Short Bed Truck with Long Bed Camper

garryk6 wrote:
Valhalla, welcome to the TC community!! I Own a 2002 F350 CcSB 4x4. I was looking at shortbed campers. A friend had a Bigfoot 9’8” TC made to fit short beds in a shortbed crew Dodge 2500. I measured from the back of his bed to the back of the camper and it was 38”. When I found my 1966 Avion Camper it was gutted and is a 10’ Camper. In my truck, the extent of camper sticking past the bed is 32”. Over half of that rests on the tailgate. I have traveled with and without the tailgate and there is no difference for me. And the tailgate does get dirty, but even in Alaska running gravel roads I have not had all the chips people talk about. I rebuilt the camper similar to stock but did shift as much weight forward as I could as I built it. I ran several years without bags. Just StableLoads and Rancho 9000’s. When I added a superhitch and 32” extension to tow my tab trailer, I found I needed bags to keep the nose down for my headlights. My camper scales approximately 2500 lbs wet and fullly loaded with the whole family (6) with gear for two weeks traveling around Alaska, we scaled at 10,900. A few years ago I scored a used set of Vision 19.5 rims and load range G tires. That made a HUGE difference in loaded ride quality, but empty it is a bit harsh. I hope these real life numbers and experiences help in your decision making. That Dodge 2500 was actually carrying 3500 lbs and the truck looked like it. Those Bigfoot’s are nice but boy are they heavy. Good luck!! Garry in Kodiak, AK

Thank you for not wandering off the question and assuming when I said 2500lb, I meant 6000lb (sheesh).

Yeah, I'm betting your trailer hitch several feet behind the axle even if not a huge trailer does more to take weight off the front axle than your camper does.

I wonder if a lot of people are confusing squatting due to overloading on the rear axle with the front end getting light and they don't understand that COG shifting inches has negligible impact on an already overloaded rear axle...when the original question had no assumption of being overloaded (I was looking at 2500lb loaded weight when the truck is rated for 3300lb)