This is a nice breakdown and comparison of two methods of constructing a camper shell, one example quite poor and one much better. I'm an architect and builder and really appreciate you using structural concepts in your comparisons (shear, moment arms, dymanic loading, adhesives, etc.). I prefer rigid foam as an insulator as opposed to fluffy varieties (fiberglass, cellulose, mineral wool, etc.). There are three major types of rigid foam, with polyisocyanurate and extruded polystyrene (XPS) giving much better performance than expanded polystyrene (EPS) aka "styrofoam". Polyiso tends to perform worse in cold climates and requires an aging de-rating factor, so I prefer to spec XPS for cold applications. At a glance, I believe I see a mix of EPS and polyiso in your builds, but I could be wrong. There is always a trade-off in wall thickness/R-value to interior volume. Three and four season models will do better with thicker walls and especially double-paned windows. Zero windows would obviously be best from a thermal perspective, but who wants to camp in a cave?! In residential construction, we are seeing and specifying lots of engineered wood products that are taking over joists, beams, and sometimes even studs and columns for their extra strength and stability over dimensional lumber. I hope it engineered wood makes it way into the RV industry soon. We all know that metals are superior to wood in almost every metric (with the exception of thermal), but material and fabrications with them cost more, as well as its dead weight are crucial trade-offs. It's perfectly acceptable to build a high-functioning structural shell out of wood. Haters gonna hate, though. Hat's off to a well-informed video and I wish you well taking on the "big boys" in the RV construction world where cutting corners and shoddy techniques rule the day. I'll subsscribe and keep an eye out for new uploads.
Excellent comment. You put the truth of a complex and hot topic in a gentle, intelligent, and open way. Very nice. I could not agree with you more across the board there. The powers that be have put such a harsh smear on wood that the general market has a poor taste in their mouths for it, but it remains one of the most superior materials out there. I'm very open to new techs but I'm not going to up and shift with the wind, especially after the real success we have had with wood construction. I'm saying that as one who also builds with aluminum. If we can show folks on this channel how to approach the various materials and muild methods with an open and eager mind, I will be extatic. One size does not fit all. Great comment. Thank you!
Awesome videos. I've been looking at building my own for a while now and this information is invaluable. One question though, I notice on the campers right side, your window looks a couple inches lower, resulting in the cantilever being cut in half. Why take this step when the left side appears to be much more sturdier? Thx again!
@christophergracey absolutely great question. I'll cover this in one of the videos for that build. There is a cantilever there that is super strong. It is just the secondary method. The main answer is design constraints on why we toggled to the secondary.
Myself during covid I was bored so I built an 18' long travel trailer using 1" by 1.5" studs, 1/8" luan inside and outside of the walls and ceiling with 1"styofoam glued in everywhere. Outside skin is all Fylon fibreglass glued on and extra glue (the glue I use is actually a tybe of caulking) at all the seams as well as some seam tape on all the corners. The front, roof and back is made out of one piece of Fylon. No leaks or problems with 30,000 KM so far. Got me hooked on building RV's as a hobby. But I do not use wood anymore, I have now made 3 Teardrops and a small truck camper out of Fylon/styrofoam/Fylon sandwich construction. I make the material myself. Wood will be around a long time but the composite revolution is coming. Watching RUclipss out of australia and they are saying the whole industry there is going composite. No wood, no aluminum or steel anywhere except the chassis.
@steveogilvie5203 composite panels can be good. There are a fraction of companies out there doing that properly as well. I'm looking forward to sharing sound design and production methodology as we go forward here. Wood framing has a ton of pros to it if you have the skill and ability to execute properly. That is why, as a company, we will stay direct to consumers. That way, we do not have the crushing need to drive the cost of production down to the point of low quality so that distributors can get their cut. That means we will stay small as a company and less people will get our product, but those who do will always benefit from the high quality. That said, we will always look to new technologies to improve our product. So, as composite improves, if it can prove better than wood, it will always remain an option. So far, for our climate, it has not proven itself.
@@cachecamper The cold weather is where a composite does its best. I go winter camping whenever I can. But to be a composite manufacturer takes a lot of money for CNC and composite panel manufacturing. I do it all by hand with some wooden forming moulds I built to make the shape of the teardrops. The walls are glued in to the main body in a pocket on both sides. It becomes a one piece cabin. I am a very experienced wood worker. I use wood to make my teardrops and then the form is removed to be used again on the next build.
@steveogilvie5203 jigs are everything. Especially in production and to reduce time. Best on paper. That is what describes composite panels in the cold. There are many other factors above and beyond insulation value that come with the reality of a cold climate. Condensation is the single largest issue. It is multiplied significantly with composite material. This is going to be a future video. No way to explain it all here.
The single biggest problem with all campers is leaks. especially leaks at the roof/wall intersection. If a camper is made at LEAST with a 1 piece roof that wraps over the top of the wall it it massively better. Second these things rely on every part for structural strength, a huge part of that is the skin itself. In short stop all leaks before they happen and it will likely last longer than you will.
In my opinion, no. The cost of that repair was more than 22k but the customer asked us to stop at 16k. Everybody has their own view of what is a valuable way to to spend their money. We let them know it was too far gone and it was their call. They chose to fix it. In their case, the customer who sold it to them had no idea the extent of the damage, but when they found out, gave all the money back to the buyer. So he got a free camper and decided to go ahead with the repair. It was actually a really neat situation. Good people. At the time I took that video, I thought we were going to end up cutting the camper up and disposing. But that changed the next morning.
@@cachecamper Did they stop in and look over the issues with their rotted out camper ?? The whole camper at this point is questionable even after repairs
@josephpuchel6497 it's amazing what folks spend money on even after seeing it. However, we all find value in a different way. For them and their situation, it actually made sense. We thought we were going to be cutting it up and charging disposal fees. But we fixed it.
Good question. No, not at all. I'll be putting together a video on that specifically as well. I will also be doing a video on our approach to insulation value
@cachecamper thanks! Looking forward to it! I'm planning on building a truckbed camper from foam and "poor man's fiberglass" and I'm wondering if I make it from pure foam like a monobody kind of thing or if I make a skeleton like you do here and then wrap it in the pmf/fiberglass.. Super useful to see your approach and hear the real life knowledge so I can bring that into conservation while choosing my design!
Thanks for this video - awareness about build quality in general is not nearly where it should be among consumers. When profit is the primary motivating factor (as it is with all things under modern capitalist realism), and more profit can be generated by building things at a lower level of quality, a very serious and wide-ranging issue arises, where producers and manufacturers of all kinds of products in all kinds of industries are incentivized and motivated at a fundamental level to build things to fail, or at the very least, to build things poorly. The first problem is obvious - you're paying a premium for literal garbage - as the old saying goes, you've been had. The second problem is more insidious - at the base level there is a fundamental understanding that, if something is poorly designed and built, then it will fail and break down sooner...which forces the consumer to have to buy back in and replace it sooner. This equals greater profits, and thus directly incentivizes a design philosophy of building things to fail on purpose. They called it "planned obsolescence" back in the 80's/90's and it was technically made illegal in much of north america and europe...but how do you enforce such a law? are we going to have regulators watching every production facility of every manufacturer? In the end, manufacturers just started getting more technical and specific with this build procedures - one of the most well-known examples is car manufacturers designing specific small parts buried behind the engine block to fail out early, intentionally making repairs complicated and costly, so that you will just buy or lease something new instead, which is where they make most of their money nowadays. There are tons of examples across a wide variety of industries, and it's a huge but quiet problem that very few talk about, even though it undermines our whole society in a big way - a lot of the products we rely on day-to-day actually can't be relied on, and profit is being made off intentionally deceiving the consumer and providing products that the manufacturer is building poorly on purpose. We used to talk about "cheap japanese goods" back in the 80's....then they got very good at manufacturing after a few decades and suddenly their vehicles were dominating western markets because of their reliability. We switched to "cheap chinese goods" in the 2000's - same thing happened, china is now a world manufacturing powerhouse capable of easily outproducing any western nation at any level, and you can even get high quality from them if you're willing to pay for it. The west shipped all our manufacturing over there in the 80's and 90's, and what little remained here became about of scamming people with big price tags for things designed to fail. The most ironic part is, half the time, they are an american company that gets all their stuff prebuilt/material sourced from china anyways LOL. What a disaster.
@Jnike8715 agreed. It's bigger than that. If work goes out that way, and trust me, it's like that on every one of those we have pulled apart, then that's a culture issue at the company. Top down and bottom up issue. Not to get into something larger but we are super fortunate to have people who truly care about the quality they're going to cover up with metal. The word craftsmanship is so disregarded. Disregarded not just by those building things but also but those paying for those things to be built. If, with this channel, I can encourage people who are building as well as those buying to care and demand craftsmanship from themselves and those who are pros, then man, I will have succeeded.
Hi, a lot of this rot could be avoided by pre-conditioning this wood in a bath of a type of urethane, acrylic. YES it would add cost, BUT it would be a top quality product. (no pun intended).
That is an interesting idea. From a place of design thinking, we always prefer to improve the protection from intrusion and put the resources there. The reason for this is that once water is in, the damage is done. You will deal with mold among other issues, so it is always best to improve the sheeting and sealant methods used.
I’ll bet all the guys that’s say steal is better than wood never built a camper or anything for that matter and drove it down a road. Listen and learn trolls. Real world experience can’t be denied regardless of what my ‘’charts say’’
Shame on you for having an informed and open mind! Perhaps you're related to the designer of the 8000 wooden 300mph Mosquito bombers produced in WW2? Wonderfully informative videos confirming my own experience with RV's; I've owned and repaired/restored them all in my 80 years. Steel frame/aluminum siding....electrolytic corrosion; aluminum frame/aluminum siding....fracture of poor welds;.....wood frame/ply inner skin/aluminum siding....rot due to poor design and execution of frame joint details. And not to mention the horrors of inadequate composite/aluminum skin bonding.... I'm currently restoring a 1974 stick and aluminum siding trailer; all corners rotted away, back wall entirely disintegrated ....a product of poor design and construction coupled with neglect.....BUT remarkably rigid and strong due to the still largely intact bond between the frame and interior lauan ply skin. Amazing after 50 years. Thanks again and keep 'em coming!
😄 love it. You bet. We live in the place where "Campers go to die". It's a harsh state on Campers and is the real test, in my view, on the various construction methods. We get to repair them all. It's awesome seeing the contrast on a daily basis and what worked vs what didn't. Happy to keep sharing.
Wood is junk especially for campers. Light gauge steel framing is stronger and lighter than wood and doesn't cost that much more. You can sugar coat your wood framing and 2,000 staples all you want, it's still junk, because it's wood and staples.
Fortunately, this is not the case. I truly appreciate this comment because it brings up an awesome conversation that many have wrong. Steel has is pros and cons just like any material. There are many many benefits to using wood for manufacturing a camper. You genuinely just need to understand how to properly build. As time goes on here, we will make more videos explaining why this is the case. Many pros, there are also cons. The way the work is done is the true answer above the material being used.
@@cachecamper We understand your confusion. There are documented seismic stress test on 6 story tall light gauge steel buildings that outperform wood framing, A mobile camper constantly experience seismic like conditions. There is even an entire real light gauge steel house that was completely rolled 360 deg on the ground with no damage. Without this knowledge you obviously wouldn't know which is understandable. The odd part though is you're in Alaska and build low R value thin walls because that's what you see everyone else doing which is junk. No offense.
@Nova-m8d Another great topic. Two actually. I love it. But first, we have learned time and again that many approach various build methods with the same hostility and passion as politics and religion. We will continue to respond, as we do in our business, with understanding and a continued desire to educate and improve. What matters at the end of the day is always practice and exposure combined with trial and error. I'm so excited to be bringing what we do and our knowledge to our audience here on RUclips, finally, because there are so many misconceptions and overcorrections in the dos and don'ts of building. We are actually well aware of the seismic stresses on our campers and across materials. That is why we build with aluminum and wood both. Wood, in practice, has higher strength and response to seismic stress on a completed unit than steel, suprisingly. It is not where near the same as seismic stresses on a building. Much different. I so love that you brought three topics up here because we're going to make videos on them. The truth about insulation value is another fantastic conversion. Thank you for your engagement, genuinely. These are all reasons why we decided to go ahead and start creating educational material.
@@cachecamper The attachment to outdated methods is exactly why the industry gets stuck in the past. Light-gauge steel isn’t just an alternative-it’s superior in every way. Pretending wood is better because it’s familiar is lazy and shortsighted. Steel is stronger, safer, and more sustainable-get with the times!
@Nova-m8d again, it is exciting to be bringing the truth of all the production methods to folks. We have been exposed to light gauge steel for many years in repair as well as aluminum framing, SIPS, wood, fully composite, etc, etc, and we have found, contrary to what works on paper, the things that are truly holding up in the long run and why. Because we're always curious. We have built in so many ways and have almost tried it all. So happy to be sharing our findings with folks. More than 50-years of good and bad practices under our belts. We have our stories of failure and successes. I hope you're willing to stick around and see what we have to offer.
![Correction - Truth about Aluminum Framing [part 2]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/cy4mChKypVk/mqdefault.jpg)
![Correction - Truth about Aluminum Framing [part 2]](/img/tr.png)
Grateful for the time you have allocated to create such an informative video! Take Care
As a retired carpenter of 40 plus years experience your product is excellent !!!
Nicely Done!
Awesome video! Thanks for sharing :)
You're welcome and thank you for the feedback! We will be sharing much more going forward.
@@cachecamper That's great. I'll sub so I can follow. I'm really interested in the proper way to build campers. Thanks!
This is a nice breakdown and comparison of two methods of constructing a camper shell, one example quite poor and one much better. I'm an architect and builder and really appreciate you using structural concepts in your comparisons (shear, moment arms, dymanic loading, adhesives, etc.).
I prefer rigid foam as an insulator as opposed to fluffy varieties (fiberglass, cellulose, mineral wool, etc.). There are three major types of rigid foam, with polyisocyanurate and extruded polystyrene (XPS) giving much better performance than expanded polystyrene (EPS) aka "styrofoam". Polyiso tends to perform worse in cold climates and requires an aging de-rating factor, so I prefer to spec XPS for cold applications. At a glance, I believe I see a mix of EPS and polyiso in your builds, but I could be wrong.
There is always a trade-off in wall thickness/R-value to interior volume. Three and four season models will do better with thicker walls and especially double-paned windows. Zero windows would obviously be best from a thermal perspective, but who wants to camp in a cave?!
In residential construction, we are seeing and specifying lots of engineered wood products that are taking over joists, beams, and sometimes even studs and columns for their extra strength and stability over dimensional lumber. I hope it engineered wood makes it way into the RV industry soon. We all know that metals are superior to wood in almost every metric (with the exception of thermal), but material and fabrications with them cost more, as well as its dead weight are crucial trade-offs. It's perfectly acceptable to build a high-functioning structural shell out of wood. Haters gonna hate, though.
Hat's off to a well-informed video and I wish you well taking on the "big boys" in the RV construction world where cutting corners and shoddy techniques rule the day. I'll subsscribe and keep an eye out for new uploads.
Excellent comment. You put the truth of a complex and hot topic in a gentle, intelligent, and open way. Very nice. I could not agree with you more across the board there. The powers that be have put such a harsh smear on wood that the general market has a poor taste in their mouths for it, but it remains one of the most superior materials out there. I'm very open to new techs but I'm not going to up and shift with the wind, especially after the real success we have had with wood construction. I'm saying that as one who also builds with aluminum. If we can show folks on this channel how to approach the various materials and muild methods with an open and eager mind, I will be extatic. One size does not fit all. Great comment. Thank you!
Awesome videos. I've been looking at building my own for a while now and this information is invaluable. One question though, I notice on the campers right side, your window looks a couple inches lower, resulting in the cantilever being cut in half. Why take this step when the left side appears to be much more sturdier? Thx again!
@christophergracey absolutely great question. I'll cover this in one of the videos for that build. There is a cantilever there that is super strong. It is just the secondary method. The main answer is design constraints on why we toggled to the secondary.
excellent info. ty
You're welcome! Can't wait to show more
Myself during covid I was bored so I built an 18' long travel trailer using 1" by 1.5" studs, 1/8" luan inside and outside of the walls and ceiling with 1"styofoam glued in everywhere. Outside skin is all Fylon fibreglass glued on and extra glue (the glue I use is actually a tybe of caulking) at all the seams as well as some seam tape on all the corners. The front, roof and back is made out of one piece of Fylon. No leaks or problems with 30,000 KM so far. Got me hooked on building RV's as a hobby. But I do not use wood anymore, I have now made 3 Teardrops and a small truck camper out of Fylon/styrofoam/Fylon sandwich construction. I make the material myself.
Wood will be around a long time but the composite revolution is coming. Watching RUclipss out of australia and they are saying the whole industry there is going composite. No wood, no aluminum or steel anywhere except the chassis.
@steveogilvie5203 composite panels can be good. There are a fraction of companies out there doing that properly as well. I'm looking forward to sharing sound design and production methodology as we go forward here. Wood framing has a ton of pros to it if you have the skill and ability to execute properly. That is why, as a company, we will stay direct to consumers. That way, we do not have the crushing need to drive the cost of production down to the point of low quality so that distributors can get their cut. That means we will stay small as a company and less people will get our product, but those who do will always benefit from the high quality. That said, we will always look to new technologies to improve our product. So, as composite improves, if it can prove better than wood, it will always remain an option. So far, for our climate, it has not proven itself.
@@cachecamper The cold weather is where a composite does its best. I go winter camping whenever I can. But to be a composite manufacturer takes a lot of money for CNC and composite panel manufacturing. I do it all by hand with some wooden forming moulds I built to make the shape of the teardrops. The walls are glued in to the main body in a pocket on both sides. It becomes a one piece cabin. I am a very experienced wood worker. I use wood to make my teardrops and then the form is removed to be used again on the next build.
@steveogilvie5203 jigs are everything. Especially in production and to reduce time. Best on paper. That is what describes composite panels in the cold. There are many other factors above and beyond insulation value that come with the reality of a cold climate. Condensation is the single largest issue. It is multiplied significantly with composite material. This is going to be a future video. No way to explain it all here.
Would the unit you showed be salvageable or is it just trach and buy a new one?
Really informative video, I have worked on a decent amount of RV's, and I'm usually disgusted with what I find.
Same
The single biggest problem with all campers is leaks. especially leaks at the roof/wall intersection. If a camper is made at LEAST with a 1 piece roof that wraps over the top of the wall it it massively better. Second these things rely on every part for structural strength, a huge part of that is the skin itself. In short stop all leaks before they happen and it will likely last longer than you will.
100%. I'm going to make a video talking about skin as related to structure
What kind of stapler/ staples was used for construction?
Wide crown framing staples
The truck camper you showed is that worth fixing?
In my opinion, no. The cost of that repair was more than 22k but the customer asked us to stop at 16k. Everybody has their own view of what is a valuable way to to spend their money. We let them know it was too far gone and it was their call. They chose to fix it. In their case, the customer who sold it to them had no idea the extent of the damage, but when they found out, gave all the money back to the buyer. So he got a free camper and decided to go ahead with the repair. It was actually a really neat situation. Good people. At the time I took that video, I thought we were going to end up cutting the camper up and disposing. But that changed the next morning.
@@cachecamper
Did they stop in and look over the issues with their rotted out camper ??
The whole camper at this point is questionable even after repairs
@josephpuchel6497 it's amazing what folks spend money on even after seeing it. However, we all find value in a different way. For them and their situation, it actually made sense. We thought we were going to be cutting it up and charging disposal fees. But we fixed it.
The first one is made from dumpster dive scraps 😂
What a about cold bridges because if the massive wood? Isnt SIP with ply enough for the walls like you've done in the roof ?
Good question. No, not at all. I'll be putting together a video on that specifically as well. I will also be doing a video on our approach to insulation value
@cachecamper thanks! Looking forward to it! I'm planning on building a truckbed camper from foam and "poor man's fiberglass" and I'm wondering if I make it from pure foam like a monobody kind of thing or if I make a skeleton like you do here and then wrap it in the pmf/fiberglass..
Super useful to see your approach and hear the real life knowledge so I can bring that into conservation while choosing my design!
Thanks for this video - awareness about build quality in general is not nearly where it should be among consumers.
When profit is the primary motivating factor (as it is with all things under modern capitalist realism), and more profit can be generated by building things at a lower level of quality, a very serious and wide-ranging issue arises, where producers and manufacturers of all kinds of products in all kinds of industries are incentivized and motivated at a fundamental level to build things to fail, or at the very least, to build things poorly. The first problem is obvious - you're paying a premium for literal garbage - as the old saying goes, you've been had.
The second problem is more insidious - at the base level there is a fundamental understanding that, if something is poorly designed and built, then it will fail and break down sooner...which forces the consumer to have to buy back in and replace it sooner. This equals greater profits, and thus directly incentivizes a design philosophy of building things to fail on purpose. They called it "planned obsolescence" back in the 80's/90's and it was technically made illegal in much of north america and europe...but how do you enforce such a law? are we going to have regulators watching every production facility of every manufacturer? In the end, manufacturers just started getting more technical and specific with this build procedures - one of the most well-known examples is car manufacturers designing specific small parts buried behind the engine block to fail out early, intentionally making repairs complicated and costly, so that you will just buy or lease something new instead, which is where they make most of their money nowadays. There are tons of examples across a wide variety of industries, and it's a huge but quiet problem that very few talk about, even though it undermines our whole society in a big way - a lot of the products we rely on day-to-day actually can't be relied on, and profit is being made off intentionally deceiving the consumer and providing products that the manufacturer is building poorly on purpose.
We used to talk about "cheap japanese goods" back in the 80's....then they got very good at manufacturing after a few decades and suddenly their vehicles were dominating western markets because of their reliability. We switched to "cheap chinese goods" in the 2000's - same thing happened, china is now a world manufacturing powerhouse capable of easily outproducing any western nation at any level, and you can even get high quality from them if you're willing to pay for it. The west shipped all our manufacturing over there in the 80's and 90's, and what little remained here became about of scamming people with big price tags for things designed to fail. The most ironic part is, half the time, they are an american company that gets all their stuff prebuilt/material sourced from china anyways LOL. What a disaster.
Lack of satisfaction and excellence in craftsmanship. That person should be washing paper plates!
@Jnike8715 agreed. It's bigger than that. If work goes out that way, and trust me, it's like that on every one of those we have pulled apart, then that's a culture issue at the company. Top down and bottom up issue. Not to get into something larger but we are super fortunate to have people who truly care about the quality they're going to cover up with metal. The word craftsmanship is so disregarded. Disregarded not just by those building things but also but those paying for those things to be built. If, with this channel, I can encourage people who are building as well as those buying to care and demand craftsmanship from themselves and those who are pros, then man, I will have succeeded.
Most of the builders on RUclips put that company to shame.
Hi, a lot of this rot could be avoided by pre-conditioning this wood in a bath of a type of urethane, acrylic. YES it would add cost, BUT it would be a top quality product. (no pun intended).
That is an interesting idea. From a place of design thinking, we always prefer to improve the protection from intrusion and put the resources there. The reason for this is that once water is in, the damage is done. You will deal with mold among other issues, so it is always best to improve the sheeting and sealant methods used.
GREAT IDEA
I’ll bet all the guys that’s say steal is better than wood never built a camper or anything for that matter and drove it down a road. Listen and learn trolls. Real world experience can’t be denied regardless of what my ‘’charts say’’
This is the way...
😂 love the comment. It's one of many. But it is a good one.
Travel lite camper
Shame on you for having an informed and open mind! Perhaps you're related to the designer of the 8000 wooden 300mph Mosquito bombers produced in WW2?
Wonderfully informative videos confirming my own experience with RV's; I've owned and repaired/restored them all in my 80 years.
Steel frame/aluminum siding....electrolytic corrosion; aluminum frame/aluminum siding....fracture of poor welds;.....wood frame/ply inner skin/aluminum siding....rot due to poor design and execution of frame joint details.
And not to mention the horrors of inadequate composite/aluminum skin bonding....
I'm currently restoring a 1974 stick and aluminum siding trailer; all corners rotted away, back wall entirely disintegrated ....a product of poor design and construction coupled with neglect.....BUT remarkably rigid and strong due to the still largely intact bond between the frame and interior lauan ply skin. Amazing after 50 years.
Thanks again and keep 'em coming!
😄 love it. You bet. We live in the place where "Campers go to die". It's a harsh state on Campers and is the real test, in my view, on the various construction methods. We get to repair them all. It's awesome seeing the contrast on a daily basis and what worked vs what didn't. Happy to keep sharing.
OMG GLAD I WOULD NEVER EVER BUY ONE
sure would like the know the manufactures name so I know what NOT to buy!
Wood is junk especially for campers. Light gauge steel framing is stronger and lighter than wood and doesn't cost that much more. You can sugar coat your wood framing and 2,000 staples all you want, it's still junk, because it's wood and staples.
Fortunately, this is not the case. I truly appreciate this comment because it brings up an awesome conversation that many have wrong. Steel has is pros and cons just like any material. There are many many benefits to using wood for manufacturing a camper. You genuinely just need to understand how to properly build. As time goes on here, we will make more videos explaining why this is the case. Many pros, there are also cons. The way the work is done is the true answer above the material being used.
@@cachecamper We understand your confusion. There are documented seismic stress test on 6 story tall light gauge steel buildings that outperform wood framing, A mobile camper constantly experience seismic like conditions. There is even an entire real light gauge steel house that was completely rolled 360 deg on the ground with no damage. Without this knowledge you obviously wouldn't know which is understandable. The odd part though is you're in Alaska and build low R value thin walls because that's what you see everyone else doing which is junk. No offense.
@Nova-m8d Another great topic. Two actually. I love it. But first, we have learned time and again that many approach various build methods with the same hostility and passion as politics and religion. We will continue to respond, as we do in our business, with understanding and a continued desire to educate and improve. What matters at the end of the day is always practice and exposure combined with trial and error. I'm so excited to be bringing what we do and our knowledge to our audience here on RUclips, finally, because there are so many misconceptions and overcorrections in the dos and don'ts of building. We are actually well aware of the seismic stresses on our campers and across materials. That is why we build with aluminum and wood both. Wood, in practice, has higher strength and response to seismic stress on a completed unit than steel, suprisingly. It is not where near the same as seismic stresses on a building. Much different. I so love that you brought three topics up here because we're going to make videos on them. The truth about insulation value is another fantastic conversion. Thank you for your engagement, genuinely. These are all reasons why we decided to go ahead and start creating educational material.
@@cachecamper The attachment to outdated methods is exactly why the industry gets stuck in the past. Light-gauge steel isn’t just an alternative-it’s superior in every way. Pretending wood is better because it’s familiar is lazy and shortsighted. Steel is stronger, safer, and more sustainable-get with the times!
@Nova-m8d again, it is exciting to be bringing the truth of all the production methods to folks. We have been exposed to light gauge steel for many years in repair as well as aluminum framing, SIPS, wood, fully composite, etc, etc, and we have found, contrary to what works on paper, the things that are truly holding up in the long run and why. Because we're always curious. We have built in so many ways and have almost tried it all. So happy to be sharing our findings with folks. More than 50-years of good and bad practices under our belts. We have our stories of failure and successes. I hope you're willing to stick around and see what we have to offer.