West Coast Mags
Adventurer
I have a unique pop up camper, similar to a four wheel camper, that uses a pretty flimsy metal sliding track system with springs to assist when raising or lowering the roof. After an "incident" trying to disassemble it for repair I've managed to bend a number of the tracks and the slides the move in.
The lift systems is basically a series of bars that make and X pattern on the sides of the camper. When you push up on the roof, the X spreads with the aid of a horizontal spring on the bottom and one on the top.
My buddies and I were tossing around the idea of trying to convert it to gas struts, like they use to lift a hard tonneau cover on a pick up truck. My top is one piece fiberglass like a tonneau and is about the same size and weight. We were thinking that if we arranged two struts on each side in a V pattern it would lift and close easily and each strut would only have to handle about 40 - 50 lbs.
Anyone tried something similar or have other ideas?
This camper is about 30 years old and parts are non-existant. Everything bent pretty easily have the premonition of it happening again in the future if I put it back to stock.
The lift systems is basically a series of bars that make and X pattern on the sides of the camper. When you push up on the roof, the X spreads with the aid of a horizontal spring on the bottom and one on the top.
My buddies and I were tossing around the idea of trying to convert it to gas struts, like they use to lift a hard tonneau cover on a pick up truck. My top is one piece fiberglass like a tonneau and is about the same size and weight. We were thinking that if we arranged two struts on each side in a V pattern it would lift and close easily and each strut would only have to handle about 40 - 50 lbs.
Anyone tried something similar or have other ideas?
This camper is about 30 years old and parts are non-existant. Everything bent pretty easily have the premonition of it happening again in the future if I put it back to stock.
