Chuck offered many great amenities including a water system that could hook up to city water at a campground or feed off a 20 gallon water tank. The water system included a sink and sprayer. Chuck also had operational power from a 12 volt Deep Cycle Marine battery. This battery powered a series of camp lights, the water pump, an Iceco 12v fridge and more. The battery itself was set up to charge either by a battery charger that connected to shore power at a campground, and also from a device that keeps it topped off when the trailer is plugged into a vehicle.

Chuck was great! But we quickly learned that by having all the available space for camping gear, we would end up bringing WAY too much stuff. We had to simplify. The solution? Chuck 2.0!

To build Chuck 2.0, I completely demoed Chuck down to the frame to offer a fresh start and then began to build it back up. Again, using 2×3 construction and bolting the bottom 2×3 plate to frame for added stability.

I knew I was also going to want to incorporate a “star gazing” window on the front that would allow for more natural light then just the doors and roof vent would provide. This image shows that framed out.

Next, it was time to frame the walls and roof. I had already picked out the doors I would be using, so I knew what my rough opening were. This is a very important step, you really need to know the rough openings for any doors and windows you will be incorporating before you begin framing or you’ll end up having to get creative with adding them in later.

Here is my rough opening for the tear drop style door I will be using. We decided to have a door on each side and I HIGHLY recommend that in your build if two people will be sleeping it. It’s great to each be able to get out without having to crawl over each other.

Once I had my walls framed out, it was time to frame out the back portion. This is also tricky. You have limited space to use, so it’s important to think about what you need and how things should be laid out for maximum efficiency and use.

For our kitchen, I knew I wanted to have a sink (running water off grid is a true luxury!) as well as wire in our 12 volt Iceco fridge. Of course, we would also need some cabinets or shelving to put cookware, utensils, etc., and I also wanted it to be well lit and potentially have a speaker (more on the speaker in a bit).

With the initial framing complete, it was then time to add sheathing. For this, I used 1/2″ exterior grade plywood. I also used clear silicone at all seams as an added level of water protection.

Water is going to be the hardest element to keep out of your DIY overlander trailer build, so you need to take extra care wherever possible to prevent even the slightest bit getting in.

From there, I decided to add some Tyvek for yet another barrier to elements. I am not sure this totally necessary, but since contractors use it when building houses, I figured why not! Once I had it wrapped, I installed the doors and window. These went in relatively easy, since my rough openings were correct. I also used flashing tape around the perimeters and then spray foamed any larger gaps to help keep it as air tight as possible.

One other thing that is truly a MUST! Definitely incorporate a 12 volt fan into your build. This particular model goes both directions offering both intake and outtake which can really cool it down inside when it’s hot or provide exceptional air flow on intake when the doors windows are open. It’s easy to install and worth every cent. Check it out here on Amazon. Also, as I side note, if you are worried about leaving it open on accident, when it rains. They do make models that auto close when they sense water.

For the exterior, I decided to go with T1-11 siding. It’s thin and light weight and came in a finished gray color, which I thought looked pretty good. Again, once I had it fastened, I went through a second time and applied silicone to all the seams and screw heads where I had fastened it. I also adding a TON of silicone around the doors, window, and roof vent.

I knew I wanted to trim all my seams with something, but I just couldn’t figure out a solution. Finally, decided to use 4″ wide waterproof Gorilla tape. Not only did it adhere to the T1-11 well, but it also provides another moisture barrier on all my seams. Also noticeable in this photo are the two exterior camp lights I added. These are switch operated, with each light having it’s own switch built into the light.

Above those are marine speakers. These are wired to a receiver in the back kitchen. I also wired a speaker into the cabin and one in the back kitchen. If you like listening to music, definitely consider this upgrade! Here they are on Amazon.

Moving to the inside. I used 1/2″ foam board insulation between all my studs and on the bottom to provide extra comfort whether it’s hot or cold out. I had a bunch of old pallets lying around and decided to repurpose them as the cabin walls to give Chuck 2.0 a rustic feel on the inside.

For the ceiling I used “Utility” panels that I picked up at Lowes. Finally, I wired in 6 mini 12 volt recessed lights, 3 on one side (as pictured) and 3 on the other. Each side is controlled by it’s own touch switch that can also dim the lights as needed.

The blue circle light illuminates the light switch. These are pretty cool. You simply touch the switch and the lights turn on or off. If you keep your finger on the switch, the lights dim. Plus, they have built in memory, so whatever the dim setting was when you turn them off, will be the setting when you turn them back on. Click here to view them on Amazon.

I also wired in a charging station on each side. The port offer both a USB and lightening port (see on Amazon).

Next, it was time to build out the bed. I found a great company online that will customize a mattress for whatever size you want. So I didn’t have to worry about building the interior to meet a predefined mattress size. As is, it came out to just 2″ shy of a full queen, which is pretty amazing. Also, the way I designed this, and the way teardrop campers are designed, allows for your feet to go under the kitchen cabinet space. I am 6’3″ and when I lay in the cabin, neither my head nor my feet touch the ends. It’s deceptively spacious on the inside.

For the bed frame, I used 1×4″ laid over 2×3″. This provide great air flow and additional sleeping comfort.

Here is pretty much the finished interior. Overall, it came out very well, and is extremely comfortable! There is not too much I would change, but I will address that at the end of this post.

And here is the finished kitchen! I used the same 15×15″ rv sink I had in the original Chuck. Using some left over plywood, I also created a cover for the sink for when it is not in use to provide additional useable counter space.

Like the original Chuck, Chuck 2.0 is set up for both city water (campground hook ups), or off grid. However, this time I left off the water tank. To be honest, it was a total pain to fill and clean. This set up offer a switch operated water pump (hidden by the curtain under the sink) that has a hose attached that can be inserted into any Jerry can or water container. Turn the pump on, and you have running water in the sink and the sprayer located on the exterior side.

The post Chuck 2.0! Our New Overlander Trailer Sleeper Build appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

Since this video, we have also added a 25 gallon fresh water tank and water pump that gives us lots of water when we are off grid camping. Stay tunded to our YouTube channel for the most up to date developments.

The post Walkthough Of Our (Mostly) Completed DIY Overlander Trailer appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

Once we had the plywood in place, using a very short pencil (about an 1″ long), we marked many of the empty holes in the trailer frame on the plywood.  Then removed the ply once again and drilled through holes in the plywood.  Following that, we reinstalled the plywood decking with the new through holes.

From there, we carefully measured each though hole and transferred those measurements to several 2×3’s that we drilled through as well.  This allowed us to lay the 2×3’s around top parameter of the decking and run through bolts through the 2×3’s, plywood and into the existing holes on the trailer frame.  Using washers and lock nuts, we secured the bots.  This created an excellent platform to build from.

Once we had everything in place and bolted down, we started adding our studs (vertical 2×3’s) to create the walls.   We used a 16″ on center layout, which means we positioned all our studs every 16″ so that the center of the 2×3 was in the middle of the line marked out at 16″.  You can really do what you’d like here as long as you don’t get too much distance between your studs and you stay consistent throughout the process.

Before you start this part, be sure and know exactly how tall you want your overlander trailer to be.  We knew we wanted to use full sheets of 4′ x 8′ plywood on the walls so this would mean that we needed to account for the horizontal top 2×3 that would eventually lay along the top of our studs as well as the 1/2″ plywood on top.  This meant that our studs needed to be 44″ in our case.

Note the plywood decking and 2x3s along the parameter.

One more thing to mention, be as thoughtful as possible about how water will penetrate your design.  While we ran our 1/2″ plywood on the sides flush with the top plywood, you might actually want to run your top sheet long to cover the end of the side sheets.  We simply filled all our cracks with silicone to prevent any water from getting in.

At this stage, you want to take care to ensure you keep your new construction square.  This can be done a few different ways including using a level, framers square, and a tape measure.

As we progressed along, we needed to also be sure and frame out both what would be the slide out kitchen as well as the back hatch.

Where our slide out kitchen will be.

Once that was all complete, it was time to start sheathing it with the plywood.  For our walls, we used 1/2″ treated plywood and eventually treaded it with several coats of solid deck stain and sealed all the screw holes and cracks with silicone.

With that complete, it was time to get to work on the back hatch and slide out kitchen, which we will cover in the next post.  Here is a brief YouTube video of our framing process and please give us a like and subscribe

The post Framing Our Trailer appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

Having never installed electric trailer brakes, this was a pretty straight forward and relatively easy process, with the exception of one thing.  When you are installing a brake assembly on the Timbren Axle-less Suspension, you need to be aware that the mounting nuts and lock washers are not provided.  At first, I found this annoying, but after thinking about it I assume Timbren does this because of the varying assembly’s and configurations.

Never the less, you will need to visit your local hardware store and pick up 10 (five for each side) 3/8″ lock washers and 10 3/8″ UNF nuts. If you are not familiar with UNF, it stands for Unified Fine.  That means, the threads on the bolts on the Timbren axle are fine thread and a standard 3/8″ nut is not going to work.

So how do tell the difference?  You need to look for 3/8 – 24.  A common size for instance is 3/8 – 16 or even 3/8 – 20.  Those will not work.  The “- #” is important and references the thread, 24 being a fine thread.

When you mount your electric trailer brake you need to also make sure the magnet (oval shaped apparatus) is at the bottom and that you mount the left and right hand side accordingly – the Dexter 12″ Nev-R-Adjusts were labeled, and I assume most other options are as well.

Once you get the brake on and add the lock washers and 3/8″ UNF nuts, be sure and tighten them down to the specified torque rating.

With the brakes on, it’s time to move to adding the hub/drum assembly.  Having also never done this before, this was slightly more intimating as this process involves packing two bearings with grease.  For this process, you are going to need a few tools:

1. A couple few pairs of latex gloves.
2. Bearing grease.
3. A clean, dry surface to work from.
4. Hammer (rubber mallet, if you have one).
5. Small section of wood (ideally a 2×4 at about 6″ in length)
6. Clean rag
7. Pliers (needlnose works best)
8. Wrench for the castle nut

Now I could go into detail on how I did all of this, but I think it would be far better to just show the videos I watched to learn how to do this.

etrailer | Dexter Electric Trailer Brake Kit Installation

…and this one I highly recommend:

How to Repack Trailer Wheel Bearings [Start to Finish]

So once you get hub properly, you can add your wheels and tires and then adjust your brakes and wire accordingly!

The post Installing Dexter 12″ Nev-R-Adjust Brake, Hubs, and Wheels. appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

First, your axle selection is going to dictate (for the most part) the weight your trailer can carry. For those that are not aware, there are several terms to be aware of and they are as follows:

GVW

Gross Vehicle Weight. This is your vehicle’s standard curb weight, plus an estimate of the typical load of passengers, fuel and stuff.

GVWR

Gross Vehicle Weight Rating. This is the maximum safe weight for your vehicle. Exceeding this weight will place stress on your engine, transmission, and brakes beyond what they are designed for.

Tongue Weight

The amount of weight at the coupler (where the trailer meets the vehicle).

GCW

Gross Combination Weight. This is the combined weight of your vehicle and the trailer (Not the tongue weight, but the total weight.) This number cannot exceed the GCWR.

GCWR

Gross Combination Weight Rating. This is the maximum safe weight of your vehicle and trailer when both are fully loaded with people, fuel, and all your stuff. And like the GVWR above; exceeding this weight will place stress on your engine, transmission, and brakes beyond what they are designed for.

GAW

Gross Axle Weight. This is the amount of weight that carried by each of the vehicle’s axles. They will be different based on engine weight and trailer tongue weight capacity.

GAWR

Gross Axle Weight Rating. This is the maximum safe weight you can place on the front and rear axles. And just like the other two weight ratings above, exceeding these numbers will damage your vehicle and create dangerous driving conditions.

Source: https://www.4wheelparts.com/the-dirt/towing-your-trailer-determining-the-towing-capacity/

All vehicles have a towing capacity as well as tongue weight restriction so will want to find out what yours is before you get too far down the road with your build.

In our case we will be pulling our trailer with either a GMC Canyon pickup or a Subaru Ascent SUV. Believe it or not, the Subaru Ascent can tow 5,000lbs and has a tongue weight max of 500.

The Ironton trailer frame we purchased actually comes with an axle that allows for 1,715lbs, which is decent for a trailer that is not going to have sleeping arrangements or a roof top tent. However, it was still going to be too close and we wanted to create a trailer that was truly off-road capable and a through axle would certainly complicate that without the right lift set up.

Enter the Timbren Axle-less suspension system. These come in a variety of configurations to meet various needs and budget requirements. Though as I right this, we have not actually tested them yet, having installed them I can say with absolute certainty that these things are BURLEY and far more substantial than the axle that came with the trailer kit.

We opted for the Heavy Duty version that provides a load capacity of 3,500lbs, will accommodate larger off road tires, and gives and additional 4″ of lift and we got a great deal on them through etrailer.com.

A few things to note with these:

1. Watch the video on etrailer.com on how to install these and read the instructions provided by Timbren. It’s a very straight forward process, but does require some precision.
2. While some do come assembled, ours did not and required the spindles to be bolted on first (the bolts are provided). This requires a torque wrench which can be purchased at Lowes for about $90 – you will also need it when attaching the axles to the frame.
3. Depending on your trailer build, you may find it much easier to flip the trailer over when installing them. Since our trailer was only in a frame state, it was easy to turn it over. This allows the axles to rest flush against the bottom of the frame vs. having to hold them in place when trying to measure and drill the mounting holes in the frame.
4. While our trailer did have the support crossmembers directly below the axle (as Timbren mentions in the install directions), we decided adding the steel tubing wouldn’t hurt. So after getting the axle system loosely bolted to the frame, we measured the distance required for the tubing and found 5′ would work (seems about right since it’s a 5×8′ trailer). I was able to find a piece of steel at a local weld shop and had them cut it to length for $25 – which was half the price I was able to find online.
5. Once you have everything together and bolted firmly down, you will likely need some help flipping the trailer back over – like I said, these things are BURELY!

Here is a short YouTube video we created of our general process,

Next, we will be moving on to adding the brakes, hubs and wheels…

The post Overlander Trailer Axle: Timbren Axle-Less Suspension appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

There are many different routes you can go. If you are a welder, or know a welder, you could build a frame that way. If you’re like us, and don’t really have access to a welder, buying a trailer frame is the next best solution.

I did a quite a bit of research on this and found that some people build off already assemble frames like those you can get at Lowes or Home Depot, however there seemed to be some concern that those trailer frames need to be beefed up a bit with reinforcement to be able to handle the potential twisting in off road situations.

Through my research, the bolt together frame options from shops like Northern Tool and Harbor Freight seemed to be the best way to go, which is what we decided on.

While this type of frame is well rated, there are a few things to be aware of.

Trailer Size

Really, the first aspect you need to consider is what size trailer you need. If you plan to build an off road trailer that will allow you to sleep in it, depending on your height, you will want to pay attention to the length of the trailer.

A lot of overlander trailers are build on 4′ x 6′ frames. These can be great for minimalists and especially if you plan to have a roof top tent since the tent won’t take up any storage space.

For our needs, we decided on a 5′ x 8′ trailer and so far it looks like it’s going to be the perfect size for our camping needs.

Trailer Load Capacity

The first thing to look for is the trailer load capacity. This is important because it will determine the amount of weight your trailer can carry. However, and this is important, load capacity is strictly a function of the axle strength. It does not mean the frame will break if the weight is exceeded.

What this means is that if you plan to upgrade the axle system like we did, you don’t need to be concerned with the load capacity – that will come later in your axle considerations.

With that said, we probably could have scaled down to a slightly less expensive option – I was actually eyeing a folding trailer from Harbor Freight that I saw some built off of, but they haven’t been able to keep them in stock so I ended up purchasing an Ironton 5ft. x 8ft. Steel Utility Trailer Kit from Northern Tool.

Assembly

If you decide on a bolt together kit like we have, assembly is fairly straight forward but here are a few tips from experience.

1. Be sure and layout all the frame parts ahead of time and position them as if the trailer was assembled. Take EXTRA note of the bolt hole patterns in each part as some parts look very similar but if not assembled exactly as they should be, you will have to undo everything and start over!
2. Make sure you have all the parts. Our kit did not come with washers, so a quick trip to Lowes was required.
3. Make sure you have all the right tools. We needed a socket, an adjustable wrench, and a speed square.
4. Use your speed square (carpenters square) to ensure the frame is completely square.
5. I repeat, use your speed square (carpenters square) to ensure the frame is completely square!
6. Don’t tighten everything down until the very end.

The post The Frame: Ironton 5ft. x 8ft. Steel Utility Trailer Kit appeared first on Overlander Trailer.

There are several types of overlander trailers out there and they range wildly in price (which is why I am choosing to build ours). Some are the more traditional teardrop campers that provide room to sleep in. Others are gear storage with the addition of a roof top tent to provide off the ground sleeping accomodations.

Most overland trailers have their own electrical systems that operate off at least one 12 volt battery. This is sort of the brains of the operation and provides power to whatever other accessories the trailer might contain (ie. water pump, lights, etc.). Most trailers are equipped with multiple ways of charging the battery system which allows for off grid adventures. For instance, the addition of solar panels can be used to maintain a charge when boondocking (a fancy word for being somewhere without power). Generally, overland trailers will contain a few different charging mechanisms to ensure the battery system stays topped off wherever the adventure leads and we’ll cover this in more detail when get into our own system.

Other amenities you might find are slide out camp kitchens that provide access to cold goods in a cooler of fridge, a sink set up and even a cooking and prep area. Roof racks are common as well for carrying extra adventure gear like bikes and kayaks.

If you are in the market for an overlander trailer, my best advice is to really look thoroughly at all the options and if decide to buy one, make sure it has everything you need and want as it’s quite an investment. On the other hand, if you choose to build your own, I hope this site can help guide you through the process…

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