My camper wasn’t supposed to move until April, but this hasn’t been anything close to a normal winter. My boys have been asking to go camping since I got it last fall, so I decided to indulge them with a trip to Duluth last weekend.

We left at 100% and made covered 102 miles to the park at 60 MPH, arriving at 48%. I averaged 1.6 mi/kWh because of a moderate tailwind, which is much better than I expected at 40º. We unhooked and set up, then drove 50 miles up through Duluth and back and ended the night at 33%.

I plugged in to the 50A outlet at the campsite and charged back up to 99% overnight in about 13.5 hours. We went to the train museum in Duluth yesterday morning and plugged back in at the campsite while we had lunch, then left for home. We left at 91% and averaged only 1.4 mi/kWh without the helpful tailwind, arriving back home at 34%.

I was impressed with how well thought-out the towing experience was. The IBC doesn’t activate until I press the brake pedal, which lets me recover the trailer’s energy on regen instead of wasting it with the brakes. The truck will come all the way to a stop without ever activating the trailer brakes, but they’re instant when I touch the brake pedal. Tesla, in comparison, activates the circuit with the brake lights, so the trailer brakes activated whenever I came off the throttle. The truck also powers trailer running lights whenever the lights are set to Auto, which is something I’ve never seen before. Performance was every bit as impressive as you’d imagine with a 7,000-lb truck pulling a 2,700-lb trailer.

Overall, the truck exceeded my expectations. I traded my Model Y for the Lightning to get better towing range, and it’s gonna fit that use case nicely. We left the house with a full charge covered the entire weekend with Level 2 campsite charging. Temperatures were far from optimal, so I can plan on 180 miles of range with a worst-case 1.4 mi/kWh average at 60 MPH. Charger availability is a problem today, but Tesla’s network is expected to open in the coming weeks. I think this will work great as long as my battery problems remain in the rearview mirror.

 

That's a pretty cool pop up

 

That is very cool ain't it?!?! Looks to afford enough sleeping room without a huge profile when deployed.

 

Quite unique indeed. Kind of looks like one of those site built tiny homes.

 

Thanks, guys.

I settled on an A-frame camper because it's almost as aerodynamic as a conventional popup camper, but only takes a couple of minutes to fold up. The old popup took almost an hour, and all of the tugging and pulling was difficult with my hand problems. I believe Aliner pioneered the design a couple of decades ago, but Forest River has been making them for at least ten years. This one is a 2019 with a cassette toilet, heat pump, hot water, and electric brakes on a torsion axle. It's perfect for us!

 

Those A-frame popups are really quite nice. I remember when they first came out many years ago. Looks like your family really enjoys it, which is what really matters.

Thanks for the trip report Tom.

 

Hi there! Thanks for sharing!

 

Great report Tom. I knew the time you stayed with me you were interested in eventually doing some camping.

And now you can.

 

Thanks, Scott! It's nothing like your rolling palace, but it fits us really well. That time in 2013 was the first time I'd been in a camper since I was a kid, and it lit the match.