M416 Build

[dieselcruiserhead]

In place... Notice the weld around all seams around the sink in this post. It gets ground down to be smooth (see photo 2)...

I have mixed reservations about the sink personally. As sick as it is and how nice it looks and will work very well. My wife also loves sinks now when car camping mostly because of her contacts, which was one reason I was willing to install one (we have one in our '77 Ford Camper Van). I have my own little internal debate about the "Expo" nature of things where, as someone who was a backpacker and packed everything in, and has always sort of thrived on living things rough, are we basically building glorified RVs? So this is about as close to it as it comes for me and is really, completely utterly unneeded. That said I'm sure it will come in handy for dishes and brushing teeth etc...

Also notice the piece of steel resting between the drawer and the fender...

 

[Aggie]

great work!

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

The sink again. Hard to tell from this crappy picture but it is flapper ground smooth so nice and silky. I have some other smaller updates/changes but forgot to take pix of them and they'll get uploaded with the finishing of it all...

The drawer slides are 36" long and the drawer is 34" long. I wanted longer but no one makes a 40" slide and this allows for water storage on the far side of the drawer if needed...

The reason that groove is cut in the far side of the drawer is to allow for a small support/bridge to the fender to allow for water. The idea right now is drill a hole and tap a simple spigot into one of these cans I suppose...

In this case I didn't want something more permanent (like a pump or faucet) because it would require a battery or major electrical (but am allowing for expansion of that stuff if its ever required) again to combat the RV aspects of it all, and that this trailer can be a standalone unit without being over the top with electrical etc and the costs of solar etc. But really do I have the time for a 7 day trip or will I even really be rural enough that would require this unit to actually be self sufficient?

For these pics I'm borrowing my wife's actually quite high end Olympus P+S but it still doesn't rival my relatively cheapo Canon P+S's (at the shop or being replaced after years of being abused/sand/dirt/dropped/shop dust etc). Which is why I am a Canon guy. I am not a happy camper with a company that will put out crap P+S's like a Nikon Coolpix (one of my worse digital camera experiences) or this Olympus which she likes. I do think it takes warmer pictures though.

That's it for now!

cheers, Andre

 

[XJBANKER]

very impressive.

 

[R_Lefebvre]

I have mixed reservations about the sink personally. As sick as it is and how nice it looks and will work very well. My wife also loves sinks now when car camping mostly because of her contacts, which was one reason I was willing to install one (we have one in our '77 Ford Camper Van). I have my own little internal debate about the "Expo" nature of things where, as someone who was a backpacker and packed everything in, and has always sort of thrived on living things rough, are we basically building glorified RVs? So this is about as close to it as it comes for me and is really, completely utterly unneeded. That said I'm sure it will come in handy for dishes and brushing teeth etc...

I have thought of this as well. But again, once you have kids entering the equation... you have NO idea. We went tent camping last summer a couple times, and you have not idea what it's like trying to have two adults to set up a tent, while a toddler is running around getting into trouble. A 20 minute job becomes 45. And cooking dinner, ditto. What used to take 30 minutes for a couple, now takes 1 hour. And clean up?

Any conveniences you can have when you've got young kids is appreciated.

Also, yes, we may have all the conveniences of an RV, but with two big exceptions... these things are still way easier to tow, and the most important one: They are like inside out RV's! That's what I like about them. I hated the idea of having a cramped RV. Yeah, we drive for hours to be "in the great outdoors" then spend 50+% of our time in an 8 foot box?! I liked the tent trailers I looked at, but whenever I looked at something like a 17 foot travel trailer... I just don't get it.

These camping trailers are build inside out. A convenient kitchen, but you're *outside*.

This is again all with my cutoff wheels on my grinder. I went through about 10 for the night which is an additional $20 or so in costs and time/labor consuming versus being at a real metal shop that has a shear or brake press.

I feel your pain. The best part is the black crap in your nose for 2 days. :Wow1:

But seriously, you must be doing something wrong. You've seen my trailer build, I've only used 2 chop-saw blades, and about 5 cutting wheels. I find if you push them, they get used up fast. Slow it down and let the heat do the work and they last much longer.

 

[VE2WHZ]

very nice made !!!

great pic

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

I feel your pain. The best part is the black crap in your nose for 2 days. :Wow1:

But seriously, you must be doing something wrong. You've seen my trailer build, I've only used 2 chop-saw blades, and about 5 cutting wheels. I find if you push them, they get used up fast. Slow it down and let the heat do the work and they last much longer.

I still have the black crap but I'm sure you saw the pic earlier of my getup. I looked at some old pics and noticed I'm still wearing the same old shop cap, which is a wool hat I skied in the late 90s in Vermont, that I was wearing to wrench in. Then ear plugs, respirator, and goggles. For even large parts of the evening... This helps a lot or is borderline mandatory... This said I'm still concerned about possible long terms from it all...

After buying Harbor Freight cutoff wheels (which are very good) I noticed cut off wheels and grinders etc are not very good for us. It is blatantly marked "known to the state of California to be cancerous." So I wear a respirator almost all the time and definitely when cutting. I really affected myself with my first build from a few times not wearing protection when building my first FJ55. It would render me sick for even a few days sometimes.

The black boogers that I get now are residual mostly from just being in the dusty environment. Also, the other ones that I use (Home Depot now has decent ones at about $1.70 each) and the Forney ones (which are also very good - I use their mig wire too, it is awesome) for about the same price are not marked cancerous. So I try to buy these almost exclusively, but my thoughts are maybe they're not certified for California so they don't have the warning, and the welding industry is very well known for hiding the negative health affects of welding. After all we're using ancient technology in these heavy-MMM old school styled (but made in America) boxes with basically 60 or 80 year old technology. It's like the car, the reliability and small aspects like smoothness and power has gotten better but really its the same old thing, and retardedly costs a fortune for each of these machines as well. Really, the welder should cost about half as much as it does. But at least these nicer Miller and Lincoln machines are made in the USA. A common trait of career welders is they get the "shakes" usually starting as early at their 40s. My assumption is it comes from fumes. The effects or contaminants or paint or oil on metal or fumes from flux or something along these lines. Also, a good example of welding industry tactics are zinc poisoning (which is a form of blood poisoning) from welding galvanized metal. It is not a temporary sickness - it is very well documented that zinc poisoning can have permanent, long term consequences, and there are hundreds of people who have them including several on several boards. For this reason I am *very* careful welding to anything that is galvanized.

The cutoff wheel is sort of my tool of trade so I go through them heavily and use them on all sorts of stuff. Some last a long time but others, *particularly with sheet metal*, do not last that long. It is a bummer but it's OK. On the 14 gauge and the long 4 foot spans of sheet metal I was going through about 3/4 of one with each cut. Agreed that I could slow down and use them more cautiously but I figure it would only save me 1-2 wheels or about 10-20% at most, hardly worth it. But noted.. This crossed my mind several times and I did make some adjustments, hardly made a difference.

Also, my chop saw blades usually last a year or two!

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

Rob thank you for your comments on the kitchen and sink as well.. Again the long term and kid perspective helps a lot! I would agree that it's a little tougher as its outside but again we live in arid Utah. Not as arid as Arizona but it is still "usually" a pleasure to be outside. If I could I'd be outside any day of the week including showers

I would love to take this guy to Burning Man and live out of it for the week there but Carrie and I bought a cute little 10' foot enclosed camper / travel trailer that is indoors. She says she's opposed to being outside. I guess I'm letting my wife get soft (who is a hell of a trooper too ).. But maybe you have a point.

 

[R_Lefebvre]

Interesting about your thoughts on the health effects. I thought I was being precautious because I'm wearing ear muffs and a full face protection visor. I wear glasses, I find prescription safety glasses do not really protect well enough for hard-core fab work. Real goggles over the glasses fog up... It just seemed easiest to get a full face shield. And the ear muffs because they're on-off all the time and plugs are a pain to put in.

But, I hadn't really given much thought to a dust mask. I guess it makes sense, but now I'm running out of square inches of face to hang things off. I also have the extra fear because I have to grind Thoriated Tungsten electrodes for the TIG welder, and thorium is radioactive.

I worry, but... it seems to me like since I don't do it all day every day, is it really a big deal? I see so many guys who weld with no protection at all, just a t-shirt, no gloves, close your eyes and "Chicks dig a tan".

I hadn't seen the cancer warnings on the disks, but it's hard to know what that really means. It's like MSDS sheets. Did you know that you could asphyxiate if you consumed too much water?

I try to take care for accute things. Hearing damage, sparks, etc. The chronic things, I just hope? that since I only do this occaisionally..?

 

[24HOURSOFNEVADA]

As usual, you deliver us a top notch build with plenty of great idea's. I dig the sink slide. It reminds me of a Kimberly Kamper.

The slides being incorporated are really cool. Makes me want to build a copy cat.

 

[burke]

great build...i like the stealth slide out kitchen.

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

THanks guys... Interesting as much as the arms/suspension are totally stolen from AT as are the tail gate latches from someone on ih8mud, the lid design and hinges and this kitchen thing all sort of was invented... It's nice to hear and to see that other brands are doing the same design... The Kimberly Camper, very cool. I've never actually checked one out...

There was an AEV JK with some sort of trailer behind it in Heber City yesterday. I wasn't sure what the trailer was, I'll have to dig through the photos and see, maybe it was a Kimberly...

 

[highlandercj-7]

24 hrs, LOL I don't know where you got the pics of the Kimberly but the tow TJ could be my Jeeps son, lol. I never seen the slide out on those trailers yet that is cool.
OH yeah, it's not stolen designs, it's working within your skills and budget. Most folks would love to be able to buy a bunch of new stuff from the factory and have tons of time to go out and wheel and use it. Few are that forchanate, most have to bust there tails to get what they got. SO stolen designs are folks that are going to taken them and make a production run at someone else's expense. I call this adapting and overcoming.

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

Not too much for updates except... Maiden voyage (a pretty full statewide-trip) is in 12 days exactly so I'm starting to nail up the last of it. The bad news is I have a pretty nasty little cold and my poor wife Carrie is just sick as a dog, it a cold but possibly the sickest I have seen her ever.. So I haven't had a lot of time to get it done. My thoughts are I need about 1 full day of fab. Then a day of disassembly and paint, and then one more day of paint and wiring and last little things like weather stripping...

I was down last night for a few hours which were a lot of fun. So much so that I put up a post on my blog about it about the tunes we were playing, which was old-school Herbie Hancock...


Anyway, one thing that has been front and foremost on my mind was the lift mechanisms, that heavy-MMM lid, and what would happen with the roof top tent on it. How would I get it all open. I knew there were heavy duty lift shocks but wasn't sure how they would work... I asked my Land Cruiser club the Wasatch Cruisers about it and got a lead about one of the most killer finds in all of Salt Lake which is a discount warehouse that sells insurance-damaged goods from UPS and other carriers. It is mecca to anyone who is interested in our hobbies, a friend from WC literally makes a trip there weekly. Tools, I even bought my winch there brand new (M12000) for $600 once upon a time with a little bend in one of the bars that I could care less about...

Anyway, the install. Here are the shocks. They came with everything except the extremely obscure hardware so I had to improvise. The little balls in the bottom right, which I pulled of a wrecked 4x4labs bumper, were too small but they help for reference...

Using the press to compress and test. They were so stiff I wasn't sure they even worked. They are Genesis brand from a www.austinhardware.com at around I think $30 each - really not too expensive.

The only thing is the hardware was missing. I did find one bolt and thought I could find the rest somewhere else but had no luck... This is what it's supposed to look like. According to the part number online its a 16mm "ball stud."

HEre is what I came up with. It works but there is some flex. So I've ordered the mysterious ball studs online from some vendor in Florida for probably about $20 shipped I figure..

Notice the rounded heads. They fit perfectly in the cartridge...

 

[dieselcruiserhead]

Bolt installed, some steel cut from scrap for the mounting plates to add rigidity to the tub wall.

Welding inside the trailer. The lid prop is tack welded into place for safety..

You can see the plate welded in at the back left corner of the tub

The tailgate side, this is more 14 gauge...