hi everyone before we get started into today's video
i wanted to thank everyone for watching these camper build series videos
i'm really excited to build another camper and to share the process with all of you
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premieres will happen so you can watch along with me thanks for being here enjoy the video
all right today we are going to be building the base for our new camper i'm going to show you
kind of how it gets put together show you a couple things i'm doing differently and then we'll kind
of dig into it and start building that base okay so the first thing we've got to do is i'm going to
be building up a base on top of the metal trailer frame i'll be using two by fours and what that's
going to do is get the camper base level with the the top of the trailer here so right now i
have these cross members in my trailer that's an inch and a half down below the rim of the trailer
that's because this is a utility trailer it usually has a wood deck on it that is made of
two by sixes so if you know two by fours two by sixes they're actually an inch and a half
thick that's because of all the planing process and all of that so what's going to happen here
is we will be putting three long pieces going from the front the back of the trailer of 2x4 and then
we'll have these cross bars cross members covered also in a 2x4 i was going to make a lap joint
at each of these places so i would like cut out half of the width of both the cross member and the
long support and kind of overlap them there glue them and screw them i realized that was going to
be extremely overkill it was going to add a lot of work so instead i'm just going to be putting
in my long pieces and then i'll be adding in my cross member pieces and i've got these leftover
steel brackets from a different project so i'm going to be using these to kind of reinforce
each of these joints here so that's going to really tighten everything up hold it real tight
not allow it to move at all again this is overkill not really necessary i could just use the frame of
the trailer as my kind of base there in structural support but i've got them i'm going to use them
and add them on so the first thing we've got to do is cut these long members these long pieces we'll
get them all set on the trailer then we'll start cutting our cross members get them all figured out
and um then we'll be bringing in the wood decking this is going to act as the actual base of the
camper on top of that wood depth decking i'll be putting some insulation as well and a little bit
more support for the flooring so still a lot to do we've got to put these long numbers on cross
members then wood on top from there i'm actually going to be pulling the whole thing off putting a
layer of underlayment or undercoating underneath that a spray-on undercoating so that's just going
to kind of keep out any moisture that happens to come up a lot of people will say you don't
really need to use underlayment because a lot of moisture isn't going to get there it's not like
it's going to be flat on the roof and water is going to sit there and seep in
if any moisture does get in ends up dripping off and drying off fairly easily but i like to
be better safe than sorry so let's go ahead and cut these pieces and start laying them on here
here i'm cutting the long supports to length the front gets wedged under a little lip
on the front of the trailer so they are a little longer than the camper will end up being next i
measure out the middle of the trailer to get the middle support as close to center as possible
and then i measure out the length of each cross member these are all within a quarter of an inch
but i am measuring them to get exactly perfect i will leave a link in the video description for
all the screws wood glue etc that i use for this build some of these are affiliate links
others are not by clicking them you help me continue to make these videos
i then use my leftover metal brackets to screw everything together
this isn't really necessary because once the base is screwed and bolted to the trailer frame
it will be as strong and rigid as you need it to be again i am the king of overkill
once that is done i cut my plywood base to size i'm using three quarter inch plywood
since the trailer is roughly five by eight one single sheet of plywood won't cover the base
so i have to cut two pieces to cover the whole five foot width after laying down my plywood i
measure and mark where all of my two by fours are to make sure that i can actually screw into them
before screwing the plywood down i apply a good bead of construction glue
just to make sure everything holds together real good have i mentioned that i'm overkill
to attach the plywood to the two by fours i'm using inch and 5 8 construction screws
this lets me screw through the plywood and into the 2x4 without
going through the other side of the two by fours
okay now that i have the base built i'm going to take it off of the trailer i haven't screwed it
into the trailer yet i've just kind of screwed all the pieces together so i'm going to pop it
off the trailer lay it up against the wall with some plastic down and i'm going to spray some
underlayment on it i don't really worry too much about moisture getting underneath there
if it does it will dry out pretty easily since water won't be sitting on it it will maybe get
splashed up from the road but i imagine it will dry out pretty easily from what i've read but
just to be on the safe side i'm going to go ahead and cover that with underlayment not underlayment
undercoating which is a lot of times used on vehicles um it's supposed to go on metal i've used
it on wood before and it seems to work just fine so we're gonna do that next and then after we're
done with that we'll put it back on the trailer and i'll bolt it in and we'll be done for the day
here i am using rust-oleum undercoating it is a rubberized coating it would probably be better
to apply a primer first but like i mentioned before i am not super worried about this section
after that i put the base back onto the trailer frame
to attach the camper base to the trailer i'm using two different methods for the first i'll
be using these headlock screws they're supposed to replace lag bolts and they need a special bit
though so be aware of that i will also be putting these bolts through the base and the trailer frame
i start with the headlock screws i'm putting four screws through each of my five metal
cross supports next i drill my holes for the bolts i use a one inch bit to create a countersunk hole
so that the bolt head sits below the top of the base these are 3
8 inch bolts with washers and locking washers
and i will also be applying some dreadlocks to each bolt before tightening them down
to finish up i apply some construction glue to my seam
between the two plywood pieces just for peace of mind
thanks so much for watching part two of our camper trailer build series
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you