Cadillac of Homeless Shelters

HEY! I love the designs youve done (at your blog-I just visited it).
I just wanted to give you a bit of helpin something I noticed that youve had problems with in the past. You had said in one of your blog posts that you used a variety of wall thickness in some of your inventions and had trouble bending thinner wall tubing because it would collapse. Well I have a great fix for that! Itll enable you to bend ANY thin wall tubing without it collapsing. The only thing youll need is access to a tall or long full size freezer, and some water. (Do you know where im going with this?)
Well anyway, you simply plug up 1 end of the tubing you want to bend, then fill the tubing with water and plug the other end so that it doesnt leak. Then stick the whole thing in the freezer till the waters frozen (dont do this with tubing that has a seam that wont hold water.)
Anywho, once the waters frozen you can then bend the tube with any tubing bender or muscle it along by hand (but itll be difficult to so by hand when its got ice in it. ) But anyway, they use this method of bending tubing in order to make trumpets and saxaphones and other thin wall tubing instruments.
So, the idea is that the ice is hard and strong enough (when confined in the tube) to keep the tubing from collapsing when bending.
Ive tried it myself and its worked very very well for me especially with very thin wall tube such as brass, copper,aluminum, and steel.
I did it once with steel tubing but the problem I came across was due to the fact that the tube has a welded seam that ran the full length of the tube, and it wasnt very strong of a weld and the ice cracked the seam as it expanded . The ice wont expand that much, but it was just enough to mess it up enough to have to find a new piece of tube that didnt have a seam.
I hope this helps you !!
Sincerely Joseph Kenyon
( http://www.josephkenyon.com )

just mount that onto a reversed trike and you would have a fine Mobil home. the ultimate work bike atachment

Good for you thinking of those that are less fortunate.

Paul—

Very well thought out, and perhaps even better, very thought provoking.

Not being homeless, but looking at your homeless shelter, it me makes me ask, “Just how much is it that I really need?”

Thanks!

Very creative- and looks as if a TON of work and time went into the design and creation of it. The wooden, flat roof, seems the only worry I’d have- but the flat surface to display wares, is a great idea.

If this guy weren’t in Washington, I’d LOVE to shoot this thing for an episode of TINY YELLOW HOUSE TV.

I have a homeless, mini-cube design I’ve been workin’ on- Its only a comic-like/pretty-detailed sketch, but Kent, I’ll have to send it your way at some point (I also plan on trying to build it eventually).

-Deek
http://www.relaxshacks.com and Tiny Yellow House TV

Nice! I can see a detachable folding fabric canopy on top being handy for shade and rain protection as well as providing some extra outdoor living space.

I think it’s great. Concerned that the roof would catch rain though. Is there any way to catch the run-off for use?

Now – how to get it out there to those who need it.

Wow… the ingenuity! That is fantastic!

is there some sort of bathroom? just curious. I’m lookikng to start a similar project and I find these ideas facinating. I feel that everyone should have to live in something so basic for at least a month so that we can understand what luxuries we really need.

Paul, very clever. I’ve been noodling ideas for an ultra-small car trailer camper, and your design is very close to what I want. Put it on a small car trailer, and voila. You might think of adapting it for that purpose and putting/selling plans on the web.

Now someone needs to come up with a safe place for the homeless to park these shelters when not on the street collecting resources. Or is that something that already exists?

Really well thought out. The windows make it so it is not claustrophobic.

Now if they could make it legal for these to be set up on vacant lots such as they do with city gardens and maybe supply some kind of community bathroom including showers.

I am glad to see that people are working on the problem of homelessness because Uncle Sam sure isn’t!

It’s been a time since I’ve seen something so creative.
Thumbs up!

Kisses from Nydia.

This is just downright inspiring.

Paul, congratulations! It’s so refreshing to see that there are people looking for solutions instead of complaining. There are so many empty lots now days. Probably, the creation of a temporary park for homeless people where they can be until they rebuilt they life, could be a good solution.

I hope your homeless person doesn’t live in a very hilly place. Otherwise there might be some trouble pushing that thing up a hill.

[…] Paul Elkins: High Mileage Trikes Tiny House Blog Design Boom Tree Hugger Sustainability […]

Great idea for homeless folks. I like the design. No one deserves to be homeless.
Gotta ask, how much does it cost, homeless people are poor ?

Hi,
I like your unit and think it is nicely thought out and built.

Here is another similar unit that may interest you if you have not seen it…..

http://edar.org/

They seem to have a marketing and distribution system for their units already and may be able to help you with that….

Brian

I love this–thanks for sharing it.

It is tiny, but it has a sink and a stove. maybe when they house the homeless vets, they can provide them a tiny home in a camping area, instead of trying to stuff them into an apartment building and have their PTSD get the best of them.

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This is a great idea! The only concern I have is the size and type of the wheels. I think the kind of wheel you have might work quite well in easy pushing situations. But might be really difficult on rough ground or bumpy services. I am guessing that the way the wheels you have chosen swivel will make it very manoeuvrable, but the size would seem to me likely to get stuck in holes or in soft ground. At first I thought maybe larger wheels like barrow orbicycle wheels might work better, but they would not swivel, and using four of them would make manoeuvring difficult. The only option that I can think of that might avoid the wheels getting stuck and allow larger wheels to be used would be to have two wheels in the middle and two shorter resting feet at the front, like a two wheeled barrow, for when you stop. This might do the trick and avoid getting stuck and keep manoeuvrability whilst making it around, and then you would need stabilisers that could be put down when the shelter was parked and being used. Anyway hope this is constructive, and good luck with them!

How can I. Get a blueprint of a homeless shelter on wheels. So i buld one for my self i like to redesine it to what i whont in it or one that i can put on hack of a bicycle. Please replay to the email address that provide

Not good for fluffy people.

Its ingenious but trusting design.

It looks somewhat fragile for a homeless person to sleep in when around them others don’t get the same treatment. I think for practicality you’d need to start from a more durable rain proof shell.

Secondly, I think you’d have to do something about the wheels. I see poor sleeping people being pushed into traffic.

Hi I like this idea. I would use the louvered window off a VW westfallia. I think the closets & doors out of one of those would be perfect as well. Awesome concept!