Project "Problem Child"

[poriggity]

This thread will be used to document the build and restoration of a project I've dubbed "problem child".

The project in question is a 1988 Lance LC980 slide in truck camper. I inherited this from my in laws. They were tired of paying storage fees on it, so my father in law told me that if I stored it at my house, I could have it. Score!! So, first matter of business was to get the camper out of the storage lot in the desert. Since the truck already had tie downs installed, and I knew the turn buckles were in the camper, I removed my tailgate and we made the 1.5 hour trip to the desert and picked up the camper.



First thing we noticed is that the turnbuckles were not going to work, as they were too short, so we devised a temporary plan for securing the camper to get it home. Combined all 4 turnbuckles to hold down the rear of the camper, and red necked up some ratchet straps for the front. As you'll see farther down in this thread, this has been rectified.

Here she is at home.. squatting the rear end of my 2500 pretty hard...





It was apparent that after a very squishy ride home, the first thing to do is to add either airbags, timbren Suspension enhancement or something else. After a lot of reading reviews on all the major products out there, I settled on timbrens. The cost to effectiveness ratio seemed good, and all the reviews on them have been positive. They replace your stock bumpstops and I'll say they work great. Took me 30 minutes to install, and that included looking for all my tools and putting them all back away. They definetly help with the ride while loaded, as well as getting rid of most of the squat in the truck.



Before timbrens:



After timbrens:



To be continued in next post....

Scott

[poriggity]

Managed to run the stove top for a little bit by hooking one of my BBQ tanks to the camper lines and push all the air out of all the lines, and got the fridge to light on propane! One small step for man, one huge leap for my camper....

[poriggity]

Replaced the bathroom fan, and replaced the broken vent trim in the dinette area...





Hooked up my BBQ propane tank to the camper, and managed to light the stove pilot and the oven pretty easily. The generator would not fire, and the fridge would not light on propane. I haven't had a lot of time to diagnose the problem, but I'm hoping to spend a little more time on it later. I have the fridge plugged into shore power, and it works fine on that.. go figure. I'm sure it's something simple.. it usually is.



Scott

[poriggity]

New mattress installed with kiddo testing it out...

Scott

[poriggity]

And some more pictures of the other side of the camper, and the back, for those of you who requested pictures. I took pictures in a turnout on my way home today. Never mind the vinyl trim falling iff, I gotta fix that. It came loose on the way home.



Scott

[poriggity]

Pulled my tail light lenses today and cleaned them up a bit.. They were caked in dirt pretty badly.. Here's a before and after picture. I also ordered some more LED bulbs for the tail lights, and aide "porch"


Before cleaning:


After cleaning:


Camera takes horrible pictures. Didn't get much time to work on the camper today as I promised my wife I'd keep the kiddo out of her hair so she could get some stuff done.

Scott

[My_Blue_Heaven]

I agree with D and Joe. I originally tied things down to the front of the bed and the bumper, but after awhile, they deformed. I urge you to spend the money to get Torklifts and frame mounts.

One of the big advantages of this forum is learning from the mistakes of others.

My .02, for whatever it's worth.

[poriggity]

I left home early this morning with truck and camper to head to galaxy campers in Ontario, ca to have the owner, David, wire my truck up for the camper, as it wasnt yet completely wired, and i was using magnetic tow lights as my brake/turn lights. David was awesome. He quoted me a price and stuck to it, and the work he did was top notch and very professional. To top it off, he saw my turnbuckle and chain arrangement, promptly pulled some longer threaded hooks out of his pile of stuff and said "Here, take these and that will allow you to get rid of your chain arrangement.. ", I was willing to pay him for them, but he gave them to me and said it was because the job took longer than he originally quoted. It took longer because he had a customer that heard about him, from canada, with an emergency. So, he helped them out for a bit, which I was totally cool with. Overall, an awesome experience, and I can tell you any and all camper service I need will be going through David at galaxy campers.





Scott

[JoeChiOhki]

67avion wrote:

Scott wrote:
Yes, I have looked at frame mounted tie downs. My family has been using happijac tie downs for decades with no Ill effects. I know frame mounted are stronger, and I may go that way eventually, but for now, the happijac are working great. I ask you, if happijac products consistently failed, or did not work for campers, would they continue selling them, risking a large lawsuit if the mounts failed?

Scott

Of course you are right, Happijacs are a good product according to a lot of folks. And I respect your family's experience. But, I have seen tie downs fail when a great deal of stress is experienced. That does not appear to be the case with frame mounted equipment.......best of luck.

Personally, I've seen more failures at the camper end of the tie-down than the truck end.

The big complaint people had with Happijac is that they mount to the truck bed and bumper, which is not as sturdy as it once was and can deform when heavy load is applied.

The big complaint I see about the frame mounted tie downs is they're using only a vertical clamping force instead of a bi-directional (Happijacs both pull at an angle and down where as Torklifts and belly bars basically just pull straight down) and without a bed mat the camper could potentially shift more.

[67avion]

Scott wrote:
Yes, I have looked at frame mounted tie downs. My family has been using happijac tie downs for decades with no Ill effects. I know frame mounted are stronger, and I may go that way eventually, but for now, the happijac are working great. I ask you, if happijac products consistently failed, or did not work for campers, would they continue selling them, risking a large lawsuit if the mounts failed?

Scott

Of course you are right, Happijacs are a good product according to a lot of folks. And I respect your family's experience. But, I have seen tie downs fail when a great deal of stress is experienced. That does not appear to be the case with frame mounted equipment.......best of luck.

[FireGuard]

Looks like a fun project and the price was right.
You will be fine with the Happijacks. I carried several campers, 2 well over 5k lbs and never had a problem with the HJ.
On the newer trucks with lighter bumpers and sheet metal, they add cross bars and L brackets and a reinforcement for the rear bumper.

[poriggity]

67avion wrote:
Hi there. Great project! However, I wonder about the tie downs and turnbuckles that are attached to your bumper and sheet metal. There have been discussions for a long time about failures with this arrangement. Have you considered a frame mounted product like Torklift Talons? Take a look at them, there are a lot of people on this forum that have experience with them that may be helpful.

Yes, I have looked at frame mounted tie downs. My family has been using happijac tie downs for decades with no Ill effects. I know frame mounted are stronger, and I may go that way eventually, but for now, the happijac are working great. I ask you, if happijac products consistently failed, or did not work for campers, would they continue selling them, risking a large lawsuit if the mounts failed?

Scott

[67avion]

Hi there. Great project! However, I wonder about the tie downs and turnbuckles that are attached to your bumper and sheet metal. There have been discussions for a long time about failures with this arrangement. Have you considered a frame mounted product like Torklift Talons? Take a look at them, there are a lot of people on this forum that have experience with them that may be helpful.

[poriggity]

bedrocker wrote:
Tell Dave Jeff from Lompoc said HI 🙂

I will Jeff, when I see him. I am looking forward to getting the truck "officially" wired for the camper. I'm pretty tired of using magnetic tow lights plugged into my 4 pin harness on the truck for stop lamps.. HAHAHA.
Scott

[bedrocker]

Tell Dave Jeff from Lompoc said HI 🙂