Short bed truck and camper combos

I have an 2015 Arctic Fox 865 with a "Fox Landing" bumper, it has a good 24" of overhang on my 2011 F-250. One of my coworkers just bought a Lance 865 with folding stairs and he is pleased. He tows a fishing boat on his adventures.

His Lance is an easy 1000lbs lighter than my Arctic Fox. He has less water, less gray and black,one 20lb propane, no oven and no hampers or cabinets around the bed and a two burner stove. But it is four seasons, it has a TV for football season and the bed is comfortable.

He can tow with no or little extension, I cannot.

We already settle, that slide is something you have to buy, but is triple slide having new-generation oven, or the 60 yo design?
Wait a minute, triple slides don't have space for ovens ;)
When you think you can add touch-screen GPS to older truck console, I can only wish you good luck.

Seems maybe a couple of you haven’t seen new TCs. :)

Trucks still have doors, seats, frames, beds, and gasoline and diesel engines, whoopee. As far as a GPS is concerned, that’s easy to add to an older truck, too. You could of course add any number of engines/brakes, etc. Heated seats with dual climate control has been available since early 2000s.

Sure, some brands haven’t innovated in truck campers, but Host sure has. They use lighter materials, now have triple slides for more space and multiple seating locations. They’ve added fireplaces and multiple types of seating locations and not just the normal dinettes. Of course, they also added convection microwaves, larger holding tanks, and bettter more modern insulation.

Before you say those new things in TCs can break, that’s the case for the new features on trucks as well.

As far as warranty goes, you can add a warranty to anything if you are willing to pay for it.

Back to shortbeds, there is nothing from a few years ago that compares to a triple slide shortbed of today.

I've always been amazed at how little truck camper designs have changed over the last 50 years. There has been little truly innovative concepts carried over to truck campers. Sure we have the upgraded electronic stuff mentioned above as well as Alde heat systems but the half dozen or so basic floor plans across the industry haven't changed much and my favorite pet peeve, the very uncomfortable dinette seating with the 90 degree, short seatbacks hasn't evolved at all. The single biggest change in the industry seems only to have been the price tags.

Looks like you did not see much of new trucks Jim.
The 12mpg I averaged in 2.5 years with 5-6000 lb campers, live traffic GPS, ability to listen to opera singing while cruising above 60 mph no worry about going to Death Valley for 124F adventure.
My GPS lead me to my friend door in Prince Rupert, BC, even it is US model.
Did I say you will get warranty?
TC? Ovens are the same design for 60 years, refrigerators got computer boards 30 years ago, but the same boxes for 50. Cabinets same as they were 100 years ago. You might get LED lighting in newer camper and MP3 player, but that is easy to upgrade in 20 yo camper.
Mattresses, unless you are buying $70k unit -is going to be cheap anyway and good idea to add foam topper, or get whole new thing from Costco,

Saying nothing changed is kind of like saying nothing changed in the new trucks. Still, probably worth considering different age trucks and truck campers if you want to save some money.

Kayteg1 wrote:
You are not going to have too many choices for TC for short bed, but what luxury you are seeking?
15 years for camper is not much and basic designs, basic appliances did not change.
What might change is deep TV compartment replaced by flat-screen bracket.
If you want a slide, that is something you have to buy with new camper, but almost everything else can be updated.

This is a good post. This is exactly what I found when I was looking around at newer truck campers. Nothing has really changed. I have an arctic fox. Even the interiors don’t look that different from the age of your rig to the new ones. You could update a few small things and come out with a truck camper that competes very well with new ones.

Frankly if you think about spending high-dollars on newish camper, why not spend it on new truck and get TC any size you want?
That is what I did.
Spend $6k on camper and $60k on truck. No worry about overloading since I have new dually, where new, aluminium technology increased payload by about 1000 lb and you can't tell old camper from 2 yo.
Plenty of very nice campers with single slide below 10 grands.

Host SB Rainier or Tahoe ... no equals in other brands. BTW, if that is too much, look for used models since they produced a lot of SB models over the years.

Truck Camper Magazine only features advertisers in their “guide”. Not a problem, but something to know if you are looking for “all” brands/models.

I would study the construction from these manufacturer's before I would buy anything new or used. Some of them still use luan backing behind the fiberglass skin. Some use azdel/composite backing.
Luan will delaminate quick if you get a leak with water getting in between the luan and fiberglass. Especially if the manufacturer skimped out on the glue bonding the two. Now if a manufacturer uses enough glue and good quality glue you will not have as many problems with a luan/wood backing.

Some have used luan then switched to azdel. You will have to study it to find out when they switched if you want something other than luan.

Some use wood frame construction still and some use aluminum frame. Some use 1 inch wall frames and some use 2 inch wall frames. Some use 2x4 plus 2x2 inch aluminum framing in some of their construction. Some use more insulation and some don't. You can get different R values in the roof, floor and sidewalls than others. Some have a crowned roof and some have a flat one.

I don't know your needs. Some people camp in freezing temps and some don't.

Another thing is slide out mechanisms. Lippert, Happijac and Schwintek
Some give you problems more than the other

Just my 2 cents :)