The Comet Camper

May 14 2013

New Video and oh hey I missed you guys!

I’m back!

What a wild trip! Just to remind you all, for the past month I was traveling around the US (car-camping in my Element, which worked out great) interviewing Tiny House people and doing tiny house stuff. In the coming months (it takes so long to edit this stuff!) you’ll see my interviews with Laura Lavoie of Life In 120 Square Feet, Dan Louche of Tiny Home Builders, Alex Pino of Tiny House Talk, Sicily of Le Petit Maison, Steve Harrell of Tiny House Swoon and Tiny House Listings, Andrew Odom of Tiny (r)Evolution, and Hari and Karl of Tiny House Family. What an awesome community of people we have! Turns out everyone lives in a tiny house for very different, unique reasons, and it was amazing to see so many people who had really found a sense of fulfillment through small living. More on all this later!

Also, Kent Griswold told me that I had a video up on YouTube, maybe some of you have already seen it? I just found out about it while I was away, and I’d love it if you guys checked it out and “liked” it if you feel like it! Here’s the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uKCnIBOhpw

I’m getting excited about Tiny House Fair in June. Matt and I have one month to complete the COMET. I anticipate 12 to 16 hour days and lots of exhausted yelling! Haha! If I’m absent for the next few weeks, you’ll know it’s just because I’m working my butt off to get this hunk of vintage metal ready for it’s big debut.

I have an article coming out in a regional magazine called Spirit of Change soon, so I’m looking forward to that.

Here’s some photos from the trip for you to look at:

At the tiny house workshop in Wilmington – Steve Harrell had this awesome sign, I want to make one now too!

Thanks for reading! Talk to you all soon!

Tagged building, camper, comet, DIY, education, green, tiny houses, trailer, vintage, workshop

Mar 21 2013

1 Comment

Tiny Houses

Tiny House Building Workshop: North Carolina Edition

So, as I mentioned in the last post I had to postpone my March tiny house road trip until April. At first I was bummed out, then I realized I would be traveling south at the same time of Deek Diedricksen and Steve Harrell’s Tiny House Workshop in NC, and now I’m so excited because I get to hang out there! Oh, you haven’t heard of this North Carolina workshop? Well, let me tell you, it’s going to be the biggest tiny house meeting of the minds yet, anywhere. The speakers will knock your socks off. And even though I’m not on the poster, I’ll be around too to talk about tiny houses and answer questions about off-grid stuff, design, sustainability, etc.

Here’s what Deek says about it on his website:

North Carolina Relaxshacks.com Workshop Announced! SIGN UP DETAILS…
HANDS-ON Tiny House Building Workshop with DIY Network Host, Author, Designer, Builder, and Blogger Derek “Deek” Diedricksen. We’re talking almost 35-40 hours of contact, building, demos, networking, and MORE! It looks like we’ll ALSO have a tiny house on wheels visiting us, courtesy of TENNESSEE TINY HOMES! We’re excited to meet builder Joe, and see what he’s done!
Want to learn how to build a tiny house/cabin? Better yet, want to build one?? Here’s your chance, and we’re limiting this workshop to only 25 total, so as to keep it intimate. Sign up details are below….

JUST ANNOUNCED- EACH ATTENDEE WILL RECEIVE THESE DOOR GIFTS!!!!
A $120+ Value!
Plans for The Sonoma Shanty Cabin from Kent Griswold!6 months of Kent’s Tiny House MagazineLloyd Kahn’s AWESOME BOOK “Tiny Homes, Simple Shelter”Tiny House plan sets from COZYHOMEPLANS.comDON VARDO/gypsy wagon plans from Dee Williams and the P.A.D. Crew!Plans for The Darrington Cabin….the one we’ll all be buildingand more……
Its $120+ worth of door gifts for just signing up!
We’ll also be giving away a few copies of my book “Humble Homes, Simple Shacks” leading up to this event.

April 26th-28th- Tiny House-Building Workshop #4

I never planned on doing many of these, but the first three I did were so much fun and all of them sold out, so I figured, why not do one somewhere warmer?

So North Carolina it is!
Wilmington, NC, to be precise…

This workshop will be a team up with Steven Harrell of Tinyhouselistings.com and Tinyhouseswoon.com – a THREE DAY, HANDS-ON, WORKSHOP where we’ll collectively build a tiny house! This will be another workshop that will be limited in size, so as to keep it intimate- 25 people or so is the maximum, so if interested, you might not want to wait too long on this. $399 for the three day event. Some food, snacks, coffee, materials, workbooks, and more, are all included.
GUEST SPEAKERS/DEMOS from… -Kent Griswold of Tinyhouseblog.com (making the trek from CA)-

Alex Pino (FL)- To Discuss Downsizing Techniques (from TinyHouseTalk.com)-

Laura LaVoie- Tiny House Dweller and Builder 120SquareFeet.com-

Steven Harrell- co/hosting, and the man behind Tinyhouseswoon.com and Tinyhouselistings.comand

JUST ADDED…. Dustin Diedricksen- Environmental Engineer, Small House Dweller, Tiny House Builder…..

Andrew Odom- Builder/Dweller/Blogger- TinyRevolution.us

Ryan Mitchell- Builder and Thetinylife.com and we might STILL have more!~

PLUS….
-Campfire discussions at night
-Pizza Party/Cocktail meet n’ greet/networking hang-out
-Salvage Construction Demonstrations
-How to Save THOUSANDS While Building Your Own Tiny House
-What NOT to do when building and designing your own tiny home….
-Tricks Of The Trade and Techniques
-Tool Safety, Selection, and “Old School Tools” (Tools Deek still uses on off grid jobs)
-Designing and tips for space efficiency
-Alternative Building Techniques And Approaches
-Giveaways
These are just some of the things we’ll be covering as we all collectively build and design a tiny house/guest house.”

Obviously, the networking here alone is worth the price of admission. What you learn in between the building is amazing. I have been to all of Deek’s workshops since the beginning, and they are my favorite tiny house workshops! They are super fun, relaxed, informational, and you will make lots of friends. Email Deek (kidcedar@gmail.com) to sign up, and do it quick because it’s almost sold out if not already!

See you in NC!

Tagged building, Deek, design, DIY, education, sustainability projects, tiny houses, workshop, workshops

Mar 21 2013

Project Ventura: a huge success!

I just wanted to give you all an update on the fabulous young ladies of the Ann Richards School and their Project Ventura eco-trailer. They have finished their presentations (you can read about their experiences here: http://projectventura.wordpress.com/) AND they have met their funding goal on Kickstarter!! YAY! So thank you to anyone and everyone that donated – I can’t wait to see how the renovation turns out. You really made this project real for the girls by funding it into existence! (See, high school projects don’t have to be pointless and boring – they can be awesome and life-changing like this!). Congratulations, ARS DAP girls, you are all amazing

In other news, I got back from my residency at Goddard and was exhausted and then got sick and so have been MIA for a few days. My time at Goddard was really wonderful and empowering. There is a genuine autonomy and agency given to students there. It felt unreal for the first few days, to be asked what I wanted to learn, instead of having things shoved down my throat or having to fight and fight to convince people that Tiny Houses are a legitimate area of study. Everyone there just gets it. And I’m excited about my first “packet” and the coming semester. I did have to postpone my road trip until April, which was very frustrating at first but turned out to be a good thing.

Tagged comet, DIY, education, school, tiny houses, tour, Ventura

Feb 28 2013

1 Comment

Sustainable Design, The COMET, Tiny Houses

A New School, A Podcast, and A Road Trip

Hello lovelies,

Sorry I’ve been away from the blog for a few days – I have been very busy prepping for Tiny House Road Trip Spring 2013. What is this Tiny House Road trip? In my neverending quest for the essence of the tiny house movement, I have planned a tour of the eastern and southern US, during which I will interview, film, and photograph tiny house people and their homes. I leave in less than 2 weeks! The road trip is about one month total. I’m interviewing tiny house builders, designers, and dwellers, documenting everything with cameras, audio recorders, and the pen. I’m very excited to finally meet some of the tiny house bloggers and internet acquaintances that I have been following via the internet for a long time. I’ll return with lots of footage and insights to share with you all. So for the last week, Matt (cameraman, audio tech, and tiny house partner in crime) and I have been modding out my Honda Element with a platform bed with storage underneath, insulated window covers, black-out curtains, and custom vents for the windows. We’re just car camping the whole trip (not towing the COMET, alas) to save money. If you have a tiny house project or business or thing you think we should see, let us know in the comments! This is the first of multiple tiny house road trips I have planned. I hope it goes smoothly – we’ve been planning everything out to the last detail but you never know!

Also, I was delighted to be interviewed by Andrew Odom of TinyRevolution for his podcast, RevoConvo. He’s a super nice guy, and we share a common sponsor (GreenBuildingSupply.com). We talked about trailers and Worcester and off-grid systems. It was really fun, and you can all give it a listen next Thursday when it comes out! (I’ll post the link when it comes out).

Lastly, I wanted to mention that I’m going through an exciting transition right now in my (also unending) quest for Tiny House University and autonomous education. “Tiny House University” is my phrase for the unusual education/college path I have carved out for myself in search of a major in a subject that isn’t exactly mainstream. I left Hampshire College last semester, which was a hard decision. I had been on Field Study (independent, off-campus semesters) for a few semesters in a row, and realized that I would never be able to go back to campus and the traditional classroom, as the COMET has taken on a life of its own and more than anything I need the flexibility of independent education in order to pursue opportunities that arise thanks to the COMET. I was accepted at Goddard College, a non-residential school in Vermont (my favorite state…in the warmer seasons haha) and I start today! Basically you go to the campus once a year for one week to meet your advisor and create a study plan, then you go home to wherever you live and do whatever you do, while corresponding with your advisor once a month. Pretty cool! So I get to study tiny houses full time, and earn a degree in Sustainability, which is what I’ve been working towards for a few years now without even realizing it! I’m very excited for this new leg in a long journey towards Tiny House University.

Did you guys know I now write for Tiny House Talk on occasion? I’m very excited. Here was my first post: http://tinyhousetalk.com/tiny-houses-of-the-past/. And soon there will be another post on THT detailing my search for Tiny House University, a “how-to” for interested people!

Thanks for reading along, I hope to be able to update you all throughout my week at school and the road trip, but forgive me if I’m MIA for a minute!

Photo courtesy of Swan Moon.

Tagged comet, DIY, education, green building, podcast, tiny houses, vintage camper

Feb 11 2013

18 Comments

Sustainable Design, Sustainable Living, The COMET, Vintage Campers

I love my tiny house.

Okay, okay, so I know I’m still trying to catch up the blog with the progress in a chronological and step-by-step fashion – but I can’t help it. I love my little house (even though it’s unfinished) and I want to share what it looks like with you all at this point! So let’s look into the future-present at the most recent photos of the COMET. Give me your feedback in the comments! We’ll get back to the progress updates later – unfortunately this did not all happen overnight

I’m in love with this little custom hand-made soap holder that Matt made for my kitchen. It keeps the soap off of the valuable counter space and also covers up some irreparable damage on the original back splash so that I could re-use it!

Step into my office…

Humanure Deposit Receptacle – With Urine Diverting Action

My new, very modest, closet.

If my cat were in the camper that’s the sunny spot she would be sleeping on!

The couch in the back is also my bed – it folds down/pulls out to be quite comfortable (awesome fabric from Sew Fine Fabrics on Etsy). You can see the Marmoleum click flooring that I used (courtesy of GreenBuildingSupply.com) and the turquoise Marmoleum sheet good countertops (which everyone mistakes for being original – which means I picked the right color!). At first I thought all the colors were a little much, but I like them now. It fits my style. I’m happy with my little fold-down desk area in the back, made out of salvaged 1950′s cracked ice Formica. We used scrap Marmoleum from the countertops to make the bathroom floor, and some panels of cork flooring from the ReStore for the kick-plates in there. The rounded piece of the counter folds up and down too, which has come in handy!

Oh, and I just updated the PHOTOS page too, with these pictures. I updated a few other pages too – check out the new “SUSTAINABILITY” page under the “ABOUT THE PROJECT” header.

Well, it’s not finished, but it’s quite homey, and I love it. I had to share. Thanks for reading!!

Tagged camper, design, DIY, green, home, recycled, sustainable, Tiny House, trailer, upcycled, vintage

Feb 09 2013

7 Comments

Tiny Houses

Neon Victorian Tiny House (that’s right, NEON PINK)

Finally! Finally I have found a picture of one of my favorite tiny houses! I have walked by this little gem a hundred times, and I always forget exactly where it was or how to find it as if it was only a dream. But no, it’s real. It’s located in Newport RI (my parents have a trailer in Newport on a beach – the whole trailer thing sort of runs in the family) so I’ve seen it in real life and it always makes me swoon. It’s so detailed – from the colored shingles to the gorgeous bay window out front. Next time I’m in Newport I’ll take some detail photos, but for now feast your eyes and be inspired by this house. More tiny houses should be painted these colors…in my opinion. Death to boring houses!

Tagged antique, architecture, color, design, home, neon, newport, style, tiny, Tiny House, victorian, vintage

Feb 08 2013

TEXAS! – finding the TINY in the “everything is bigger” state

Woah, what an amazing trip.

We’ve been back for a few days, but are just getting some time to reflect/catch up now that we are snowed in for the next few days thanks to this “nemo” storm we’re experiencing in MA right now (there’s a driving ban, so we couldn’t go anywhere even if we wanted to!).

TEXAS has more TINY going on than one might think, considering it’s the state known for the slogan, “Everything is Bigger…”. We had an incredible, inspiring time hanging out with the Engineering class at the Ann Richards School in Austin. Those girls are the coolest: they love math and science, the love engineering, and they were wise beyond their years. They were so engaged with their Project Ventura, they came in on Saturday and every day after school. I was super inspired by the work these girls were doing. We learned a lot from each other! You can all go check out their blog: http://projectventura.wordpress.com/. AND, you can help them out because their KICKSTARTER has just LAUNCHED! Please, please, please support these awesome girls by donating if you possibly can – they are the next generation of great innovators. I’ll keep reminding you throughout their campaign, but why wait? Go to their project page now, and donate some $!

Me (in the pink shirt), Matt on the other side, with the ARS class.

In a moment of wonderful fulfillment of life-goals and awesomeness, I also got to talk extensively to the ARS AP Environmental class about radical menstruation (a topic some of you will not be surprised to learn I am very well-versed in and passionate about). It’s an all-girls school, so they were all interested, and they asked! It was the highlight of my life – at least for that moment. I think I had a lot of those moments with the ARS girls. But seriously, I hardly ever get a chance to change awesome young ladies’ lives, but by the end of that talk no one was going to use a tampon again!

I digress! While in TX, we also visited some other inspirational tiny house innovators. We hung out with Brad Kittel at Tiny Texas Houses for more than a few hours, which was wonderful. I filmed a great interview with this visionary man, so once that’s all edited you guys can see it. We also interviewed Garrett Finney – designer of the Cricket Trailer – a personal inspiration to me and the COMET. Right in Austin city limits, we visited and spoke with Tracen Gardner, the man behind the modular tiny house company Reclaimed Space. We’re working on editing all these interviews/tours now, hopefully they will be ready soon-ish! Tiny is becoming a big deal in Texas – and these are just a few of the leaders of this movement for smarter buildings.

Tagged avel, comet, DIY, education, green, house, math, science, simple, texas, tiny, travel

Jan 23 2013

1 Comment

The COMET, Uncategorized, Vintage Campers

Installing the Fresh Water Tank Fill Spout

The fresh water tank (the only tank in the COMET – no grey or black water tanks) lives underneath the rear couch/bed. Originally it was under the dinette bench on the port side, but that meant that there was about 15 feet of tubing wrapping around the entire trailer to get from the tank to the faucet on the other side. We moved it to underneath the rear bench to be closer to the faucet. The fresh water tank is 15 gallons and I refill it about every 3-4 days. You don’t really use a lot of water when you have to pump it by hand. And the hot water is just one of those black bag camp showers that I hang up outside.

Here’s how we installed the new fresh water tank.

Here's where the new fresh water fill spout goes. Thanks Timbucktu RV Supply in Worcester for all the parts needed for the water tank installation!

Here’s where the new fresh water fill spout goes. Nothing is pressurized, so it’s just an angled spout where you put water form the hose. Thanks Timbucktu RV Supply in Worcester for all the parts needed for the water tank installation!

Close up of the fill. We caulked around the edges, and screwed it into the wall. The small spot to the left of the spout is the vent, which allows the tank to empty correctly.

Here’s what it looks like from the inside. We toe-nailed in a piece of plywood so that we would have something more than just aluminum to screw it into from the outside.

Here are the lines attached, using hose clamps. The blue and white striped line (the larger one) is the water fill line, it goes from the fill spout to the tank. The clear, smaller line is the vent line for air to escape as the water drains. It goes from the tank to the spout, then outside via that vent. Don’t skimp on the caulking when you’re dealing with the water situation. Better safe than sorry!

Some context.

The tank! It came with no pre-drilled holes, so we could decide where to put them ourselves. Using a hole saw bit on the drill, we cut out the correct holes for the hose attachments. There were 3 holes in the tank total: one for water to come in from the spout, one for air to escape when it’s draining, and one for water to travel from the tank to the faucet via another line, which is down at the bottom.

Then we cut the new panel for that wall (the old panel was all water damaged under the window and at the floor) and tacked it in.

We then put in the framing and front of the rear bench (not tank yet) because we needed to see how we would run the line from the tank to the faucet and make sure everything would fit.

Now, we actually installed the kitchen before attaching the water tank and hooking everything up, so that’s where I’ll stop for now. Basically, the tank got put into it’s spot under the bench, it fit very snugly. We hooked up the fill line to the appropriate fitting that we had installed in the side of the tank, and the air vent line to the appropriate fitting. We put the fitting (barbed) into the bottom for the faucet line as well, but didn’t hook it up until the kitchen was finished. So we’ll look at the kitchen then get back to finishing up the water tank. Photos to come!

Tagged camper, comet, DIY, off-grid, renovation, vintage trailer

Jan 22 2013

5 Comments

Vintage Campers

My Life is Validated by Tenth-Grade Girls

This is probably the coolest thing that has ever happened to me, so bear with me while I explode with excitement and awe.

All I ever wanted with this blog and this project was to inspire other people to take their life into their own hands and do something creative with DIY attitude. Well, I never imagined that I would inspire a group of high school girls to undertake such a project, but it’s happening right now!
The girls at the Ann Richards School For Young Women Leaders in Austin TX are not your average tenth-graders. These engineering students focus on project-based learning at their high school. The class’s assignment this year is directly inspired by the COMET, as they turn a 1970′s travel trailer into a solar-powered learning tool. They are incorporating the eco-friendly aspects of the COMET and the small space design techniques of tiny houses into their project. The girls are learning 3D digital modeling, design, green building methods, construction, and more through the hands-on project. Right now, the design groups in the class are coming up with designs, budgets, and plans. The client will choose the winning design, which will be implemented in the trailer this spring.
Needless to say, I was flattered and amazed when their teacher (who is so amazing – I wish I had teachers like this in high school!) emailed me saying that they were undertaking Project Ventura, based on the COMET and my own methods. Now I’m going down to TX this week to teach the class for a week and learn what I can from this group of incredible young women. I can’t wait to see how they’ve improved on my ideas and what they’ve come up with for designs. Matt’s coming as the SketchUp expert, and will be teaching them 3D design using this free program.
I strongly encourage you to check out their blog! It is very detailed and extremely well-written. It will keep you up to date on all of their discoveries and victories. And if you have some money to spare, or think it’s a good cause, consider donating to Project Ventura so that they can begin the building process!
I can’t really describe how happy this class of inspiring young women makes me. I feel like I’ve accomplished a part of what I set out to do with the COMET, and it’s very fulfilling. Of course, I’ll let you all know how the trip goes and I’ll have lots of photos to share. Now go over to http://projectventura.wordpress.com/ and check out these kick-ass ladies!

Tagged camper, design, DIY, education, greenbuilding, science, sustainability, vintage

Jan 22 2013

Sheet Metal Patches & Bodywork

It’s about 10 degrees here in MA today, and while I look back at these pictures from the summer I am wistful to say the least. So here’s some pictures of some sheet metal work we did on the trailer to patch some gaping holes and button the skins back up after replacing some of the wood inside the walls. Sometimes, when you replace the old rotten wood under the skins, they don’t fit back on just perfectly (they would if I wasn’t going to repaint the thing, but I am so I wasn’t too vigilant about it this time around). There was a gap on the corners of the trailer where the aluminum met and started to separate from the weight of the rear. These gaps had been there since I got the trailer, so I knew I’d have to patch it anyway.

First, we put a strip of sheet metal (aluminum flashing for this application – because it’s flexible/malleable) around the corner and underneath the member for extra protection. We just nailed it in to the new wood. This would be the flashing that would keep any water out. When you put the skins back down, caulk around the edges and screw it in with sheet metal screws (the ones with the little rubber gaskets work well for this, but we just caulked each spot where the screw would go before screwing it in).

This will fill the gap between the original aluminum siding that had separated at the corner. This is common to find in vintage trailers. Matt’s hairy arm, not mine .

Caulked and screwed back down.

We did the same thing to the spot under the old heater vent, which was a big gaping hole. We flashed with the aluminum strip wherever the skins didn’t meet up just right. This will keep the water out.

Under the old heater vent next to the front door (heater was removed). This step can be a pain in the butt, but is worth it to keep the new framing dry.

Once the flashing was in, we needed to patch that huge hole. We used a different type of sheet metal, stainless steel, for the flat panel that will cover this whole mess. See below.

The process is: caulk around the edges where you’re going to place the panel, then lay it on and hold it in place. The caulk should squish out a little, and create a full seal. Put caulk dots all around and sheet metal screw into these spots so that it seals around the entry point of each screw.

Close up detail.

There you have it! We did this on the other side of the trailer where the original water fill was. We didn’t match the corrugation of the original aluminum siding because we figured it was all getting painted turquoise and won’t be a big deal, but if I was doing a period-specific restoration I would match the corrugation pattern of the aluminum.

Thanks for reading and there’s more to come!

Tagged building, comet, DIY, sheet metal, trailer, vintage camper

The Comet Camper

Vintage campers will save the planet

New Video and oh hey I missed you guys!

Tiny House Building Workshop: North Carolina Edition

Project Ventura: a huge success!

A New School, A Podcast, and A Road Trip

I love my tiny house.

Neon Victorian Tiny House (that’s right, NEON PINK)

TEXAS! – finding the TINY in the “everything is bigger” state

Installing the Fresh Water Tank Fill Spout

My Life is Validated by Tenth-Grade Girls

Sheet Metal Patches & Bodywork

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