hold up to years of abuse.

Instead, as my walls are is 1" tube steel, I decided to weld some brackets on the inside so the awning could mount directly against the body of the trailer. This of course provided a very convenient excuse to justify purchasing a welder. I grabbed a Hobart 140 that I am running flux core wire through.

Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

I started with 1" x 1" x 1/8" angle iron which was cut into ~3" (8) sections then ground to length.

40098459721_c8cf530e39_z.jpg
Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

I drilled 2 chamfered holes for the awning bolts, radiused the corner that sits against the aluminum skin, and drilled 3 chamfered holes in the flat that rests against the stud. This is what it looks like tacked into placed.

39199097735_a7c9ed6a1e_z.jpg
by Tim Souza, on Flickr

Why the 3 holes? I really only have access to weld the interior edge joint. I was concerned that trying to weld too much of the lap joint along the top and bottom edges would push the puddle too close to the aluminum and burn through. I drilled those three holes so I could rosette weld the brackets to the sides and provide additional support so they don't peel off. Given that the extend tof my MIG welding experience is limited to the couple of coupons I ran on Saturday, more welds (provided I don't burn through the material) are probably better, increase my chances of good adhesion. Here they are all tacked in place. Position was established parallel to the roof line.

39386538404_802dafc108_z.jpg
Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

Test fit was spot on, so I went ahead and finished welding them in last night. I welded the full edge seam, did a partial along the top and bottom flats, and filled all 3 rosette welds. I won't profess to be the world's best welder, but this doesn't look too bad with only a couple of days under my belt. A little bit of wandering, maybe a tad too cold, and a bit more control of the puddle should get these looking much prettier.

Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

As I have insulation and plywood walls interacting with the tubing on which the bracket sits, I flap disked it all smooth. Good news is the welds showed very little porosity and good penetration into both metals. I don't foresee these going anywhere.

Untitled by Tim Souza, on Flickr

There was a little bit of heat distortion as I dumped a lot of heat into relatively thin walled tubing, but probably no more than 3/32". Hoping it didn't move things around enough to throw off the hole alignment, that was one of the biggest risks doing it this way and putting as much weld as I did into those brackets. Got some lap sealant on the way and will probably get things bolted in for good later this week.
 

jgaz

Adventurer
I'm following your trailer build. I like your idea for mounting your awning flush with the trailer sides.

I realize that this is after the fact, but if you have to attach brackets to your wall ribs again and are worried about heat distortion, consider 1/4” structural rivets.

Here I'm using them to mount brackets to 1” square tube that will support a cargo basket in my LJ.

9FA97CCE-80DF-4D3F-A4C1-057E43C83A95.jpg

Just be sure to use a rivet where the stem stays in the set rivet. The hollow center that remains in some rivets after they are set will not be nearly as strong in shear loading.

Sorry for hi jack. You've done a nice job so far.
 
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Adventurous

Explorer
I'm following your trailer build. I like your idea for mounting your awning flush with the trailer sides.

I realize that this is after the fact, but if you have to attach brackets to your wall ribs again and are worried about heat distortion, consider 1/4” structural rivets.

Here I'm using them to mount brackets to 1” square tube that will support a cargo basket in my LJ.

View attachment 434548

Just be sure to use a rivet where the stem stays in the set rivet. The hollow center that remains in some rivets after they are set will not be nearly as strong in shear loading.

Sorry for hi jack. You've done a nice job so far.

Thanks! And I always appreciate seeing how other people have accomplished similar tasks. I like to tuck those techniques away for later, never know when they will come in handy.

I chose to weld partially because it's a skill I've always wanted to teach myself and this provided the opportunity to learn. I've always had aspirations to fabricate things and this was a step in the right direction. Can't grow if we never challenge ourselves right?
 

Scott B.

SE Expedition Society
Thanks! And I always appreciate seeing how other people have accomplished similar tasks. I like to tuck those techniques away for later, never know when they will come in handy.

I chose to weld partially because it's a skill I've always wanted to teach myself and this provided the opportunity to learn. I've always had aspirations to fabricate things and this was a step in the right direction. Can't grow if we never challenge ourselves right?

You realize that describes half the people on this site, myself included, don't you? LOL
 

Adventurous

Explorer
You realize that describes half the people on this site, myself included, don't you? LOL

I always try and clarify, I can't tell you how many people I run into that say, "Couldn't you have bought something like that already? Why do you need to make it? It's just going to cost more time and money."
 

Adventurous

Explorer
are you happy with the single axle choice?

So far yes. There are certainly advantages to having dual axles, but I'm not sure I would benefit from them with this trailer. Plus, the extra axle added 500 lbs and ~$1K to the cost of the trailer.
 

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