My wife and I are going to Alaska for a river trip the first two weeks of July. We're going to drive up there from UT. We're going to leave our raft at home and rents rafts, food pack etc from an outfitter. 6 other friends will fly in to Juneau and take a ferry or a float plane to Haines to hook up with us. We all have our own rafts and gear for multi-day river trips, but everything has to be flown out by bush plane at the end of the trip and our gear doesn't break down small enough to fit in the plane. We're super excited about this trip. We'll bring our own camping gear, river gear and my wife's inflatable kayak.


A friend of ours has offered to loan us his '04 Adventurer R80 truck camper to use for this trip. It's a non-slide camper. We're planning to go on an extended road trip in '19 and this would be a great opportunity to check out truck campers on a relatively short trip. We've rented a 19'and 27' TT before and were underwelmed with them. I will say, I could hardy feel them back there when towing them. Love this truck.


So, our '15 F-350 4X4 6.7 CCLB SRW w/ 11,500 lb. GVW does not have a camper package, but does have the factory towing package. The sticker on the driver's side says it has 3400 lb. of cargo capacity. I weighted it at a Cat scale and it weights 8580 lb. w/ me, 3/4 tank of fuel and a Leer cap on it. The cap weights about 250 lb. so let's figure the truck weights 8300-ish lb. The camper has a dry weight of 1845 lb., so with us, our gear for the trip, water/propane, etc. we should be well under GVW.


Our truck has 46K miles on it, so I'm planning on replacing the shocks. I put Toyo AT2 285x 75x 18 tires on about 3k miles ago and will buy another one for the spare. This, of course has nothing to do with carrying the camper, just prep for a trip thru rural Canada/US. Our truck doesn't have a rear sway bar, so I'm going to install a Helwig sway bar.


To actually address carrying the camper, I'll install Torklift front hold downs. I have the AMP flip down step in the back. It would interfere with the Torklift OEM hitch rear hold downs, so I'm thinking of using the Happijack rear hold downs that bolt to the end of the bumper. Our friend with the camper used this same system on his 1/2 ton Chebbie for a 6 week ski trip in Canada last winter and didn't have any problems. The stock bumper seems pretty heavy duty for this application. I'm open to other suggestion for rear hold downs. If we decide to buy a camper in the future it would probably be closer to 2500 lb. dry weight and I could upgrade the rear hold downs then. Does anyone use this set up and would you do it again?


From the photos I've looked at of the Stable Loads, there's not enough room for Stable Loads between the lower helper springs and the spring pack. Less than 1/2''. I think the Torklift upper helper spring bumper stops are insanely priced at $300 for a bolt/nut and some molded rubber/poly. Are any of you aware of a similar product at a more reasonable price or is this not the way to go? I don't think I've read of anyone on this site mentioning them. Other option would obviously be air bags. I'm trying to not get too carried away in case we decide truck campers aren't for us, but I want to smart about this. The hold downs would be the only thing that wouldn't be beneficial if we decide that a trailer of some sort would work better in the long term.


This Forum and TCM.com have been really helpful. I'm open to other suggestions.


Tom

 

Sounds like a great trip!
The rear sway bar is an absolute must. Hellwig bars are nice and stiff and should work great with a TC. Also easy to take off in the future if you need better articulation.
As far as tie downs, you'll probably be fine with a rear bumper mount for the smaller TC. If you go to a "full size" TC in the future (811/990 size) I'd recommend frame mounted tie downs. Yes, the bumper itself is frame mounted...but. My worry would be getting offroad and taking a dynamic rolling motion (left to right crossing a drainage for example) and pulling in a direction the bumper was not meant to be pulled.
Regarding rear suspension, if you're looking at stable loads, etc, you might as well look at the airlift 5000 ultimate air bags. They're actually about the same price. No fancy compressors needed, just a bicycle pump. They have internal jounce bumpers and are easily adjusted between loaded/unloaded. I've had them on both my TC rigs ('03 350SRW LB 6.0 and '17 F450 6.7) and am very happy with their performance.
Have fun!

 

+1 on the rear sway bar. I have the OEM one on my SRW and it stays planted very well. I had a Hellwig on my prior truck and it was one of the best upgrades I did.

 

I use the rear happijack rear mounts and the torklift for the front. Seems to work well and my camper is a bit heavier than the one you are using.

For the lower stableloads I run some homemade ones made out of plastic splitting wedges. Without the airbags lifting it up some they are tight to get in but with some air in the bags they are easy to install and I'm guessing don't take me much longer than the real ones that cost about 10x as much. For a long trip where you would install them once you could always just jack the truck up a little to get them in without airbags. Ride is pretty rough with no camper and them installed but not to bad and if I'm just unloading the camper for a day or two I leave them in.

A good sway bar works wonders and is money well spent. I've always ran a bigwig but the roadmaster has just as many people that like it.

Sounds like a fun trip.... wanting to do Alaska ourselves at some point.

 

Thanks for the input everyone. I was leaning towards the air bags and they really aren't much more than the torklift blocks.
That's a clever idea there, lambodesigns The Big Wig sway bar is what I'm going to install.
My wife is really excited about about this trip. She'd like to spend more time in Alaska after our river trip, but I've got a couple project going on this year that prevent that. Next year's another story.

 

I just copied someone else's idea. They only take a few minutes to make and the big thing is our trucks already have the hole drilled in the overload to mount. Of all the mods I did to my truck this was the biggest bang for the buck not counting the sway bar that was a given. My wife can tell if they are installed with or without the camper so the difference is pretty decent if she notices from the drivers seat. I really just built them to be a backup in case I had an airbag failure but they work so well that had I built them before the airbags.... I might not have installed the airbags.

 

tmacc, after we got our Northern Lite truck camper, it became very clear to me that the truck I had did not meet the payload requirements (even though the Northern Lite is not a heavy camper compared to a lot of them in the same class).
So, I went on a mission to find a truck to maximize my payload while still meeting my comfort desires in terms of options. Long story short, the truck in my signature is what I found. At 4226 lbs of payload, it is plenty capable of hauling our NL camper, which when fully wet, is about 3600 lbs.
To address your specific questions, I would say definitely do the sway bar. I got this truck with the camper package so it already had that as part of the option.
I did install the Torklift upper stableloads but not the bottom ones. I also installed the AirLift 5000 Ultimate airbags and opted to go with the onboard compressor and WirelessAir remote so I could air the bags up on the fly. I also tied everything in to my #1 upfitter switch as well so I can turn the power to the airbags on and off as I wish. I had my dealer plumb the manual fill lines and valve to the back side of the wheel well liner on each side so the valve is sticking through the liner allowing me easy access to it if I every need to manually fill my bags.
Of course, I went with the Torklift tie down brackets with fast guns as well.
I think the airbags and upper stableloads were perfect for my situation. I run my airbags when empty at 5 lbs and to tell you the truth, I cannot tell the difference in ride from before I had the airbags installed. It rides nice and not like buckboard one tons of yesteryear.
I have a friend who lives in Alaska and he and his wife have had truck campers for years and currently has his on a Ford dually. They travel back here every year in it and he told me the most important thing you need, assuming all other things are in order, when traveling the Alcan highway with the truck camper are good tires.
Your upcoming trip sounds like a blast and real adventure. And, you have a very good friend willing to let you take his camper to Alaska!

 

WyoBull. Thanks for the input. You confirm what other have said and what I had in the back of my mind....except for the $300 blocks of rubber.


Like you and others have posted on FTE and TCM.com, it appears most folks buy or have a truck and then start thinking about TCs. I admit that TCs were the furthest thing from my mind when we bought the truck used last July. One thing I'll say is I'm glad I got the F-350 rather than a F-250 to start with. I was thinking TT or maybe 5th wheel in the future, but it was actually to replace my CTD work truck w/ 303K miles on it. I don't recall how TCs came into to the picture, but I was helping our friend out with his kitchen remodel and checked out the camper and he offered it. I don't think he was thinking Alaska, but had no qualms when I threw it out there. He works ski patrol, ski guide, or avalanche instructor in the winter and goes up to Alaska for 2-5 months to work on a fishing boat, so he could appreciate the trip. I did invite him and his wife on our river trip, but their schedules didn't work. Since it's borrowed, I'll treat it better than one I owned. Once my wife saw it she was onboard. She commented how much room it had, but this is a woman who is perfectly happy to spend 23 days running rapids and camping for 280 miles of the Colorado river thru the Grand Canyon with only what you can carry on a 16' raft. Note: we've never run out of craft beers or food. We thought we were close on TP once, but found two rolls after we got off.


We're almost as excited about the drive up with the TC as we are with the river trip. Almost, but not quite.


I can appreciate your friend's advice on tires. I think these Toyos are pretty good. They're rated for 4000Lb. capacity each. As I mentioned above, I'm going to buy another one for the spare tire. I had them on my CTD and had good experience with them. I've had experience with trying to get a replacement tire in the hinterlands of Quebec back in the 90s. It wasn't cheap or fast.


If anyone is interested, here a trip report from a few years ago of some folks that ran the river we're running this summer.


https://community.nrs.com/duct-tape/...egasms-galore/

 

Hmmm..I'll stop by Home Depot today. How did you fasten them to the helper spring

 

Sorry for the delay.... I'm out in Seattle for a wedding.

Here's the quick version.... I put the wedge in place and marked the location with a sharpie to place a t-nut. Then used a drill press and a forstner bit to make a flat, then a regular drill bit to drill all the way through. You could probably use a wood bit to make the flat if you don't have a forstner bit. After that I pressed in a stainless steel t-nut. I think it was a 3/8" nut but I'm not home to measure to be sure. Basically it is the biggest diameter you can put through the hole in the overload. Pretty easy and once you tighten down the bolt it stays in place. Very easy to take on and off... just 4 bolts. If you do some searching you should be able to find some pics and details of what I described.... family is ready to head out so gotta run.

 

That sounds like it will work. I have plenty of forstner bits and a drill press. Thanks

 

Sounds like you have received some great advise here already.
I installed the sway bar and 5000 airbags as well although my camper is much lighter than yours and love the way it handles.

BTW, we're planning on Alaska in '19 also!!

 

I went with the Load Lifter 5000 Ultimate's 3 years ago as well . Made a ton of difference. Couldn't really afford to go with an onboard compressor at the time. That was going to be a project for the following year. I'm just now in the process of putting the WirelessAir Gen 3 Kit 72000 on the pickup. Hope to finish it up today. It will be nice to not have to get out in the cold and rain to pump up the bags.

 

Well, we're a week off from leaving for our trip. I installed new shocks (Bilstein 5100), the Bigwig sway bar, and the 5000 Ultimate air bags. I also made the cheapo stabilaloads that lambodesigns described above. That was pretty clever....and well, cheap.
We picked up the camper from our friend last week and took it out for a test run this past Sat. I don't know what an acceptable amount back and forth sway, but there's some. I mainly stuck to two lane after a windy stretch of I-80 east of here because that seems like most of what we'll encounter in BC, YT, and AK. All I need to do is change the oil before we leave.
Thanks for everyone's suggestions and input.

 

Just unloaded the camper from a 3600 mile little jaunt to Ohio and the drive across I70 in Kansas was as windy as they come and the rig did great even when the big rigs were passing or being passed. I still hate that part of the drive but it doesn't matter what I'm driving. I saw your post as I was waking up from a nap when the wife was pulling in to get gas and let me take over driving again. The fact that she (city girl) will drive it on I70 with the wind howling says the sway isn't too bad or she wouldn't drive it. We have big, heavy, TALL boxes in the back of our trucks so there is never going to be zero sway but after seeing some of the rigs getting blown around I think a setup like yours is the best you can do without going DRW.

Enjoy your trip! Hoping to get back to Alaska ourselves at some point.