Shipping a Wildernest camper

zx9rpilot

New member
I am wanting to purchase a Wildernest 6.5 camper on Craigslist. I live in Huntsville Alabama and I have been looking for months for a 6.5 foot length model for my Tundra and nothing has been closer than Colorado. They are almost all in California, Washington state or Colorado. So I am basically left with no option but to freight ship one. I found a good deal for a Wildernest 6.5 in Washington state. The seller has a forklift. I would like some ideas on the best way to go about shipping it. It looks like most freight companies require the items to be on pallets or fully crated. So pay the seller for time and materials to build a simple pallet to put it on? Or fully box it up. I am hesitant to ask too much from the seller because he might just say it is easier to just focus on selling to locals. I would be willing to pay up to $800 to have it safely arrive in Alabama. Any recommendations on freight companies? I have even considered flying out there, boxing it up myself and delivering on a rented truck to a freight company. I asked a truck accessory store near the seller that sells new fiberglass truck campers if they would be willing to help out and they said they do not ship truck campers and only receive them as a full truck load from the manufacturer.
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DaveInDenver

Middle Income Semi-Redneck
This is a tough one. Personally I'd drive out and just get it myself but WA <-> AL is a long haul. I've done CO to Washington in 2 days and even that was a SOB.

I'd be worried about it getting abused (my nightmare would be it arriving with no glass left) in transit so I'd build it into a crate. But I understand your dilemma because it will probably sell easily enough in the PNW that he doesn't have to really work that hard at it.
 

AZ_Nick

Member
I would put it on uship and have a small auto transport company move it on a trailer. Might be a little more than $800 but should be pretty drama free. You will get limited insurance from a freight company unless it is fully crated.
 

Nikkshepherd

Observer
I live here in Washington and before getting mine locally, I looked into picking one up in Colorado. My plan was to fly down to Colorado and bring it home in a uhaul or on a rental truck. Should bring you in at under $800 and you get a road trip out of it.
 

zx9rpilot

New member
Thank you for all the replies. The price to rent a the smallest Uhaul truck to drive one way is $1,327. That would be in addition to a plane flight, hotels, gas and food and loss of income for 3 days.
 

dwh

Tail-End Charlie
I work as a driver for Penske. One client that leases all their trucks from us is Avery Transport. Avery primarily handles all the deliveries of new Lance campers from the Lance factory, but I believe they also do one-offs. Their trucks have all the hardware to support and lash down campers. I would call them first - they may be able to help you figure something out.

http://www.averytransport.com/
 

Doc187

Observer
I had a flip pac shipped via uship from Houston to Indianapolis for around $400. Just be patient and lower bids will come in.
 

zx9rpilot

New member
I do have listing on Uship but no bids or even questions yet. I got an automatic quote on Uship with YRC Freight for $559 and $676 for UPS Freight. Both of those are with the camper on a pallet and with a forklift at pickup and dropoff locations. I was messing around with the automatic quote thing with the different variables to see how they affected price. Crate price was no different than pallet. Stackable made no difference and the weird thing is that a 500 lbs load was cheaper than 400 lbs by $108! $559 at 500 lbs and $677 for 400 lbs. How does that make any sense? I also made a CAD file for a possible pallet for the seller. Trying to make it as easy as possible.
Wildernest pallet.jpg
 
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zx9rpilot

New member
I finally got my Wildernest Camper that was shown in the first post. For those that are having difficulty finding a local wildernest or similar type truck camper shell and need to have one shipped from far away I thought I would provide my experience to help others in similar situations. I tried the Uship listing thing and after two weeks not a single person made a bid or even emailed me any questions. On the Uship page I could get multiple quotes from commercial freight companies. The cheapest was for YRC freight at $559, and that is who I went with. They did require pickup from one of their shipping centers or from a business with a forklift. They also require the freight to be on a pallet or in a crate. I was able to get the seller of my Wildernest to build a pallet for me and cover the windows with cardboard and plastic wrap from $100. The seller also was able to use his forklift to load the pallet into the YRC truck. There was some communication issues with YRC to begin with in making clear the camper was secure to the pallet. The bolts were not visible to the driver so at first the driver refused the pickup. He came back the next week after describing how it was all held together and after the addition of the cardboard on the windows. I rented a Uhaul trailer and picked up the camper at a YRC shipping center. Unfortunately the camper was just too wide to fit inside the trailer. I had to put it sideways sitting on the railings. Not the best but I did not know what else to do. I then used motorcycle ramps and wood to get it off the trailer once I was home. So total it was $400 for the camper, $559 for shipping, $100 for pallet and protection, $35 for Uhaul trailer, $38 for wood.

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