Sleeping Platform, Drawer, and Fridge Slide
We have been using our simple plywood platform and Rubbermaid totes for the last 10 months on the road. It worked fine, for the $60 it costs us, most of the time, but sometimes it got totally out of control organization-wise and nothing was easy to access. Also, we realized that sometimes we really don’t want to haul everything out of the back of the truck just to make a snack or brew some coffee.
Originally we looked at the ARB Outback Solutions drawers and ARB Fridge Slide, but had trouble finding anybody in Ecuador that had anything in stock or were willing to give us a quote.
This made it easy to move to the next option. This was to have a local carpenter build us a drawer and sleeping platform. At $25/day for skilled labor we thought that Ecuador was the best option for this. Well, the first carpenter came back with a quote of $950 and a two-week build time. Umm… ******. Obviously that wasn’t in our budget.
Our last option ended up being the best, and only real option, for us. It was time to build this junk ourselves. Luckily we were in Ibarra, Ecuador where we found a plywood store that could cut out the pieces we needed. I sketched a quick design and gave them a list of pieces I needed cut. We had a day to wait before picking them up so we went to the hardware store. I already had a 18V DeWalt drill with me so we picked up a pile of woodscrews, hinges, and some glue. They also happened to have some heavy-duty drawer slides we could use as a fridge slide. Sweet.
We wanted to have the main drawer on slides of some sort as well so we bought rails (1.5”x1.5”x1mm square tube) to mount to the drawer and 12 heavy-duty casters for those to ride on. The following day we picked up all of our 15mm (5/8”) plywood and then started out by tearing out all of the old stuff from the bed. After a quick sweep of 25,000km of dirt from the bed we started piecing together the jigsaw puzzle.
Now we have a nice and low sleeping platform for when the wind is too strong for us to pop the rooftop tent. The 6ft drawer slides out nice and easily and we can access the necessary items without hassle. Also, Ashley can now actually see inside of the fridge by pulling it out to the edge of the tailgate. Not too shabby for less than $200 and a day and a half of work in a campground in Ecuador
