My dad built pretty well what you're thinking on an old 5th wheel trailer frame. He put an RV rubber roof skin on the roof for water proofing. He had painted plywood on the walls outside but eventually he bought rv siding to put over the plywood, watertight and has worked well for over 10 years. For your application I might consider some type of metal roofing material as well. If you were going to have a shipping container originally, if you used colored metal building cladding on the outside plywood you'd have waterproof and no need to paint or anything down the road. wouldn't look much different texture wise tha a sea can. some other options for you. I like the way you're thinking.
Building our box out of wood?
- Thread starter MTVR
- Start date
Looking at a map of the various "zones" and the recommended R-values for walls and "attics". I'm seeing recommended R-values of up to 21 for walls, and up to 60 for "attics". We'd have to do a 2x8 or 2x10 ceiling/roof, stuffed to the gills with polyiso, to get anywhere near that.
IdaSHO
IDACAMPER
As for roofing material....
My personally recommendation would be a silicone coating.
I use Gacoroof
gaco.com
My personally recommendation would be a silicone coating.
I use Gacoroof
GacoFlex S2100 - Gaco™
Cleanable Solvent-Free Silicone Coating GacoFlex S2100 is the only cleanable solvent-free 100% silicone coating in the industry to resist dirt pick-up even after years of exposure, thereby maintaining significantly higher whiteness and solar reflectivity than other silicones. S2100 offers the...
gaco.com
rruff
Explorer
Like I've been saying, "optimal" R for a camper is much less than in a house. If I get sufficiently bored maybe I'll do some calculations. But I know >3" of foam would be getting silly.
Where do you plan to travel and in what climates? What size box?
16' feet long, 8'6" wide, and no more than 8' tall.
We'd like to go anywhere we want within the continental U.S., and we're willing to try to plan ahead, so that we're not in the hottest parts of the country during the hottest part of the year, but we also don't want the thermometer to dictate where we can and cannot go.
As far as air exchange, we can intake cooler air from underneath, and exhaust hotter air from the ceiling. We may also be able to run a mini-split or something several hours a day.
We'd like to go anywhere we want within the continental U.S., and we're willing to try to plan ahead, so that we're not in the hottest parts of the country during the hottest part of the year, but we also don't want the thermometer to dictate where we can and cannot go.
As far as air exchange, we can intake cooler air from underneath, and exhaust hotter air from the ceiling. We may also be able to run a mini-split or something several hours a day.
Simons
Adventurer
Lol! Come on now, I’m just opening up the imagination. Absolutely no CNC requirement to cut plywood. I think I mentioned pencils and a jigsaw.....
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
s.e.charles
Well-known member
the best teacher adjusts his lecture to the audience. gauging some of the questions, I, and perhaps erroneously, took the OP's construction experience to be limited.
mea culpa
mea culpa
Keeping the dimensions to a maximum of 16' long, 8' wide, and 8' tall would allow you to easily skin the outside with 20 sheets of 4' x 8' plywood.
The maximum 8' width helps with keeping you legal across the United States. Maximum Allowable Width for RVs State Equipment and Road Use Law Summaries
Most houses are nailed together rather than glued and screwed.
Gluing and screwing your camper together using 4x4s (really 3.5"x3.5"), plywood, and rigid foam insulation would be simple, easy, and give you plenty of insulation for such a small (and well sealed) volume.
Last edited:
Yes, you are correct. Some states only allow 8 feet wide.
So maybe 8 feet by 8 feet by 16 feet long...
No worries.
I have decades of experience as a homeowner, and I have always been able to take care of my own framing, roofing, gutters, electrical, plumbing, insulation, drywall, mudding, taping, texturing, painting, tile work, glazing, fencing, and so on...although I'm really much better with vehicles...
Last edited:
IdaSHO
IDACAMPER
Who is talking about 4x4's?
They have no business in a camper build. Period.
They barely have any business in residential construction as it is, for a variety of reasons.
If you design such a thickness wall, use 1x or 2x
There is ZERO reason to consider 4x, and many reasons not to.