Advice on truck and camper purchase

[Spikeman]

Greetings I have been reading and learning at the Forum for the past 3 years taking notes. I finally decided to buy a truck and camper. Like many of you I face the following dilemmas off-road ability vs. style and comfort. or spending big bucks for something I may not be crazy about for years on end. Having almost ruled out a popup camper. I am considering making the following compromise decision advice and criticism please.
2019 RAM 2500 4x4 Crew Cab Tradesman 8ft box 6.4 gas Hemi
PAYLOAD 3190.00LBS Off-road package ,Anti-Spin Differential Rear Axle, Electric Shift-on-the-Fly Transfer Case LT275/70R18E OWL On/Off-Road Tires 3690 payload, Hill decent ,off-road shocks Ground clearance 8.6” Many components from the Power Wagon will be adding rear progressive Sumo Super springs Please advise?
Palomino HS750 hard side dry weight with options about 2150lbs H 8'2' W 86” FL 8'2 Solar panels 200w,2x Battery Group 24 12V AGM Battery, Tie Down Package-4 Torklift Brackets W/4 Happijac Turnbuckles & Chain, rubber bed mat. Palomino now has all aluminum frame with upgraded interior small but doable for a single man
Question how much 4 wheeling will I be capable of ? Forest roads only Burr Trail or Mogollon Rim trails like or something more extreme. Should I buy a Pop-up instead? Thanks

[Kayteg1]

Than you have forest roads and logging roads.
When I never had intention to leave pavement, when Great Canyon campground was full, I took advantage of forest road behind the park gate.
Truck gauge show it at 14% and that was the most off-roading my RWD made to date.
It was beautiful there btw and on following day, at canyon trail I meet the guy who paid lot of $$ to have his chair sitting over neighbor sewer pipe.

[ajriding]

Yes, this is a reoccurring theme on forums.

People say "off road" and then 100's chime in thinking that a DOT dirt road or gravel road is what "off road" means. No, these are still roads. These roads do not require any special equipment. They are "off pavement" but that is not a real topic.

If people are confused by the blurry line between DOT maintained roads and user-made non-road trails, then they probably are not or will never go off road anyway, so we can just skip any replay to such a post and save the space

[emcvay]

ajriding wrote:

emcvay wrote:

smarty wrote:
Remember that dually's suck when it comes to off roading

Depends on who's driving 😉 and whom you ask 😉

Mine isn't a true 'offroaders' rig mind you and I don't have plans to try a jeep trail but it did fine on our rough road to the cabin though not as easily as our thinner SRW.

My only real issue at this point is the stable loads I installed need to be cut down about ½" so the overloads don't enguage without the camper on

Dirt roads and gravel roads are not off-road, they are on a dirt road, or on a gravel road.
When people want to go off road with a TC they probably mean actually off of the road be it gravel, dirt, asphalt or pavers. Rocks that are out in the wilderness which you do not see on a prepared road are a biggie since they will get stuck in the duallys. The width is another as many off road tracks are actually trails that were made by previous drivers leaving tracks for you to follow. They are almost always SRW tracks, so having two extra wheels makes this more difficult too, and near impossible if the track is too narrow and walled in by obstacles… So off-road means not on a road. thanks

There is 'off road' and there is 'off-road'....if you mean people who want to drive where no one has driven before, ok. Nuff said. However, most people think of 'off road' in different terms (and you cannot define that just because you want to).

My drive 'off-road' was on a dirt trail (at best) that other 4x4's had driven on but no one was going to take a caddy down that 'road'. Goat trail might be better description but it was wide enough for a truck camper...my driveway isn't much better. Yes, it's a 'driveway' but just barely. Sure a car can sometimes make it up there (in the summer, in dry weather, if one is careful) but as my sister once found it, that car might also get stranded until someone with a 4x4 comes along to help her get back out (and she never even made it half way). Campers, hard side ones, do often go places they shouldn't and I've seen dually's go placed you'd never imagine...but then I also used to drive a Duece and a half :d 😛 No the dually isn't going to hit the trails at Moab with the jeeps or crawl over rocks but it will go 'off road' which generally means to go off of a maintained public road (county dirt paved or whatever)....

[Grit_dog]

Very nice start to a sweet setup! Your rig will be about as off road capable as any truck camper combo could realistically be.
Good times ahead!

[Spikeman]

Has the 8 speed transmission. taking the advice of the(weight police) I am trying to stay under 3190 lbs payload the SS1500 weights 1900 + 200 with accessories dry. Sumo Super Springs (progressive spring rate) 2660 lbs capacity. The tires are are off road 33in look small because of 12in clearance Thanks for the complements That is a Tradesman with near maximum options the sweet spot in value in my opinion decent cloth and plastic interior loaded paid only $39820 after $3000 rebates + tax title etc. Why pay $70000 for a Laramie then take it off road.

[ajriding]

emcvay wrote:

smarty wrote:
Remember that dually's suck when it comes to off roading

Depends on who's driving 😉 and whom you ask 😉

Mine isn't a true 'offroaders' rig mind you and I don't have plans to try a jeep trail but it did fine on our rough road to the cabin though not as easily as our thinner SRW.

My only real issue at this point is the stable loads I installed need to be cut down about ½" so the overloads don't enguage without the camper on

Dirt roads and gravel roads are not off-road, they are on a dirt road, or on a gravel road.
When people want to go off road with a TC they probably mean actually off of the road be it gravel, dirt, asphalt or pavers. Rocks that are out in the wilderness which you do not see on a prepared road are a biggie since they will get stuck in the duallys. The width is another as many off road tracks are actually trails that were made by previous drivers leaving tracks for you to follow. They are almost always SRW tracks, so having two extra wheels makes this more difficult too, and near impossible if the track is too narrow and walled in by obstacles… So off-road means not on a road. thanks

[emcvay]

smarty wrote:
Remember that dually's suck when it comes to off roading

Depends on who's driving 😉 and whom you ask 😉

Mine isn't a true 'offroaders' rig mind you and I don't have plans to try a jeep trail but it did fine on our rough road to the cabin though not as easily as our thinner SRW.

My only real issue at this point is the stable loads I installed need to be cut down about 1/2" so the overloads don't enguage without the camper on

[emcvay]

My old setup after driving more than 30 minutes offroad with major ruts and off camber corners. I did shift the camper once and definitely scared myself once on an off camber turn (which prompted me to think dually) but I made it in with the mill in tow (out I had the customer pull the mill and that's actually when I scared myself).

I would not recommend the 990 as an 'off road' camper though! Just a logging road camper 😉

[smarty]

Remember that dually's suck when it comes to off roading

[emcvay]

Ha! I hauled my 990 on an F350 SRW LB 4x4 PS offroad to a milling job. It was a bit harrowing at times but only because I didn't slow down enough. I didn't break anything and I decided not to do it a second time LOL but now I have a dually that handles the camper much better (it weighs in about 4850lbs ready to go) and might consider it again.

Hope you enjoy your setup for years to come! To me it's all about intended use and how often you intend to use. In my case we want more comfort and less offroad ability as we spend a LOT of time in the camper (in the last 6 or 7 weeks we were in it 4 of them at least).

Enjoy

[FireGuard]

God looking truck.
Does the 19 have the 8 speed auto?
That seemed to be the only complaint with the Hemi with the 2-3 gear ratio on the 6 speed.

[ajriding]

Spikeman wrote:

That's a handsome truck! The Rams have he best body lines.

Update as you add suspension mods.

Strange you went with the smallest pop up, but you will not know its on there when off-road so much.
Campers are always a compromise of something

[jimh406]

Spikeman wrote:
The dilemma has resolved itself! I purchased the Ram 2500 with off road package at a big discount yesterday and it is huge.

Congratulations!

Does this model have rear coil springs? Are you getting bigger tires to fill those wheel wells?

[jimh406]

lonegunman wrote:
Most of the advice you get here is bad. You do not need a dually to buy a truck camper and it is possible to drive down a dirt road with a non-pop up camper. Air bags are always a plus, they do get that right.

I hope you are counting your own advice. ;). Any way, only 4 people mentioned a dually on this thread. 😄

As far as air bags go, there isn’t consensus that anyone should have air bags. 🙂