Building a Lightweight Camper for my Moped... Detailed Build

[Applause] one of my most requested videos is to make a newer lighter weight camper with an aluminum frame and foam and fiberglass body so that's exactly what I'm going to do in this build [Music] so in this build I'm going to be making the second version of my bike camper and I'm going to be trying to save as much weight as possible on this one which means making an aluminum frame a foam body and as little wood as possible while still having it be structurally sound and professional so first I'm marking ticks every two inches along both sides of a sheet of half inch finish grade Pine plywood [Music] then I'm using these two inch ticks and this measurement cheat sheet to basically make a connect the dot outline of the shape I want this camper to be [Music] then with all the dots laid out I can just use a straight edge to connect them all for my cut line foreign [Music] ER Parts I just had to freehand in a line that looked about right [Music] then I could cut out the shape using a fine-tooth wood jigsaw blade foreign [Music] up the edge quick I could trace this onto another sheet of plywood and cut it out [Music] so I'm looking to keep as little of this wood as possible really just where I need to screw into to support doors and windows and the rest I'm going to replace with foam so I measured out any doorways or anywhere that's going to need screws and drew a line about two inches in from the perimeter and the rest I'm going to cut out with my jigsaw [Music] thank you [Music] [Applause] [Music] then I measured out the cut lines for the doors in this version I made a little bit longer than the other one and I'm going to have two compartment doors that are completely separate from the main cabin all right to cut out all three doors I had to use a multi-tool to make a cut start point for the my jigsaw because I'm going to use the wood panel on the inside of the cut as the actual door itself so I don't want to drill into it [Music] [Music] and after a good sand around all the edges one side panel is ready for some foam [Music] and for the other panel the only opening I'm going to have is this pretty large window so I basically placed it where I wanted and then cut out as much as possible of the remaining plywood and to cut the rough opening for the window I had the window laying face down where I was going to place it and then I used a combination Square to measure out how far I'm gonna have to set back this cut line then I found this little piece of something that was about the right width I needed so I used it to draw a line inside of the trace line of the window [Music] five pounds Maybe next I had to cut some half inch rigid foam insulation to fit the shape of the plywood I cut out so I just traced the shape onto a sheet of foam and cut it out with a box cutter [Music] now I'm gonna have to glue this foam and wood together so I ran a quick test with three popular adhesives to see which one I want to use I just glued a chunk of foam onto a scrap piece of wood and then broke it off to see how well of a bond it formed and with these results I'm going to use a combination of the foam Fusion and the pl adhesive [Music] so I glued up the back side of my plywood panel and pressed it onto two pieces of half inch foam [Music] then using just the foam Fusion I glued in the foam inserts foreign [Music] a day later I'm ready to cut out the wall panels so using a flush trim bit on my router I can easily cut the foam to the exact shape of the plywood beneath it foreign [Music] so the foam side of this panel is actually going to be the interior of the wall so before I assemble everything I'm going to fiberglass it right now and get it painted so it's not a pain in the insulator so I mudded the seam with some normal drywall compound and sanded that off once it was dry [Music] and then I used some painters tape to tape around every Edge so I decided to use real fiberglass in this video instead of the Poor Man's fiberglass I used last time mainly because I like to try new stuff and also because this camper is going to have a lot more foam structure and the real fiberglass should be a lot more rigid than the poor man's fiberglass so this is the first time I'm ever doing fiberglass and I really have no idea what I'm doing here so I laid out the fiberglass sheet and cut it to the rough size then I mixed up some two-part epoxy resin [Music] then my plan was to pour the epoxy resin on top of the sheet thinking it would soak through but I found out I had to roll on epoxy onto the foam first and then lay out the fiberglass and then I could pull out most of the wrinkles with my hands [Music] then I'd add a little more epoxy on top and use a Bondo trowel to spread it around and get out all the wrinkles [Music] [Applause] and once I had everything wet out nicely I would use the trowel to scrape off any of the excess epoxy onto the unused fiberglass this was my last step after I made sure all the bubbles and wrinkles were worked out of the fiberglass fabric after about four hours the epoxy has cured a bit but it's still a little bit tacky and this is the perfect time to cut away the excess so using a box cutter I cut around every Edge as tight as possible you don't want to leave this too long because if it gets fully cured it's going to be really hard to cut off with a knife [Music] the next day the pieces are cured up nicely and I'm taking them outside for a good sanding [Music] you also want to make 100 sure you're wearing a mask when sanding fiberglass because you don't want to breathe any of this dusting it's also really itchy so like try to do it outside or wear a sweater or something next I'm prepping these panels for paint so I'm just using some one inch painters tape and taping around the edges where I know I'm gonna have to use some sort of adhesive because I don't want to put that on top of the paint I'd rather attach that directly to the fiberglass foreign on one coat of Bullseye primer [Music] [Music] and starting about an hour later I did three coats of exterior white paint [Music] foreign thing I forgot is to double up the plywood where the door latch is going to be so I just have this tiny block of half inch plywood that I'm going to glue in place [Music] now these panels are ready to be walls so I cut the base to size out of a sheet of half inch plywood then screw the walls into place [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] next I rip some two and a half inch wide strips of plywood and measured out the width between the two walls I needed 11 of these all cut to the same width to be the stringers between the walls used a combination Square set to one inch to draw a line one inch in from the perimeter of the wall [Music] then I lined up the outside edge of the Stringer with the line we just drew and screwed it in place [Music] foreign to come back once all four screws were in and take out one screw at a time to recess the hole down a little bit so the screw heads weren't popping out over the top of the plywood stringers on roughly 16 inch centers around the whole cabin [Music] foreign I was kind of torn because I wanted to make this camper as light as possible but I also wanted to make it a lot cooler than the last version and by Cooler I mean having some shelving and like a pull out bar top the design I was thinking of was probably going to cost me an extra 30 pounds but ultimately I decided to say it because it was going to be way better and it's being pulled by an e-bike anyway [Music] [Music] thank you foreign [Music] separate from the storage compartments but also accessible so I came up with this little sliding door system [Music] so I cut out a couple strips of quarter inch plywood at one inch and one and a half inch widths [Music] then I cut out some doors out of quarter inch plywood and used a forstner bit to drill some finger holes [Music] [Applause] [Music] so these doors can slide along the little rail system I built and allow me to access the compartment behind it which is perfect because behind this I'm going to make a slide out countertop that's going to have the power bank on it and then I don't have to bring the power bank and wiring into the main cabin foreign [Music] the next day I started making the door stops for all three doors foreign plywood I traced on the shape of the door and then measured in some inside and outside offsets [Music] before cutting it out and sanding it down [Music] [Music] foreign epoxy to attach it [Music] [Music] now to make that slide out countertop I was talking about I have some 28 inch drawer slides and I'm basically going to attach a drawer the same as I would in a kitchen cabinet now these slides are pretty heavy and they're counted in that extra 30 pounds I was talking about earlier [Music] so I mounted in two boards to attach the slides to and then screwed in the slides with some half inch screws I made sure the spacing on these was the exact same on both sides [Music] then I made up my shelf I used some two inch plywood walls and made the width the exact width between the two slides for the length I made it about one inch shorter than the overall width of the interior of the cabin [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] ERS can support like over 50 pounds so it should be fine for whatever I'm using it for [Music] then I added in the rest of the stringers and it's ready for a roof [Music] for the roof I'm just using some one-inch foam board so I cut two sheets down to the same width as the stringers [Music] and on the first sheet I measured out ticks every two inches [Music] and then use the Kreg track jig to cut lines about two-thirds of the way through the thickness of the foam this is going to allow the foam to bend a lot easier around the shape of the teardrop [Music] I then had to notch out a little wire Gap that's going to run the USB cable for the cabin light [Music] so I'm using PL adhesive to mount this foam roof in place I started working my way up from the bottom with three inch screws and basically clamping it into place every few inches to get the bend perfect [Music] these screws are just temporary and I'll take them out tomorrow once the adhesive is dried and before I get too far towards the back I have to run that USB cable for the light through that slot [Music] and then finish up installing the sheet for the second roof panel I cut the slots every three-quarter inch for the hard Bend at the back of the trailer and then after that every three inches until it met up with the first panel [Music] foreign and with the roof panels in place I can use some expanding foam to fill in any remaining gaps [Music] now to cover up the pink foam inside the cabin I'm using this wood veneer this is real maple and it's 1 32nd of an inch thick meaning it weighs almost nothing so after doing some measuring I cut it to the shape that I needed and then since it was curving the wrong way I had to use a steamer to pull out that natural curve and wrap it around the other way then I applied a generous amount of PL adhesive and stuck it in place between the stringers [Music] foreign [Music] now I'm ready to cut off all that excess foam and take out all the clamp screws before sanding down the body [Music] one of the worst parts of working with this half inch foam as you can see here is it's actually slightly over half an inch so I'm gonna have to sand this all down to match the width of the plywood [Music] the more time you spend sanding and getting everything nice and uniform the better the final product is going to look so take your time and it will take forever [Music] but with everything all sanded up I can now take some drywall compound and go along and fill in all the edges and any screw holes and any imperfections [Music] foreign [Music] all that out as well [Music] now it's time to start fiberglass in the outside starting with the bottom and I'm doing this in the exact same method as I did the interior wall panels so I'm not going to explain a ton about fiberglass in this [Music] like before I first laid down some epoxy [Music] and then put on some fiberglass shading and some more epoxy on top the first day I got the bottom and the door jambs done [Music] thank you [Music] notice the painters tape around all the edges this is so when I'm squeezing out all the extra epoxy from underneath the fiberglass sheet the drips will run off onto this painters tape and then I can take it off while I'm cutting off the excess fabric a few hours later and I don't have to sand off all these drips [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] once I had all four sides fiberglassed I took a little extra epoxy and just brushed it along all the seams to join the layers together I know this could definitely use another layer of epoxy but I'm going to leave it as is because it's going to be getting four or five layers of outdoor paint still and that should be sufficient to weatherproof it just fine now to those door panels I cut out a while ago foreign first I sanded the edges on all three doors nice and clean I also made sure to take off a little bit more material with the sander so that there's a bit more of an air gap between the frame and the door rather than just the width of one jigsaw blade [Music] for the main door I got another sheet a half inch plywood and traced on the door outline and then I drew a line about two inches inside of this line to be a cut line to get rid of as much wood as possible again I also left a little excess material around where the latch is going to be and the rest I'm going to fill up with foam getting rid of this chunk of plywood will save me about six pounds [Music] [Applause] [Music] in the other panel I also cut a hole to size this window in the exact same way I measured out to cut the other window [Music] then I glued the two panels together and clamped it down with some heavy stuff [Music] for the smaller doors I just glued on an extra width of solid plywood because the weight savings I was going to gain wasn't worth the extra fiberglass work in time it was going to take foreign and a few hours later I could use the foam Fusion to glue in the foam panel into the main door [Music] then the next day I could use the trim router to erode the second panel to the exact shape of the first panel [Music] and like with the body I to sand the foam down in the door to the proper thickness foreign [Music] [Applause] mud in the gaps then I fiberglass the outer side of the doors in the exact same way as the body I didn't do the edges of the door because I sanded this down pretty good and the layers of paint should protect this just fine [Music] now after one more good sanding we're ready to start the painting process [Music] so starting off with our Bullseye primer again [Music] thank you [Music] then I did four coats of white outdoor paint [Music] next I want to mount the doors but first I have to install this RV door latch [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] well I messed up again and I completely forgot that these latches are meant for a minimum of inch and a quarter door thickness this is hanging over so I'm gonna have to add on this little plate of quarter inch plywood [Music] [Applause] when I was painting I also painted the whole inside of the cutout just so that if any water leaks in through the latch it's not just going straight into unprotected wood [Music] foreign [Music] for the slide out door I won't need any hinges so I just used some cabinet screws to screw it directly into the front face of the pillow Shelf [Music] for latches on these two smaller doors I'm using these little key cam locks so I siliconed it in as good as possible then I added on the Locking nut and installed the latch in the right orientation [Music] so with the doors installed I marked out the paint lines and then I'm going to take off two of the doors and paint them separately so I started out with some clean black Edge work foreign and then added in some gray accent color [Music] now we're ready for the final assembly of the cabin so I put the doors back on and this time I silicone the screw holes for the hinges I also added in some foam weatherstripping on the door stops [Music] then I did some interior Finishing Touches then it's on to installing the windows but first i'm gonna have to cut some flanges for the interior of the cabin so I traced out the window and then traced out a line about a half inch wider than the window [Music] then I measured how much frame overhang I'm gonna need and drew a line for that and cut it out [Music] then I applied a strip of butyl tape around the window [Music] and set the window into place I used some two-part epoxy on the back of the window flange and once I had that in place I nailed it into the body [Music] then I pre-drilled some holes into the window frame and use some half inch metal screws to screw the window into place [Music] then apply a bead of silicone around the outside of the window [Music] and the windows are all done now I just have to install the door latch before I move on to welding the aluminum frame I just cut this little plastic cover out of an old tupperware container lid to hide the inside guts of this latch foreign [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign so before I get to welding the frame I need to know what I'm going to be Towing this camper with [Music] after I made my first camper the ebike company add motor reached out and wonder if they could send me a free e-bike I said I'm not really looking to do any sponsored content but they said just take a bike and use it however you want and give your honest thoughts on it [Music] foreign thoughts this thing is sweet and I'm never using a normal bike again much like ripping around on a motorcycle but back to that frame build so since I'm trying to save weight on this one I decided to use aluminum even though that meant I had to buy a whole bunch of new aluminum tools for the aluminum itself I'm using some one inch square by 1 8 inch thickness and one of the biggest benefits to aluminum is you can just cut it with a normal miter saw as long as you take your time now I've never really worked with aluminum before nor am I great at welding it I found out but some of the basics are aluminum needs to be really clean to weld which means rubbing it down with a stainless steel brush and wiping it off with some acetone and that means every single side of every single joint [Music] [Music] now I practice welding some aluminum for a full day before shooting this and still the first couple welds were pretty rough but I figured it out over time and at the end I grinded off whatever I needed to and re-welded it a little stronger [Music] [Music] thank you [Music] after you're welding a good portion of the frame together I decided to lay it out and measure out the tongue length just to make sure that everything's on track and to angle the tongue in towards the mount on the bike guys slotted out a 45 degree slot and then bent that over and welded it solid foreign [Music] extra length on the tongue that's because I'm going to cut it to the exact size I need later for the trailer wheels I wanted to use some wide four inch tires to match the look of the bike and the cheapest ones I could find was on a brand new bike so you know that makes perfect sense I made the axle blocks out of some quarter inch by three inch flat bar and drilled in an axle-sized hole and welded it onto the frame [Music] to get the width of the outer arm I had to get a rough measurement on the width of the axle I also cut these about an inch longer than needed so that I could clamp it onto the frame and install the wheel and get an exact measurement of how far to cut them down instead of making them too short and having to rebuild the whole thing thank you [Music] so now I can measure the Gap I have on the axle and then unclamp it and take it to the miter saw and cut it to size oh foreign [Music] the Wheel by measuring the Gap from the frame to the rim on both sides giving a slight tap to make any corrections [Music] and then these arms are ready to weld on now starting on the four corner Jack system I first cut these one inch lengths of the one inch tubing [Music] and then I drilled a clear through pinhole and weld them onto the four corners of the frame [Music] then I took some three-quarter inch aluminum tubing and cut them down into four 20 inch pieces [Music] then I marked pinholes every inch [Music] drilled them out with a pilot bit before bowing them out to the size of the pins I'm using foreign [Music] then I just welded on these quarter inch flat bar feet [Music] now the frame is pretty much done but in my typical fashion I have to go back and grind off all my welds and hide the evidence I also used some sanding pads to give it a good polish because I'm not going to paint this I'm just going to use the natural look of the aluminum [Music] now I've got to make the hitch that can mount onto the bike so I took this kit bike hitch off Amazon and sanded off to paint and I'm going to mount it into these two little threaded holes on the back arm of the e-bike with a piece of quarter inch flat bar Steel so I cut that shape with an angle grinder and a cut off wheel [Music] then I marked out the drill points and drilled them through [Music] and then welded the hitch onto the flat bar and gave it a good grinding and sanding [Music] then I attached it onto the bike with some M5 bolts I'm also going to prime it and paint it black but this is just a dry fit to make sure everything's working foreign [Music] portion of the hitch and kind of guessed where I needed to make my cuts and drill points [Music] then I had to hand file out the aluminum for about a half hour just to get this spring to be able to slide inside of it [Music] and even with all that filing I couldn't get it far enough so I just drilled a second hold and mounted it there [Music] foreign ly the last piece of the puzzle is complete and I'm ready to mount the camper on it [Music] so I'm going to install some quarter inch leg bolts at eight points through the frame so first I drilled into the body and applied a little silicone Over the Hole then I went ahead and started bolting the body to the frame [Music] [Music] then I installed my four-point stabilizers with some Lock Pins foreign [Music] for some final touches and loading it up [Music] so it's the last thing I'm going to install some solar power so I have this cheap 100 watt flexible solar panel I got off of Amazon and I just used some silicone to stick it onto the top of the camper but the solar itself is not much good without something to charge this is the blue Eddie eb3a and it's a portable lithium-ion power bank that I can plug a solar panel directly into to give me basically infinite power it's got all the hookups I need including USB and AC power so it should be perfect in this camper to charge whatever I need full disclosure blue Eddie did send me this for free but I said I'm going to give my honest review of it and my review is that it's a great device for a build like this where you're going to have solar and you need small amounts of power to charge devices on the go to hook up the solar I just had to use the provided solar panel charging cable and I ran the panel wires in through the roof of the camper and plug straight into the power bank [Music] and one last touch is this kerosene camping Grille that I'm going to use to cook some snacks on the road [Music] and finally after about 250 hours of working time this camper is ready for its maiden voyage foreign [Music] one of my favorite things about this e-bike is the banana seat and the flip down pegs which makes it perfect for my girlfriend that doesn't exist but you know what they always say women are attracted to success so I decided to go out and use my YouTube Fame to get my very own girlfriend foreign don't mind the look on her face she's just really excited and can't believe she's here on my 83 male viewed Channel [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] foreign [Music] so I had a goal to make this camper about a hundred pounds and the total dry weight of this camper not including anything removable like the power bank came in at about 135 pounds which really makes me question what my other camper must actually weigh with this e-bike I got a range of about 40 kilometers but the four sets of four inch tires are definitely taking enough off of this range if you want to build this for practical long distance use I definitely recommend using normal width tires as for Budget I spent about three thousand dollars in materials and about 250 hours of working time on this camper so now the question on your mind is probably what am I going to do with two bike campers well that's a tough one I really really wanted to give this away to somebody that comments on the video and I actually already had this ending already edited and ready to send out with everything you needed to know to enter but apparently there's a ton of guidelines that YouTube puts on giveaways and even just the government themselves and a big desirable item like this is definitely going to raise some red flags that I'm not legally prepared for so ideally I would love to give this away to one of my subscribers and I might still do that some other options are I might auction this off on eBay or I might donate it to someone in need like a homeless person I'd love to hear your thoughts on this in the comments below and while you're at it drop me a build idea for something you'd love to see in a future video also if you're interested in building this camper pick up my plans on Etsy for 10 bucks and make your life a million times easier having the exact dimensions and cheat sheets I use foreign [Music] thanks so much for watching my video and if you're new here and you like this kind of content hit the Subscribe button and see what I get up to next and a Hint it involves three 75-inch flat screen TVs [Music] [Music]

Channel: Drew Builds Stuff

Views: 4,581,719

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Id: EbBVnuXvfNQ

Length: 50min 53sec (3053 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 22 2022