Last week I was at Outfitter in Longmont, CO to have a couple of items fixed under warranty on my 2011 Apex 8 pop up camper. While I was at Outfitter, they were in process of assembling their new all molded fiberglass / gel coat Apex 8 camper shell body. I was told that they made the molds for this camper awhile back, but are just now making camper serial #1. I guess that it took their fiberglass manufacturer awhile to work out the production bugs of making acceptable parts. If the camper is well accepted, I was told Outfitter plans to convert their Apex and Juno models to all molded fiberglass bodies. The price right now is projected to be a little more than the current welded aluminum frame / Filon composite camper with the molded fiberglass roof, but I’m guessing that the final price will be worked out after they add everything up and apply overhead and profit.
The current Apex and Juno campers use a molded / gel coat fiberglass tub, roof, cab over insert (the part that makes up the under bed storage box, bed drawer slot, and cab over storage boxes on either side of the bed), and shower stall. These will be re-used in the new all fiberglass / gel coat camper. The molded (fiberglass with balsa wood cores) granite-look counter top, table, and overhead cabinet end pieces will also continue to be used. What is new is the entire upper camper box / cab over, which is now 100 percent fiberglass / gel coat with no wood whatsoever used in its construction. The new upper camper box / cab over also now sports a really nice looking raised design on the front nose of the cab over. The overall look and size of the camper will be unchanged. The height and width of the camper are fixed by the mold size, but the length can be varied from the 8.5 foot Apex 8 box up to the larger Juno 10 box. To my knowledge, all other features and options remain unchanged, although Outfitter is now using pre-finished birch plywood (called UV coat in the trade) for their cabinet work instead of framed panel construction. Also Outfitter will continue to use wood for other interior construction, and the basement floor will also continue to be an aluminum framed, waterproofed luan / foam sandwich as before. This is necessary in order to make the floor removable to give access to the water tanks and other mechanical in the basement.
The new molded fiberglass / gel coat upper camper box / cab over is constructed as follows: an outer layer of white gel coat, a layer of fiberglass, a high density block foam core, and an inner layer of fiberglass. All high strength areas use sandwiched, synthetic, high density solid board that is designed to completely saturate with resin. No wood, balsa or otherwise, is used in the exterior shell construction, which makes the Outfitter shell 100 percent high strength, wood free, molded fiberglass, which is different from molded fiberglass campers which use balsa wood as a sandwiched core structural material. (I'm not saying fiberglass / balsa wood construction is inferior, just that there is no wood to ever get wet and possibly rot.) The shell’s inner fiberglass surface is not gel coat, but is trimmed out with high grade, durable, soft vinyl upholstery material that is backed with a foam liner for additional R factor. The final weight has yet to be determined, but is projected to be about the same as the current aluminum framed model, and hopefully a few pounds less.
I’m guessing that the move to a molded fiberglass / gel coat body shell is to allow Outfitter to differentiate itself in the marketplace with a superior construction technique.
I look forward to seeing how this new upgrade works out. I really like my Outfitter Apex 8 and, in my opinion, the features that make Outfitter the best pop-up on the market just got better.
Terry
