Ski RV's, who's sleeping in parking lots?

[eldereldo]

Wow have you measured pin weight? Bags or polymer bump stop springs on the Taco?

Have you had trailer brakes, bearings, and alignment inspected/serviced? Seems like a lot for a Taco, depending on if you have any other passengers or gear in the truck. How does it feel when stopping?

With respect to MTB, what I’ve found with short length bumper pull trailers is that adding a rack to the trailer bumper really adds a lot of mass far behind the axles (increases moment of inertia) and can increase propensity to sway if your hitch and trailer balance isn’t well set up to counteract it. Now of course it will be a lot different on a 5er, as the pivot point is over your truck’s rear axle and not 3+ feet behind it, but you’re pulling with a Taco not a 1/2 ton. So anyways bikes on the roof of the truck will be more stable than bikes behind the 5er.

According to GVWR pin weight is between 450lbs dry to around 650 loaded, of course you have to make sure you dont load the trailer up with shit, and that you keep it balanced. Tacoma has the towing package which increases tow capacity to 6800 lbs, put air springs on it long ago as I used to tow a 16’ car hauler with race car and a weekends load of tires etc , had no problem, that was close to 5000lbs. Truck load capacity is 1360, no one besides me and my wife in vehicle. Towed it 150km back to my place in a howling cross wind, truck was just as stable as if was running with the topper, easily handles the weight braking, steep hills require 4th (auto) but that is recommended for towing on anything but dead flat anyways. I did a lot of research before going this way and found several instances of people towing with compact trucks and these trailers. The hardest thing was installing a fifth wheel hitch, there are no custom rail mounting kits, so got a generic one and of the lighter hitchs, then adapted it. Also needed to work around the fact that the Tacoma bed is composite so everything had to be built to by-pass bolting anything directly to the bed. In the end, if it turns out that it is to hard on the truck, then I’ll go bigger, but for now going to try it out.

[SchralphMacchio]

Nice! That’s a really light pin weight for a Bigfoot! Most of their bumper pulls nowadays are like 900 lbs tongue weight! My 19’ cabin ORV, when loaded, has about 1000 lbs tongue weight, plus I have wife, kids, dog, ridic amounts of tools and gear, canopy cover, so half ton wasn’t even an option I wanted to consider.

My FIL also has a heavily modded Taco with tow package. He removed the bed entirely and replaced it with a custom built (aluminum?) flat bed that he made with locking gear cabinets on the side rails etc. He puts a motorcycle in the bed and also flat tows his Jeep (not at the same time, just one or the other for self shuttling very remote multi day hiking trips).

[eldereldo]

Old Bigfoots are awesome BTW. I’ve seen some great renovation projects. As far as upgrades I can’t recommend enough changing at least one of the ceiling fans for a MaxxFan Deluxe 10 speed reversible fan - at the lowest speed it uses only 0.15A, and with the integrated rain shroud you can run it in basically any weather (except maybe not completely nuking winds). We run our bathroom fan in exhaust mode and use it as the drying room.
I got a cheap wireless indoor/outdoor thermometer from Amazon and keep the outdoor sensor inside the propane cover, and inside the cabin it tells me RH, plus I have another cheap thermometer/hygrometer combo inside the cabin - that helps me manage moisture and venting (we have 4 humans plus dog in the cabin so it’s a lot of moisture generation).
I also really like having Mopeka Pro wireless propane level sensors, but that’s mostly useful because we use ours a lot in the winter and it helps me know when to fill a cylinder or both - we have yet to do long enough of a cold weather trip to actually deplete the full 60 lbs of propane capacity that we can carry.
I replaced the dual handle shower valve with this thermostatic shower valve and it works great (also a safety issue so that the kids can’t burn themselves with hot water):

MISSMIN 4 inch Thermostatic RV... https://www.amazon.com/dp/B098NGP43C...p_mob_ap_share

I wired in a dual 12V/USB charging station (just got a cheap marine one from Amazon) just above our stereo console which has fat 12V wiring (but we never run the stereo because the BT speaker is way better), and set up a nice charging platform for all the various crap that we bring, and it adds a supplemental voltage monitor.

Just random thoughts for upgrade ideas! You probably want to replace that fridge if it’s still 33 years old!

Yep, fan is definitely on the list, good idea on propane monitor. Once it warms up here ( -32 this morning) will test the appliances and see what is/isnt working. According the the seller they all work, but you know how that goes. Fridge actually looks in remarkable shape, Ive seen some where the coils etc were totally rusted, this has no evidence of leaks, and the fridge looks new inside. Wont be able to see if it really works until much later when we get some weather that is way warmer than now. But expect that will be likely to need replacement. Been looking at the options, 3 ways are stupid expensive, there is a company in the states who makes a replacement system for a lot of the older fridges that changes it to a 12v low draw compressor. you basically remove the existing cooling system, and the new one goes in its place, keeps your existing fridge body so you don't have to redo cabinets to put something else in.

[eldereldo]

Nice! That’s a really light pin weight for a Bigfoot! Most of their bumper pulls nowadays are like 900 lbs tongue weight! My 19’ cabin ORV, when loaded, has about 1000 lbs tongue weight, plus I have wife, kids, dog, ridic amounts of tools and gear, canopy cover, so half ton wasn’t even an option I wanted to consider.

My FIL also has a heavily modded Taco with tow package. He removed the bed entirely and replaced it with a custom built (aluminum?) flat bed that he made with locking gear cabinets on the side rails etc. He puts a motorcycle in the bed and also flat tows his Jeep (not at the same time, just one or the other for self shuttling very remote multi day hiking trips).

Yeh their new stuff is quite a bit heavier, the usual bloat of adding all kinds of higher grade options. I considered going the flatbed route, but I wanted to keep the utility of the bed and a topper for everyday use. I’ll put in a plywood floor to level it out to the rail height so it is smooth for normal use. Otherwise the actual hitch just weighs 65lbs and attaches with 4 pins so it goes in or out in minutes.

[SchralphMacchio]

Hah, my bumper pull hitch is way more than 65 lbs!!! That’s awesome! Keep pics of the project updated here!

[eldereldo]

Rails add 40 lbs to the total hitch weight, there is a lighter hitch from a company called Anderson which is aluminum and weighs just 40 lbs for the hitch, but it has some ‘features’ I didn't like so went with this instead. Will definitely post updates once I can tear into it.

[SchralphMacchio]

This just popped up in Gear Swap!

https://www.tetongravity.com/forums/...nce-Camper-4x4

[Trackhead]

Vanlife in Yellowstone….lot better than the old snow coaches.

[Ski220]

X post.
Saw this today in Jackson, Wy.
All the way from Quebec.

[powdork]

Weird, the nordvan website only mentions Sprinters. That looks awesome and I assume the blue gasket means there's a pass thru

[evdog]

What's in the box on the rear carrier?

[Trackhead]

Nord Van looks great but that aluminum box on the back looks ridiculous. I bet I’d drives a little unwieldy.

[eldereldo]

Nord Van looks great but that aluminum box on the back looks ridiculous. I bet I’d drives a little unwieldy.

Yeh, the straps seem to indicate it’s a bit sketchy.

[Cruiser]

Think they've got some kinda moto in there? Or just extra enclosed condiment storage

[DanoT]

What's in the box on the rear carrier?

The box looks like a powder mag. Throw your own bombs in the backcountry.

[Buster Highmen]

from: https://www.instagram.com/p/CpJx3lrNecw/

[skaredshtles]

from: https://www.instagram.com/p/CpJx3lrNecw/

[DanoT]

from: https://www.instagram.com/p/CpJx3lrNecw/

So where is the engine? Under the kitchen sink or ????

[climberevan]

It's just some AI generated bullshit.

[Buzzworthy]

Only $75k

https://www.truckcampermagazine.com/...slide-flatbed/

[SchralphMacchio]

6000+ lbs wet without gear or beer, requires an F550/GMC/RAM 5500!!!
At first I snickered about a triple slide being super leaky heat wise and crappy for winter use, but then I saw that they did go with spray foam and also a bunk over dinette, so at least they are trying to get at 4 season families like ours. That thing has a bigger water capacity (80 fresh / 77 gray) than my Outdoors RV trailer!!!!
But only 40 lbs of propane capacity? Seems like the water really outlasts the heating and genset capability in terms of how long you can be out in the winter. I didn’t look but if they used a Truma furnace/WH unit then maybe it can go longer than I think on those two cylinders. And worst case, I guess having 1-2 extra 20 lbs cylinders in milk crates in the cabin that you can pull out at the campsite isn’t a terrible thing …

[Buzzworthy]

My brain pictured the crumpled truck frame under it but man I’m not gonna lie it’s pretty damn cool.
This thread allows for so many dreams.

[SchralphMacchio]

Yeah at that point it’s more like a Class C conversion for a Class 5 truck than it is a “truck camper.”
But hey, given how impossible it is to get a decent bunkhouse boondocking setup with extended tank capacity, it is pretty dang cool. I would like to know more about how winter hardy that thing is intended to be (did they add tank pads and basement ducting, are the drain valves all enclosed, etc) but at first glance it seems like a lot of thought went into the overall design.

Even if I had the money … I’m still firmly on the “no slides” train though. Just the last thing I want to be messing with is troubleshooting a fault on a slide controller and hand cranking the thing and hoping the thing doesnt bind up in the track, with ice buildup in the seals while it’s nuking outside and we’ve got to break camp to get home for work the next day.

[Trackhead]

At least they openly state it requires a 550 truck…and don’t sucker folks with 350s into thinking it’s ok.

[Harry]

Yeah at that point it’s more like a Class C conversion for a Class 5 truck than it is a “truck camper.

If it does not come off easily is it even still a truck camper ? I don’t see any real advantage of this.