2013 CarMate 100% Solar Heated and Cooled Over The Top Cargo Trailer

Friday, March 29, 2013

Picked up trailer heading home north route 2

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

On the way to pick up Version 2.0

Here are some shots into the trip, most others are on my camera, these are from my iPhone

Just entered colorado 1,031 miles since the trip started , 28 hours into the trip.

Thursday, March 14, 2013

More pictures of OverTheTopCargoTrailer 2.0

Here are a few more pics, as you can see the interior walls are wood "for better insulation" and alum roof "less rusting" during cold weather.

OverTheTopCargoTrailer 2.0 is born TODAY

OTTCT is proud to announce the birth of their
newest family members early arrival in the fresh PA snow

OTTCT 2.0

March 14 2013

Weight around 2400 lbs

Sunday, March 3, 2013

Getting closer , 22 days till 2.0 is complete

Well there is not much to report while i'm waiting for the time to come.

Below is a picture for the 4 metal panel covers that I had made. These will be used to cover the side wall 4 x 210 watt solar panels - to keep up the stealth mode. The reason they are pink, is because the metal comes with a pink film to protect the exterior. You can see the interior is white.

I was thinking they would be great while driving down the road or at night, attracting less attention. Time will tell if it's worth the effort!

Cost of each cover was about $125 each. They are 59" x 39" x 1.75" approx.

There is a pink film covering the metal

The color is white

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

The new trailer Version 2.0 is coming

Ok guys it's official

The order is now being processed , OTTCT 2.0 is being Factory built ready for PU in April.
This will be a supper insulated 7x18 - with 3 layers of insulation, nice solid R12+ 100% coverage.
2000 watts MONSTER 9 panels of SOLAR. & 180,000 btu water heater & solar AC & 800 amp hour batteries.
80-100 gallon of fresh water.
Screwless exterior in white of course.
Tandem torflex 3,500 lbs dexter axels @ ZERO deg & never adjust elec brakes.
This trailer has wood walls - as metal radiates too much heat & wood insulates better.
Also the roof Chanel is alum - less or no rust problems.
Starting weight about 2400 lbs.

Not sure when I will start the build , but it will get done fast as I will be using most parts from OTTCT

Stay tuned

I will be starting with a nice 5,500 mile tround trip for the PU.

Trailer will be in white , NOT RED

Friday, January 18, 2013

Update to the Smurf's

Well I am slowly getting done installing my second layer of foam insulation. Last night I had my very first mini test run with the new layer of foam board. It dropped down to freezing 30° and the inside temperature with only the TV and my body heat was 52° this morning. With 2 people the temp would have been 57+ deg F. I am now even more convinced that with approximately 2 inches of foam board insulation R-10 inside the plywood, one would be able to keep warm down to 10 deg without any great effort or heating required. Its not to bad to live with 50+ deg , its not that hard to get used to, at least for me. Currently I only have R4 with 3/4" of blue foam board onside of the plywood. There is a layer of foam between the metal siding & the interior plywood.

The same effect would also work for AC in the summer time as the foam board would keep the heat out & allow quite a large trailer to be cooled to 70 deg with only a 5,000 Btu AC running part time. I would estimate that 2,500 - 3,000 Btu would be adequate for cooling.

As I get a chance I will also try to post some more pictures in the next day or so.

Soon the new trailer is coming , details to follow. Thank You - to all the people at Carmate Trailers.

Thursday, January 3, 2013

The Smurf's are coming :-))

Here we go , I have decided to remove all the cabinets and install a 2nd layer of insulation on the floor, walls & ceiling. The first is just not working to my satisfaction because the metal ribs under the plywood transfer to much heat or cold. IMHO the foam inside the walls is not worth bubkus !

With the old insulation I was picking up approx 10 deg over the exterior temperature. With this new lawyer I'm hopeful that I will be able to pick up 25-30 deg. My design goal is to be able to camp out in 25 deg F and be able to maintain 50 deg F inside without any additional heating other then ambient heat from my body, tv, fridge & inverter.

Currently also the 5,000 Btu ac is barely keeping up with the cooling load in full sun at 95 deg exterior temp, this upgrade should also have the same effect as upgrading to 8,000 Btu estimated, but for the exact same power of 500 watts.

In the next few days I will test the insulation and will see how it goes, I still have a small section of about 20-30 sq ft to install, hopefully tomorrow.

The foam board is from Dow Corning and has a R4 value for 3/4" thickness.

Cost is around $15 per 4 x 8' sheet.

Worst case I will have to install another layer -

but I may wait to do that in my next trailer.

Stay tuned !!

Here is the wide open corner post with a hugh air gap

I installed a 2 x 3" and will install the foam around it,

problem solved

Just a few more small strips to go

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Sun Touch heating mat

Here is my newest idea & my test of the product so far. Below is the Sun Touch tile floor heating mat approx. 6 ft x 30 inches. The specs for this size say it will use about 180 watts, put out about 540 btu, well I measured about 162 watts maybe or 1.35 amps. Just like everything else, you only seam to get about 90% of what you pay for.

My Idea was to install this under my mattress and it would be a nice slow heating system where none of the heat would get lost. Just to make sure it works - I wired the mat directly into a plug & plugged it into the wall outlet or extension cord. Since I have misplaced the stupid $150 thermostat I decided to just install this on a regular switch or a timer with 30, 60 or 240 minutes, works just as well and is much cheaper.

On my first try I put the mat over a tarp which was laying on carpet and put my sleeping mat on top, after 15 minutes it was barely warm - so the heat was going in all directions. Maybe it was 80-90 degrees if I was lucky. On my second try I put a 1/2" foam board under the mat and this time I could feel the heat was coming all straight up at me, when I inserted my hand I would guess it was about 120+ deg right where the foam was. I would guess that if you want your tile floor hot in the morning you had better get up about 1 hour early, this thing does not work fast.

My idea when installing this mat under my bed is to cut a 1/2" plywood board 30" x 72" and install the mat under some tiles on this board. Then it will then be laid over 1/2 - 3/4" foam board & the mattress will be put on top of the tiles, this way the heating unit can be removed in the summer time when not needed and save maybe 80 lbs in weight.

Testing the mat with a regular plug.

Ops wrong spec sheet, for this mat it says 180 watts

but only uses 165 when tested.

When laid over a foam board the mat got quite hot.

Follow up electric heating is working great.....

I roller out the 30" x 60" tile floor wire heating matt directly under the mattress onto the plywood and it does take
about 1.5 to 2 hours - but then the temp got up to 112 deg

at a nice steady 160 watts
with a 12" mattress it keeps it just perfect.

I will next try put the whole thing on a dimmer switch & see if I can find the magic 85- 90 deg set point.
that is much cheaper then the $130 fancy controller. I just put the outdoor remote probe under the mattress - cost $25 for both
Why heat the whole trailer when you can just heat your sleeping compartment ?

Tonight I will try my experiment with the hot water heating hopefully & report back results.

:beer:

Thursday, December 27, 2012

The Dehumidifier trailer test

I purchased this small 25 pint unit at Home Depot for around $158. It's pulling about 8 ounces of water from the air per hour of run time. Set on low fan speed the unit runs very quiet and one can still watch the TV in the background. The unit uses about 400 watts per hour. Adding the TV and cooler I am using about 500 watts per hour and the 500 watts = about 1,500 Btu which heats the trailer very nicely to about 20 deg above the exterior temperature.

I would strongly recommend this unit, or a larger unit to anybody living inside a RV during the winter months where the humidity is above 45% as the high moisture is causing lots of hidden problems to your unit.

Cost from Home Depot $158

Controls for the unit.

Measuring the power used

Starting interior temp was 55.7 degrees

Monday, December 10, 2012

My New Lark Trailer Design - first try with Sketchup

Here we go, this is my first try with what I would like inside the new solar concept trailer, as I get better using the program I will post updated changes. Today Dec 10, 2012 I mailed the letter to the Lark Factory to see if they can build to this design, with all my future diagrams the design seams pretty easy to understand exactly what I am looking for. The nice part is, if the Lark Factory downloads the free program I can e Mail them my design directly & they can spin the model around in 360 deg view , making it super easy to understand exactly what my design is. If only all customers are this easy to deal with in what they are looking for.

For those of you who would also like to play with the program here are the links: click below

http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/download/gsu.html

Get the free version ONLY !!! and Install the Mac version

Here you can watch video's how to use program : Click below

http://www.sketchup.com/intl/en/training/videos/new_to_gsu.html

Click on the picture to get a larger view

Here is the view of the rear cargo door

Nice looking rear gate I liked ,

diamond plate, 7 LED lights & chrome sides and top

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Almost completed trailer update

Slowly I am coming the end of first phase of my construction, a few small minor touches are still needed. Soon I may be hitting the road for the coming adventure. The first stop will be Santa Cruz along the ocean.

I have also decided to see If I can get the Lark Factory in Georgia to build a newer bigger, better stronger unit for the upcoming part 2. The letter to the factory has been sent and I am waiting for a response from them, hopefully they will be on board with the next adventure.

Here is a recap of some of the current features to date. Remember this is my very first attempt at building a cargo trailer, almost everything I did I have never ever done before and extensive research & steep learning curve was required to complete this project.

If your interested in something like this project, materials like these are approx. $30k including the trailer , the labor involved is over 500 hours - not including the research of another 500- 1000 hours to find the stuff. If you would like to get your own custom built trailer let me know, maybe we can work out something. You may want to compare this to a tiny house at the tinyhouseblog.com , most of their units which are the same size are going for over $50k but do not include a off grid 840 watt solar system - their units are more designed to be connected to water & sewer utilities on a property, where this unit is designed to be closer to 100% self contained. One single person could be out in this trailer for 20-30 days , the limiting factor being food and water carried on board. This would also be the perfect BOV ...Bug Out Vehicle if one would so desire.