ramblinChet
Well-known member
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BajaSurfRig
Well-known member
I have my 83 grandby bolted through my truck bed in the front and I use turn buckles in the rear. I occasionally need to tighten the turn buckles but have never had to tighten the nuts on the bolt. I have been running my FWC camper like this for years and it has been pretty trouble free FWIW.
crystalclear
Observer
turnbuckles with lock nuts should not need to be adjusted all that frequently - and they will connect to the points on the fwc that are reinforced to take load as well as easy to repair if by chance something happens
im sure bolting the floor works just fine if you are rv parking for the majority of the time, but if you are inclined to some speed/bumps/etc - id go turnbuckles
im sure bolting the floor works just fine if you are rv parking for the majority of the time, but if you are inclined to some speed/bumps/etc - id go turnbuckles
Climber Rob
Human
I fought turnbuckles for quite a while and went through several different setups before biting the bullet on Torklift Derringers. They are excellent. I installed ½" SS marine shoulder eye bolts and ½" quicklinks on the Derringer handles. They are tight in the space, and it took some time getting the lengths dialed in and each of the bolts cut on the initial setup. Zero loosening, zero issues of any kind. Solid. Totally worth the money and time spent. Hundreds and hundreds of offroad miles on them now, and I'm completely happy.
Climber Rob
Human
It certainly wouldn't work for me and my uses, but it's a very solid attachment method. If it works for you and the places you travel...
calicamper
Expedition Leader
This would probably work. I know us sailors treat it with great respect because once cured its never coming off!!!
Depending on the truck I prefer the through-bolt mounting method if it's going to be on full time pretty much. I only say depending on the truck because it's not really an option for the comp bed Toyotas.
For any mounting style I would recommend buying a chunk of stall matt from a farm supply place and cutting it down to put between the camper and the bed. We've found that it "plants" the camper in the bed a little more firmly and helps prevent some of the shifting around they do.
The turnbuckles supplied by FWC are not the greatest but as long as you add checking turnbuckles to your daily "pre-flight" checklist they do the job although at the price I would pick up a spare set to carry just in case.
Bolt down with appropriate backing plates works really well and is definitely the most elegant solution if you don't plan on removing the camper often. I have 5 years and 40,000 miles bolted to an aluminium flatbed with no issues and never needed to tighten anything.
Rising3agle
New member
I just picked up a nice-shape used 2008 FWC Hawk after having a few of the 'large' truck campers (cirrus 720, to 820, to arctic fox 855S) so I already had the torklift frame mounts and fastguns from that setup.
right now I have the Hawk on the truck with the four turnbuckles connected to the inner-bed tie-down loops (2019 Ram 3500 has some metal loops toward the bottom of the bed walls in each of the corners). I also have two torklift tie-downs connected to the frame mounts; I removed the jacks, put a 1/2" u-bolt (or 3/8" I forget) through the hole in the jack mount, and hooked it to that. so basically the torklift fastgun is connected to the frame mount (under the truck) and the jack mount (using a u-bolt because the fastgun won't fit in the bolt hole on the jack mount). Probably overkill - and I may remove the fastguns in the future if it seems the turnbuckles are holding (which they seem to be so far). The bed loops SEEM solid, and the camper is only about 800lbs with a low COG. for comparison - the CIrrus 620 (new half ton camper) uses ratchet straps from the camper body to those same loops and no one has had any issues in the past 6 months. That camper weighs around twice what a hawk weighs, and is way higher (more top-heavy). Based on that, I figured I'd give the built-in loops a shot. I really didn't want to put eyebolts in my bed; I use my truck as my daily driver, as my 5th wheel puller, as my plywood-sheet-fetcher, and all sorts of things that those eyebolts would get in the way of.
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as a note, the torklift frame mount tie downs don't stick out near as far as you would think. they have two holes in them, for near and far, and on the near setting they are not even out as far as my running boards (or the mirrors, or the side of the Hawk camper). A lot of people steer away from them because they think they stick out so far from the truck - but at least my experience, they're closer to the inside of the truck than the camper or running boards
the good thing about the frame mounts is they go on and off quick (4 cotter pins), they allow you to put the camper on and off very quickly with the fast guns, AND if you ever decide to go to a larger camper (assuming you have enough truck) you are already set for any truck camper. For reference, I can drop a camper off my truck (with power jacks and fastguns - so a cirrus 820 for example) in under 5 minutes with the frame mounts and fast guns.
I like the turnbuckles for aesthetics; there's something about the hawk sitting on the truck with no jacks and no tie downs visible that gets pretty sexy.
and I agree with the others above - if I was putting it on and never planning to take it off, I'd bolt it down with some large backer plates. There's a video on youtube of a guy who uses bolts for his flatbed setup and he puts it on and off; it looks tedious to line up after removing, but he had it in under 20 minutes or so.
good luck with whatever you do / decide
right now I have the Hawk on the truck with the four turnbuckles connected to the inner-bed tie-down loops (2019 Ram 3500 has some metal loops toward the bottom of the bed walls in each of the corners). I also have two torklift tie-downs connected to the frame mounts; I removed the jacks, put a 1/2" u-bolt (or 3/8" I forget) through the hole in the jack mount, and hooked it to that. so basically the torklift fastgun is connected to the frame mount (under the truck) and the jack mount (using a u-bolt because the fastgun won't fit in the bolt hole on the jack mount). Probably overkill - and I may remove the fastguns in the future if it seems the turnbuckles are holding (which they seem to be so far). The bed loops SEEM solid, and the camper is only about 800lbs with a low COG. for comparison - the CIrrus 620 (new half ton camper) uses ratchet straps from the camper body to those same loops and no one has had any issues in the past 6 months. That camper weighs around twice what a hawk weighs, and is way higher (more top-heavy). Based on that, I figured I'd give the built-in loops a shot. I really didn't want to put eyebolts in my bed; I use my truck as my daily driver, as my 5th wheel puller, as my plywood-sheet-fetcher, and all sorts of things that those eyebolts would get in the way of.
-----/
as a note, the torklift frame mount tie downs don't stick out near as far as you would think. they have two holes in them, for near and far, and on the near setting they are not even out as far as my running boards (or the mirrors, or the side of the Hawk camper). A lot of people steer away from them because they think they stick out so far from the truck - but at least my experience, they're closer to the inside of the truck than the camper or running boards
the good thing about the frame mounts is they go on and off quick (4 cotter pins), they allow you to put the camper on and off very quickly with the fast guns, AND if you ever decide to go to a larger camper (assuming you have enough truck) you are already set for any truck camper. For reference, I can drop a camper off my truck (with power jacks and fastguns - so a cirrus 820 for example) in under 5 minutes with the frame mounts and fast guns.
I like the turnbuckles for aesthetics; there's something about the hawk sitting on the truck with no jacks and no tie downs visible that gets pretty sexy.
and I agree with the others above - if I was putting it on and never planning to take it off, I'd bolt it down with some large backer plates. There's a video on youtube of a guy who uses bolts for his flatbed setup and he puts it on and off; it looks tedious to line up after removing, but he had it in under 20 minutes or so.
good luck with whatever you do / decide
Rising3agle
New member
oops one more beneficial item on the torklift - they are spring loaded. so with larger campers, I have a 1/2" truck bed mat in the bed the camper sits on (acts as a stop-slider and a shock absorber) and the fastguns have springs in them. if you set them right (when you go to close them, they should start having resistance when you get the handle to the beginning of the pin hole) you are almost guaranteed to never rip your tie downs out of your truck. With a no-give turnbuckle or a chain setup that has no give to it, if you hit a large bump or dip - well, SOMETHING has to give somewhere. Usually that winds up being the camper mounts; and that can get expensive to repair
JaSAn
Grumpy Old Man
Frame flex is a reason I do not like Torklift, et.al. I want my camper to move with the bed, not a point cantilevered a foot or more out from the frame (motions aren't the same). Reinforcing the attachment on the truck bed is not difficult.
JaSAn
Grumpy Old Man
Its not that I want the camper to twist with the truck, its that I don't know of an uncomplicated way to prevent it. Unless I can come up with a mounting system that will hold my camper rigid in 3 planes while allowing rotational freedom when the truck twists the camper will twist too. Since the camper is resting on the bed, attaching to that is the least stress on the camper. My Grandby is bolted directly to the bed of my Ram though the floor.
Strictly calculated; its a simple trigonometric equation: tangent 1º = 0.017. So for a 12" cantilever, 1º of rotation = 0.21 inches. A minor but an unnecessary complication that doesn't solve the twisting problem.
My reinforcement is simple.
In the camper: 1/2", grade 5 bolt, 3" fender washer, 5" X 8", 1/2" plywood 'washer'.
Under the truck bed: a 5" X 8", 1/8 stainless steel 'washer' spanning 2 corrugations in the truck bed floor, standard 1/2" round washer, double nut.
In 7 years of using the camper, hitting a few potholes too fast, running too fast on bad washboard I can see no deformation or damage.
Torklift are ok; I just think they are way overpriced for what you get.
I don't like the look. I don't like that they can catch brush. The twisting differential is a minor thing.
On my camper (a 44 y.o. Grandby) I would have to fabricate attachment points on the camper. Bolting through the floor is simple and it works.
Again, the experience of the hundreds of folks that have gone before you (myself included) is that this is not a problem. Even on much flexier framed vehicles (Tacoma) on all sorts of terrain, we have never had a problem. Bolts stay tight, camper stays in alignment and all the doors and windows open and close even when parked off camber. While we have all heard of plenty of issues with turn buckles, I have never heard of anyone else with a bolt down installation having an issue. Also consider the millions of fiberglass truck toppers and service bodies out there, bolted to the bed, and yet how often do you see cracked clear coat from flexing the fiberglass? You are welcome to reinvent the wheel, but you are trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist.