thethePete
Explorer
Feel free to disagree, but I've seen it in real world application for years. Channel is stronger, but only in one plane. 100-wall tubing is plenty strong for crossers, but step up to .125 if you feel the need. I've never seen it fail in practice and many of these trailers have seen high point-loading. Channel WILL accumulate dirt and debris. Period. It has a ledge for debris to sit on, and it will. Full stop.
Your 8' span is a very unrealistic situation, and is also false. My father is 250lbs and I've seen him stand in the middle of a crosser with mild deflection. My 180lb butt doesn't really make it move an appreciable amount; also considering the MAX allowed with for a trailer is 101", the odds of your middle spans actually being over 7'6" are slim, especially if you want to take this thing down any sort of trail. Furthermore, you're painting a situation where you have zero decking to add structural rigidity, and you're overbuilding for no reason. Ever try and stand a studwall up without sheeting on it? I could push on one side and have the whole thing collapse. Put some sheeting on it and it's strong enough to hold up a roof. The ONLY scenario where I could see channel being a viable alternative, would be to do it with the "c" pointed downward, and only for crossers. This would keep dirt from accumulating, and may give you some strength back while keeping weight down. I still feel that you'd be adding too much unnecessary material for no real reason. I'd be interested in seeing the same overall design done in tubing and in channel, thrown into some solidworks stress analysis. Our trailer building days were before the prevalence of computer design. AutoCAD was the only player in the game and it was strictly for industrial use, not a small shop.
If you build a quality product of any nature, and people are unwilling to pay for it, you can't exactly keep your buisness sustained. I think you underestimate the average person's idea of cost v reliability. You've isolated yourself in a group of people who feel that there is no kill like overkill, and you're forgetting that there's a reason so many things are made in China and are considered disposable in our world. Hell, even cars are disposable compared to 20+ years ago. Way to slam my father's business in an effort to "prove your point" though. He felt the same way. He built 1 trailer with a reasonable margin for the 5 cheap ones that were sold down the road. Guess what, that doesn't make a very sustainable buisness model, and if you don't live in a major urban centre, good luck with making it up on volume. We're in the middle of bum-**** nowhere. We have no wheeling mecca to apeal to. We have no major population base of well-off people to draw from. We live in a smallish mill town full of tradesmen and construction workers. He made a valiant effort for 5 years and made solid, quality products while he was open. Several of his fixtures are still around town and I still see some of his trailers running around from time to tome. I think we had a total run of about 120ish trailers leave the building in that time, as well as many other structural projects, and various fab work. I know what I know because I have seen it work, and the trailers we build 15 years ago are still running around doing what they do and looking almost as good as the day they were built. I have no skin in this game, I'm simply conveying what I know.
tgreening: thanks for the supporting input. It's hard arguing with e-fabbers and people who've only ever built stuff in solidworks. I'm a licensed, career mechanic, and I grew up in a fabricating household. Pops always said, there's two kindsa smart in this world...
Your 8' span is a very unrealistic situation, and is also false. My father is 250lbs and I've seen him stand in the middle of a crosser with mild deflection. My 180lb butt doesn't really make it move an appreciable amount; also considering the MAX allowed with for a trailer is 101", the odds of your middle spans actually being over 7'6" are slim, especially if you want to take this thing down any sort of trail. Furthermore, you're painting a situation where you have zero decking to add structural rigidity, and you're overbuilding for no reason. Ever try and stand a studwall up without sheeting on it? I could push on one side and have the whole thing collapse. Put some sheeting on it and it's strong enough to hold up a roof. The ONLY scenario where I could see channel being a viable alternative, would be to do it with the "c" pointed downward, and only for crossers. This would keep dirt from accumulating, and may give you some strength back while keeping weight down. I still feel that you'd be adding too much unnecessary material for no real reason. I'd be interested in seeing the same overall design done in tubing and in channel, thrown into some solidworks stress analysis. Our trailer building days were before the prevalence of computer design. AutoCAD was the only player in the game and it was strictly for industrial use, not a small shop.
If you build a quality product of any nature, and people are unwilling to pay for it, you can't exactly keep your buisness sustained. I think you underestimate the average person's idea of cost v reliability. You've isolated yourself in a group of people who feel that there is no kill like overkill, and you're forgetting that there's a reason so many things are made in China and are considered disposable in our world. Hell, even cars are disposable compared to 20+ years ago. Way to slam my father's business in an effort to "prove your point" though. He felt the same way. He built 1 trailer with a reasonable margin for the 5 cheap ones that were sold down the road. Guess what, that doesn't make a very sustainable buisness model, and if you don't live in a major urban centre, good luck with making it up on volume. We're in the middle of bum-**** nowhere. We have no wheeling mecca to apeal to. We have no major population base of well-off people to draw from. We live in a smallish mill town full of tradesmen and construction workers. He made a valiant effort for 5 years and made solid, quality products while he was open. Several of his fixtures are still around town and I still see some of his trailers running around from time to tome. I think we had a total run of about 120ish trailers leave the building in that time, as well as many other structural projects, and various fab work. I know what I know because I have seen it work, and the trailers we build 15 years ago are still running around doing what they do and looking almost as good as the day they were built. I have no skin in this game, I'm simply conveying what I know.
tgreening: thanks for the supporting input. It's hard arguing with e-fabbers and people who've only ever built stuff in solidworks. I'm a licensed, career mechanic, and I grew up in a fabricating household. Pops always said, there's two kindsa smart in this world...
