With a 5-week trip planned for June/July I'm looking for ways to make life a lil easier and more organized in our Trail Mite. I'd like to build a cabinet to mount on the tongue to enclose the propane-tank and battery and to provide some storage room for our jacks. hoses, extension cords, tools, and whatever else I can cram in there.

Have any of you built something like this? I'd hoping to see some photos and read some ideas on contruction method, materials, etc.

I'm also gonna check out Ikea and Home Depot in the hopes of finding something ready-built that could be modified.

Ideas???

Thanx,
Vic

How about a cool looking diamond plate tongue box?

PRO SERIES DIAMOND PLATE TRAILER TONGUE BOX

Like This?

The box is from Home Depot or Lowes annd is mounted with Uni-Strut.

Search for this and you will find we have talked about it before.....more than once too!

Click to view attachment

Here is the rear edge mount.

We have had several discussions of these boxes, and found that people have built them (of wood, aluminum, and who know what else), bought various storage boxes and adapted them, and found boxes designed specifically for this purpose.

Some of the designs sold for trailers (such as Donna's example ) are tapered (or trapezoidal), to fit the A-frame tongue and maximize storage while minimizing interference with the tug's bumper in a turn. I found a few in a web search, just to show what I'm talking about...
Geneva
Delta (same one Donna already posted)
Tuffy
Tool Box Store
These are generally aluminum, and steel is common, but I know there are plastic boxes of this shape out there.

With any tongue box I would be very careful about the weight. It can add up, between the box and contents, and could be significant to both trailer balance and tongue structure.

Sheech!!!!!

Here I'm trying my darndnest to loose weight (well at least on my trailer' tongue!).... and here some folks are lookin' to ADD weight, go figure.... , ROTFLMBO!!!

Vic-

I built one that had that trapozoidal shape out of cedar.

Cheers,

Coop

There's a good source of ideas: many of the Teardrops & Tiny Travel Trailers people have tongue boxes, typically of a scale more suited to our eggs than most commercial products.

Rich, that link didn't work for me until I logged into T&TTT, so I'm posting the image here so everyone can see it in case they have the same problem... I hope you don't mind. Nice job of tying the design into the trailer appearance.

Click to view attachment

Coop, when I try to view the picture from the link...I get a "not authorized" message, would you mind posting the picture here, please.

That's the message I got before I logged into T&TTT, so I guess it wasn't just me. Anyway, Coop's picture is the one I posted, above...

Thanks Brian!

I am surprised nobody is concerned with adding too much weight onto that part of the trailer.
As a 13 ft Boler owner I know that the weakes part of the frame is just behind where the front of the fiberglass comes down and the frame bends from the angle to straight.
All I can imagine is the force generated with the extra wieght on this weakest link going down a rural road hitting pot holes or going down a rough road and not to mention those camp-ground speed bumps.....
Speed bumps?
"I SAID NOT TO MENTION THOSE SPEED BUMPS"
Gerry the canoebuilder

I am concernd and always watching the weight that I place in the area of the box which I pictured above.

The box itself is very lightweight molded plastic and the propane bottle in it was already on the tongue.
I keep the storage down to my cables and jacks and other lightweight but outdoors purposed items.
I even moved the battery to the inside to help lighten the load.

I am not so worried about the frames weak spot as mine has been nicely reinforced but the way the extra weight here effects the way the rig handles is what I think of.

Another nice benifit of my box setup is that I can stand on it safely and reach the roof.that has been very handy a few times.

I REPETE!!!

YUP- - --that's one of the 5 places our Scamp frame broke..... Larry

I used a plastic A frame box from Pricess Auto, it sits over 2 x 11 lb. propane tanks and a battery case, hinged in a locking cab over design. I'll post pics after I find them on the other computer and post them with suggested design changes.

The design caught a lot of interest at last years Glass with Class meet in PEI. A lot of people took pictures, I'm sure someone has come up with an improved design by now.

I may not have close up pictures of the specifics and the trailer is still in storage, but here is a shot that will give you an idea of what it looks like. If you are interested I can sketch out the basics and post them as well.

Click to view attachment

I’ve have made three boxes, one for my first Casita and again for my second Casita. Then I made one for my brother’s Casita.

Each time they have gotten better. The goal was to have both a propane tank and a Honda generator which could be started easily in place.

My first one was made by welding together a angle iron frame and filling the walls with aluminum diamond plate.
Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

The second & third were made by having the aluminum diamond plate bent to create the sides. The top was heliarced on by the metal supplier for $35. On these last two, we lengthened the trailer tongue which gives greater leverage (less tongue weight) and more room for bicycles.
Click to view attachment Click to view attachment Click to view attachment

The aluminum and bending was pricy though.

PS: I now have an 18’ Casita

Thanks Mike, and to all who have posted replies. Mike's box is pretty much what I had in mind. I'll be checking with the local aluminum fabricators to see how economically feasable this deluxe route is.

The other real possiblity is a plastic garden-bench/storage thingy I found at Target. It's light, sturdy, water-tight and is just about the dimensions I had in mind. It would take a little modifying and I'd need to add a locking latch.

Whichever way I go, I'll need to take off the existing tank-bracket and battery mount. That's what the good lord made angle-grinders for.

Thanks too to those who cautioned me on adding tongue weight. Luckily our TrailMite is already a little light overall (no shower, no toilet, no jacuzzi, no beer tap) so I'm thinking that a ten pound box, ten pounds of jacks, an extension cord, clothes-line, water-hose, our little propane grill and perhaps a little more, won't put the lil thing too out of balance toward the front. But if Mike's set-up, with all his stuff and a couple of 30-pound+ bikes is okay, I think ours will be just fine. But worst case, I'd use it just for the lightest, bulkiest to free up some inside space.

I'll post pics and descriptions once I've got it done, whichever way I go.

Vic