"TrailTop" modular trailer topper building components

[BOHICA]

May have already been discussed, but some random thoughts...the bigger and flatter the fenders the better for cooking surface, also a great place to put dirty footwear at night. Battery and solar panels to power the refrigerator? How about a portable "dry-flush, waterless, odorless" toilet for night use (women would really appreciate) next to where the guy is standing...compact and weighs about 25 lbs. Awesome work, love your skills!
Ken

 

[jscherb]

May have already been discussed, but some random thoughts...the bigger and flatter the fenders the better for cooking surface, also a great place to put dirty footwear at night. Battery and solar panels to power the refrigerator? How about a portable "dry-flush, waterless, odorless" toilet for night use (women would really appreciate) next to where the guy is standing...compact and weighs about 25 lbs. Awesome work, love your skills!
Ken

Thanks, and thanks for the good ideas.

The Trail Kitchen has a power system - in the Jeep I've got a kitchen battery installed above the rear inner fender and the same battery will go in the trailer. The Trail Kitchen Power panel has two power outlets, two USB outlets, and a voltmeter and ammeter for monitoring battery condition. One of the outlets powers the fridge and the other powers the sink pump.

In this photo for a better view of the battery and power system the kitchen isn't installed; I'm charging my phone from one of the USB outlets:

The Trail Kitchen also has a charging system - when the Jeep is running the battery is charged and the kitchen is powered from the Jeep and when the Jeep isn't running the kitchen is powered by the kitchen battery. The battery lasts about 3 days before it drops below the fridge power threshhold, so as long as the Jeep is run every few days the kitchen battery stays charged. When installed in the trailer, the charging system will be tied to the Jeep power through the trailer wiring plug.

For longer than 3-day operation, solar panels would be a good idea and the Trail Kitchen charging system could be tied to output of the panels.

The Trail Kitchen has a plenty of cooking/countertop surface, but more is always good. Here are some photos of the kitch en in the wild during food prep...

For even more work space, what I may do is install the side hatches to open down as tables. Here's a concept drawing, I've put a pantry cupboard inside and the hatch opens as a table.

Another option for more table space would be something like this tire-mounted table I was testing on my recent Death Valley camping trip.

Haven't found a toilet necessary yet but it's a good thing to consider.

 

[winnipegtibook]

I have been following this thread for a number of years. When will this latest design be available / licensed for purchase?

 

[jscherb]

I have been following this thread for a number of years. When will this latest design be available / licensed for purchase?

Are you asking about the Trail Kitchen (topic of my latest posts) or about the TrailTop components in general?

The Trail Kitchen is now in production and is due to be released this month, the company that licensed the design has been showing a preproduction unit at events like Overland West and Easter Jeep Safari and I am told that the first production run has just been completed, so release is imminent.

If you're asking about the TrailTop components, a few months ago I was contacted by a person who was interested in bringing the components to production and offering kits of components to build a range of camper designs. We had several phone and email conversations and we were supposed to meet to continue the discussion, the meeting was tentatively scheduled but never happened, I guess he decided not to pursue the idea further. Other than that there's been no action related to the components getting into production.

 

[winnipegtibook]

To be honest, it really doesnt matter, as I could see both working for me needs. I assume your licensing partner will (hopefully) announce something on this form? Looking forward to hearing more! Great work

 

[jscherb]

To be honest, it really doesnt matter, as I could see both working for me needs. I assume your licensing partner will (hopefully) announce something on this form? Looking forward to hearing more! Great work

I think the company that's doing the Trail Kitchen recently did a press release about it, I'll see if I can get a copy. Since I'm not an employee of the company, I'm usually not on the distribution list (or forgotten) for things like press releases .

 

[rudee13]

I still hope for a day your topper components come to market. I don't think I'm the only person who has followed your work and can see the possibilities to build a slick camper themselves. ???
congrats on the trail kitchen!

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[jscherb]

I still hope for a day your topper components come to market. I don't think I'm the only person who has followed your work and can see the possibilities to build a slick camper themselves. ???
congrats on the trail kitchen!

Thank you.

I'd like to see the TrailTop components on the market too, I think we'd see a lot of very creative campers and toppers built using them, and the creativity of people using the components would result in a lot of good ideas coming out that would lead to new TrailTop components.

Don't know if any of that will ever happen though, there have been a bunch of companies/people interested in bringing them to market but for one reason or another it hasn't happened yet.

 

[jscherb]

Countertop space is always at a premium on the trail or in the campground, so here's something I designed recently to help with that problem. This works with pretty much any trailer or vehicle - it's a table that stores very compactly and sets up on a vehicle or trailer tire. Here it is set up on one of my trailers:

And here it is set up on the tire of my Jeep:

It's also designed to extend the Trail Kitchen counter space:

Since storage space is at a premium, especially in a Jeep on the trail but often also in a trailer, I designed this to store very compactly. I also made a vinyl storage bag for it so it doesn't scratch anything or rattle around in the Jeep or trailer.

It folds up to go in the bag:

 

[jscherb]

I think the company that's doing the Trail Kitchen recently did a press release about it, I'll see if I can get a copy. Since I'm not an employee of the company, I'm usually not on the distribution list (or forgotten) for things like press releases .

I just received this one in email, it was released back in May. I hadn't seen this until yesterday.

 

[john61ct]

Great company, congratulations

 

[jscherb]

Between travel and other design projects it's been quite a while since I've had time to do any work on the TrailTop camper project. In a week I'll be using the trailer to move my son to Washington DC for his new job so today I pulled it out of the storage garage where it's been since I last worked on it.

Several of the design projects that have taken precedence can be seen on the Jeep - the JL-style grille which replaces the factory grille, and the fiberglass upper half doors which replace the factory canvas uppers. Both of those may be going into production, I'm working with two Jeep accessory companies on them.

Yet another design project that has been taking my time is the Trail Kitchen. One of the last things I did on the trailer project before I put it away was to install the prototype Trail Kitchen in it, and now the Trail Kitchen is in production and will be featured in a month at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas. It'll be featured there in a Jeep, here are a few photos of the production along with a few pre-production options that will be at the show.

The sink option in action:


The Trail Kitchen has gotten lots of coverage in magazines since the prototype and preproduction versions were first shown, here's a clip from the most recent issue of Four Wheeler:

On of the options for the Trail Kitchen is a no-drill installation kit for Jeep Wrangler, but the kitchen can be installed anywhere there's a flat surface, like a trailer. The company expects there will be good interest in the trailer market, so I need to install the kitchen in this trailer so it can be used in photos and shows. The bad news - the production Trail Kitchen is a few inches taller than the prototype, so I'll need to modify the front panel of the trailer to accomodate the additional height. For the SEMA Show the kitchen will be featured in a Jeep, so I'm not on deadline for that, but I do need to get it installed fairly soon. I'll post the installation here when I get to it.

 

[jscherb]

Trailer is literally "loaded to the gills" with things for Robert's move (we'll call the side hatches "gills" so I can use this phrase ). I haven't put the gas struts on the hatches yet so they're being held up for this photo. Turns out being able to reach in through the hatches is great for loading the trailer to its max capacity.

In my post the other day I said I needed to modify the front panel to allow room for the slightly taller production version of the Trail Kitchen, I'll make extra space by swapping the front hatch for one that isn't as tall and enlarging the lower kitchen hatch. This new hatch will provide more than enough room for the kitchen.

I'll start that work after the move when the trailer is empty again.

In other news... I've been contacted recently by two parties who have expressed interest in bringing the TrailTop components to market. Neither has fiberglass manufacturing experience so they'd be outsourcing the molding work to a fiberglass shop; both have expressed interest in packaging together kits of necessary TrailTop components to build various trailer designs and one has said they'd also sell parts individually for people doing their own designs. I'll post more on these conversations soon.

 

[rudee13]

"In other news... I've been contacted recently by two parties who have expressed interest in bringing the TrailTop components to market. Neither has fiberglass manufacturing experience so they'd be outsourcing the molding work to a fiberglass shop; both have expressed interest in packaging together kits of necessary TrailTop components to build various trailer designs and one has said they'd also sell parts individually for people doing their own designs. I'll post more on these conversations soon."


I really think these could be a hit in the dyi community. do you think the components could be used and allow for roof top tent mounts on top with correct bracing inside of course?

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[jscherb]

...do you think the components could be used and allow for roof top tent mounts on top with correct bracing inside of course?

Yes, I've already tested that, both on a simple trailer lid and a full camper both made of TrailTop parts...