My mind wanders its own random paths, but my wife needed emergency surgery yesterday, so I have been with her as much as possible, and I have never been able to focus on important things if another important thing needs to be done first.
Grad school finals, finding a new house, cleaning and clearing out Mom's house so I can sell it, etc.
We just got a contract on a house near my wife's work yesterday and I passed my first year, but I can't focus on anything important besides my wife getting better.
She will be fine, but while she is in the hospital, I can't focus on moving, Mom's house, etc.
Since I have almost exclusively needed to pack Mom's horde by myself and I was always unreasonably optimistic about what I could pack and load in a weekend, I have spent enough on rentals to buy an old truck, van, box truck, etc., and when I mentioned this to my wife, she asked if we could convert it into a camper afterward.
YouTube keeps recommending people building campers, camping trailers, etc, and I love watching people build things.
I just skimmed the 240 posts here (
Class a motorhomes aerodynamics) and happened to find more salient information from this gentleman who doesn't capitalize his name:
than this one.
I want to deep-dive into the different types of trailers and the pros and cons of each when I have the chance (and a mouse), but let me just share some things that stood out:
Quote:
Originally Posted by freebeard
Downforce burns fuel. Lift also burns fuel.
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I don't know that we need to worry about downforce or lift with trailers, but if I were to build one, I would want to make one like this, which took too long just to stitch together:
I have seen people make "Teardrop" trailers, but we established 10-15 years ago that most people don't have any idea what is aerodynamic (hence freebeard's quote), but let's say that I take two 2" foam boards, cut them to that shape, screw dozens of 2x2s between them, and fold layers of thin foamboard, glued together, around them until I have a 2" thick aerodynamic foam shape--as long as I only think in two dimensions.
Would focusing on the sides with a flat top and bottom be more effective?
This would undoubtedly be better and easier to fabricate than anything else:
YouTube randomly suggested the second video and I keep meaning to see if we dissected it, but while it looked much better than the first one, he received much worse results:
Quote:
Originally Posted by aerohead
You'd be going down the same road as with the 'THINK FLIGHT' Subaru Imprezza experiment. He got the Subie from Cd 0.29, down below Cd 0.18.
Side gust sensitivity would be an unknown quantity, so you'd want to start out with conservative driving speeds until your confidence builds up.
Modern accelerometer sensor technology, software, and actuators would be capable of deploying aerodynamic countermeasures nearly instantly, to compensate for yaw-moments; however, that's beyond my expertise.
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I have read many pros and cons of different types of trailers, campers, etc., and the thing is, it always depends.
"This is better than that"--it depends!
There is a post on Imgur asking why pop-up trailers exist and Internet strangers were not kind, but this one of indeterminate weight is going for $25,000:
Ranger 12 Sofa Bed For Sale
Do you have any idea what kind of tent you can buy for $25,000?!
I don't!
Alaska Structure Air Force Shelter (Version 2) complete with framed floor system, hard door, original harding box, and liner for $10,860.
That is 20' W x 32.5' L x 10' H at peak and can be erected in less than 30 minutes with the help of 4 adults, so definitely more difficult than a pop-up camper, but this has more square footage than a pickup and pop-up trailer would need!
I like different ideas, but most of the time, I think that a good tent and camping gear, which would fit in my trunk, are better than a camping trailer.
I really like bathrooms, though, and if it happens to be cold, I would vastly prefer somewhere insulated to go to the bathroom, change, shower, etc.
I had been wondering about pop-outception, but since I keep thinking that a tent makes more sense than trailers for many situations, I just want an insulated bathroom, I wondered about nested fiberglass and foam boxes that you separate, latch together the other way, and install a solar shower on top.
Or you could just have a 7' foam and fiberglass cargo trailer with a camping toilet.
You remove the toilet, tent, sleeping bags, and everything else that goes in the tent, set up the tent, but the pads, bags, and everything else in the tent, flip the trailer, put the toilet back in, and remove it to change clothes, shower, etc.
Hmm...
He specified corrugated metal, but how about fiberglass and foamboard?
Okay, but for smaller trailers, isn't it more efficient to have a cargo box than a trailer?
Unless you mount this to a truck of van, it would be wider than the vehicle, and I don't think that an aerodynamic base would make a very good base at all.
Can you make sense of my even-more-distracted ramblings?!
I will try to edit this later, I just wanted to put this together, but I was supposed to leave to help Mom and my brother an hour ago.
How did it take an hour to put together this mess?!
My browser is being slow...