Teardrop Trailer Quickie to Go!

[Quiet_Storm]

Alright now that I have my home audio set up in good shape, I'm scheming up what I can do next. Lately, I've gotten hooked on the idea of building a teardrop trailer and going on a long road trip. One of my first thoughts was obviously.. what am I going to do for music?? So I'm thinking about building a Quickie and Quicksand and custom building them into the cabinetry. (The battery power supply is a big selling point.) I'm not sure what I'll do for speakers yet. I thought about buying a pair of mini Orcas, but I'd prefer to build them myself.

Anyway, I have a few questions:
-Has anyone thought about special precautions for extensive vibrations and shocks? I'm thinking I should add some supports for the larger parts such as capacitors?
-I'm planning on driving from Albuquerque up the West Coast to Canada and Glacier National Park. Any chance the mothership will be have an open house around July-ish?
-Is there any interest in following the build? I'm thinking about buying the kits soon, so I can get the manuals and start planning out a custom top panel. The final integration into the trailer wouldn't be until sometime in the spring, though.

[Paul Birkeland]

If you're going to expose the built kit to a lot of vibrations and shocks, one thing that can go a long way is to use some thread locker during your build.  Otherwise, the electronic components in both kits aren't particularly heavy, and they won't need any extra support. 

You are certainly welcome to come by in July, just be aware that the drive from Glacier to Seattle is not particularly exciting. 

If your trailer has a 12V system, you can just run the Quicksand off that power to reduce your battery count a bit.

-PB

[Quiet_Storm]

Thanks for the advice! I'll keep some thread locker in mind.

Well I'm planning on working my way up California through Yosemite and Portland and Seattle, so it wouldn't be too far out of the way. I figured it would be a good way to demo the DAC before I just end up impulse buying it one night. The route is still very much in-work though.

I'm considering a solar panel/12V battery design. Would there be any concern about the voltage variation or noise on the line from things like the inverter? I'm assuming it would be too difficult to get the Quickie to run off the battery without using the AC off the inverter and a DC power supply.

[Paul Birkeland]

I'm considering a solar panel/12V battery design. Would there be any concern about the voltage variation or noise on the line from things like the inverter?

The Quicksand could run from a noisy switching supply, so an inverter hardly seems concerning. 

I'm assuming it would be too difficult to get the Quickie to run off the battery without using the AC off the inverter and a DC power supply.

You actually need 3 separate DC supplies.  Batteries end up being far more convenient.

-PB

[Natural Sound]

Sounds like a cool project! I for one would be interested in following your the build.

I've used 3 small SLA batteries in series for the 36V supply on the quickie. With a little ingenuity you could rig them up to the 12V system and charge them from the solar panel or off the alternator while driving down the road. The filament supply could be NiMh D cells. You can pick up a battery charger that plugs into a cigarette lighter plug to keep them fed. The quicksand could run off your deep cycle battery. These class D amps don’t pull very much current.

What kind of source are you thinking about? I'm guessing something digital.

Oh yeah and I'm in Albuquerque (NE Heights) if you need a hand with anything.

[4krow]

 However mounted in your trailer, I'm sure that a shock absorbing configuration is worth considering.

[JamieMcC]

The simplest shock absorbing configuration I can think of would be to have the amps in a enclosure which can be suspended by a short lengths of shock/bungy chord on each corner under a little tension.

[badman]

A sprung quickie isn't a bad idea- the 3s4 are known as a microphonic tube, mine certainly are- in addition to any overall solutions, I'd want to incorporate local damping of both the top plate and the tubes themselves.  There are a number of tube dampers on the market, and for the top plate, I'm picturing an aluminum or brass frame to screw onto the periphery of the top plate (possibly with a cross-member between the battery banks) with damping between the frame and the top plate.

[4krow]

I second the idea for top plate isolation. I think that in the past, I have seen a couple of members even suspend the tube and socket by maybe a wire. Been a long time, so I don't recall exactly.

[mcandmar]

Why dont you think outside the box (literally) and ditch the stock chassis plate.   Since the tubes run cool you could even stuff them inside some foam blocks.

[Quiet_Storm]

Alright it looks like this is officially happening! I've ordered a trailer hitch for my Subaru Crosstrek, all the Bottlehead gear (Quickie w/PJCCS and Quicksand), and some assorted other parts for the trailer. Thanks for the ideas so far everyone. I'm going to wait until I see what the parts look like and then consider some sort of replacement panel/chassis. I'm not too worried about microphonics. I'm more worried about damaging parts if and when I go off the beaten path.

[Doc B.]

I'd suggest looking at how tube avionics and other military gear was built. The type of tube socket retaining ring that mounts a shield could be useful to contain and protect the tubes. The other parts are pretty lightweight, so I don't think they would present much of a problem being bounced around. The use of a temporary strength or medium strength loctite on threads is encouraged. Be careful not to be sloppy wth it, it can discolor and otherwise kinda mess up some plastics.

[Quiet_Storm]

Alright construction has begun! In the Bottlehead spirit of DIY, we built a brick oven to get the steel tubing red hot. Then, we used a jig to bend it to 25 degrees. I'm actually a little surprised it all worked. We'll put the axle and wheels on soon and get it registered.

Also, the Quickie and Quicksand kits arrived, so I'll be designing the panel soon. More to come...