2014 Truck Camper Building From Scratch

2012 Chevrolet Silverado 2500HD with E load rated tires.
GVWR:9500
GAWR front:5200
GAWR rear:6200
Cargo Max (includes occupants):2909

When I had the EMPTY truck weighed:
GAW front:4180
GAW rear:3040
GVW:7220

And then with truck LOADED with camper, gear, people, dog, etc:
GAW front:4000
GAW rear:4860
GVW:8860

Leaving the weight of the fully loaded camper:
1640
I do not have a weight for the empty camper alone. I would guess several hundred pounds of gear, leaving the weight of the empty camper to be around 1000 pounds.
The computer on the truck gave an MPG rating of between 10 and 11 for the approx. 4000 mile trip. The gas prices were between $2.04 (in Michigan)and $2.89 (in remote part of Colorado). Probably an average of $2.40, I would guess.
__________________

mkirsch wrote:
Is the "chin-up bar" your design compromise to have a full height door in the rear?

What's the deal with the open rear overhang with the half-doors and the tailgate inside the camper?

Looks like maybe you fold the tailgate down to make a semi-enclosed porch. Seems like you made huge sacrifices to gain a tiny amount of space up front, but wasted a TON of space in the rear.

I heard a TC manufacturer say that it was not possible to have full size doors because of instability. The bar keeps the back sides from spreading out and also is great for grabbing for safety. That makes it possible to omit the usual structural piece over the door and allows many possible door designs. I'm surprised manufacturers have not utilized a similar strategy to allow a better rear end design. My design is obviously primitive, but hopefully a TC designer will come up with something better.

The doors are three pieces on each side. The bottoms fold up and can sit on the tailgate while driving. The top pieces fold down when the top is lowered.

When camping: Tailgate goes down and a small sliding floor piece goes over the tailgate to form the floor extension.
Two side pieces fold up from that movable floor piece to form the back sidewalls. The three piece doors click together and become 2 big doors.

The inside is then a full size completely enclosed 8 foot length camper, because the previously open ended rear is reclaimed as interior space.
The goal was to have full size double rear doors on an 8 foot camper and leave the tailgate on and up while driving.
It works, but I still need to make it simpler and I have some idea's for improvements.

Is the "chin-up bar" your design compromise to have a full height door in the rear?

What's the deal with the open rear overhang with the half-doors and the tailgate inside the camper?

Looks like maybe you fold the tailgate down to make a semi-enclosed porch. Seems like you made huge sacrifices to gain a tiny amount of space up front, but wasted a TON of space in the rear.

https://youtu.be/rBS0j917JGA

This one shows a quick look at the first trip with the camper.

mkirsch wrote:
The last updates from last year imply that the air cylinders alone are holding up the camper. I would not trust them even if you did something like add cutoff valves at each cylinder. There are other places the cylinders can leak, and there's nothing worse than waking up in the middle of the night with your camper's roof slowly settling down on top of you!

Admittedly I haven't watched the video so I don't know if you've addressed this particular issue but I highly encourage the use of a MECHANICAL prop to back up the cylinders when the roof is raised. Again, air can, and eventually will, leak.

I didn't trust them either. I do have shut offs but, as you said, a small leak at any seal, will cause the cylinder to drop. So I do have pop up rods that support.

davesteve wrote:

Here is a link to some new pics:
https://photos.google.com/u/0/album/AF1QipPaUMJFYJ7fd_tbW9SQjkHiCtqxJj1_eGOfczBd

403. That’s an error.

We're sorry, but you do not have access to this page. That’s all we know.

The last updates from last year imply that the air cylinders alone are holding up the camper. I would not trust them even if you did something like add cutoff valves at each cylinder. There are other places the cylinders can leak, and there's nothing worse than waking up in the middle of the night with your camper's roof slowly settling down on top of you!

Admittedly I haven't watched the video so I don't know if you've addressed this particular issue but I highly encourage the use of a MECHANICAL prop to back up the cylinders when the roof is raised. Again, air can, and eventually will, leak.

Very cool will be interesting to see how it holds up. And I thought my camper project had been complex.

Awesome!

Nicely done!