2000 ford Excursion camping/backcountry vehicle

[elpoffroad]

Summer Has Come

It has been a while since I update my excursion post. My wife and I have been taking trips to the river and the lake lately. We decided to head to Percha dam in NM and spend the night relax a bit. Got to take my daughter out and she loved it, had a little bonfire and we called it a night on the sleeping platform in my excursion and we all slept great( just wish we would have taken more pillows).

We had actually carried and extra two spare 35in tires since my friend decided to go do a trail for thats part of the chili challenge and blew two tires on trail

Loving the memory foam mattress. It is so comfortable.

In the morning she was ready to see the outdoors. She hit the road running.

My wife on the other hand was not ready to wake up lol

Beyond that we headed again to Caballo lake and Elephant butte dam for memorial weekend and it was packed, no surprise. We got to see a few of our friends at the lake and got to see the deuce and half's all over the sand. We will be heading back to the river this fathers day but since I got a new camping truck we haven't decided which to take. I will unveil the secondary camping and back road vehicle later today. Another thing that I have finished building is the roof rack for the excursion and finally took the dive on buying the ARB 2500 awning. It will be arriving this week and I will install everything next week. Super excited for that I bought some other items for the excursion to make it a tad more functional hopefully will finish the few mods soon (like bug screens for windows, cooking table and paper towel rack).
Hopefully by end of next week it can be outfitted with everything and ready to hit the road all over again :1888fbbd:

 

[elpoffroad]

Beginning of modification time

Well the time has come to start to modify the excursion a little more.
First on the list is going to be is swapping in the v/b springs I got off and f350, with that I will be installing new shocks to complement the suspension.
Second will be the removal of the storage container on top and I will be installing a roof rack .
The third thing will be installing on the roof rack the new 2500 ARB awning on the passenger side.
The fourth thing will be installing and wiring the the 1000 watt power inverter.
The fifth thing will be making a fold down table on the driver rear hatch door and mosquito screens for the rear doors to get some ventilation.
The sixth and last thing will be installing and modifying the sleeping platform for more storage.
Stayed tuned this will hopefully make the excursion a bit more overland worthy :1888fbbd:

 

[ClovisMan]

Do you know what inverter you are going with? I'm currently looking into them and there are so many choices.

 

[elpoffroad]

Inverter Question

So I have to be kinda bias because I was given a while ago a power inverter from Harbor Freight.


I thought it was a 1000 watt but its a 1500 watt/3000 watt peak.
I did buy an amplifier wiring kit to wire it up safely. I will be running a power strip to be able to plug in a multitude of items to it.

 

[5HUB]

What roof rack are you going with? I can't decide between Baja Rack or Front Runner.

 

[elpoffroad]

I made my own roof rack out of 1 in tube. I haven't finished it all yet but when I do I will post pictures its more of a baja style roof rack.

 

[elpoffroad]

Im curious, any input on the goal zero supplies from anyone, im thinking of picking up a solar kit from them.

 

[elpoffroad]

Well roof rack is on and made brackets to install awning. Everything is tight but I do still have to paint it. Also got the power inverter wired and ready to rock. Pictures will come tomorrow.

 

[Marine]

Keep up the good fight. Love your excursion

 

[tbisaacs]

Im curious, any input on the goal zero supplies from anyone, im thinking of picking up a solar kit from them.

I have a Goal Zero Yeti 400 that I mainly use for my fridge. Their panels are really expensive so I ended up going with a Renogy 100w. You can plug them into a Yeti with goal zero's MC4 adapter.


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[Pharms20]

Well roof rack is on and made brackets to install awning. Everything is tight but I do still have to paint it. Also got the power inverter wired and ready to rock. Pictures will come tomorrow.

Awesome look forward to seeing the finished product!


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[elpoffroad]

I have a Goal Zero Yeti 400 that I mainly use for my fridge. Their panels are really expensive so I ended up going with a Renogy 100w. You can plug them into a Yeti with goal zero's MC4 adapter.

I will keep this in mind when buy my solar panels and set up thanks !!!

 

[elpoffroad]

Trip to the lake Elephant butte

Well my wife and I had a split moment decision and we chose instead of staying home for 4th of July weekend we would go to the lake and go have some fun. We decided to take both the k30 with the slide in camper and the excursion. I had worked all week on getting mostly everything finished in the excursion and the new ac unit for the camper. My friend and I decided to take off early in my k30 since my wife had to work until 7pm and she would meet us up at the lake. We got to the lake and got to making dinner and to our enjoyment there was a firework display going on while we were cooking. After a malfunction with my camping stove we moved inside the camper to finish cooking. We passed the night away listening to music and having some s'mores

Woke up next morning to a beautiful sight and made breakfast. After we made our way to the lake.



Found a little cove where we got to go swimming without many interruptions. The kids loved it and my wife liked the shallow water for the kids not to be very deep in.
After been the whole day down at the lake we decided to head to campsite and grill up some chicken and crack open a few brews and relax. The wind kicked up a bit with some rain but as quickly as it came it went. We had bought fireworks for the kids to light them so that was the activity for the night. We went to bed for we knew a full day by the lake was in store for us the next day.
The next day woke up to my wife making pancakes and off we went to the lake after picking up a bit.
We decided to go to the main beach part of the lake and though it wasn't too crowded we got a great spot and proceeded to have a blast.


After the full day of swimming with family and friends we called it good and decided that it was time to go back home. We went filled up with gas and got some Gatorade and hit the road

All I got to say about this trip was , wow we had a blast. The ARB awning served us amazingly and the power inverter gave us electricity by the beach. I couldn't be happier on how the set up on the excursion came out. The rack also helped carry a total of 20 gallons of water and was more than enough. Even though there is plenty of modifications that are still left to do I love how the excursion is coming out. I did get a miss in a cylinder which I'm guessing a coil or two went south after the drive so a little repair is due but in no time it will be back doing what is does best which is exploring and hitting the road.:safari-rig:

 

[Pharms20]

Looks awesome. Makes me want to order the ARB awning right now lol. What kind of brackets did you use to mount it?


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[elpoffroad]

I made all my own brackets. I have to say that the awning is super nice and sturdy. Even when some wind came in at the beach very little movement happened compared to the stand alone shades. Im in love with my truck all over again. I have been thinking of making my own version of the road shower and maybe putting a 50 in light bar on roof.