SimplyAnAdventure
Well-known member
Well, my fairly long thread title sums up most of this. So here goes.
I have a full-on Overlanding/ Expedition camper and vehicle that I love but living in the Salt/ Rust belt of upstate NY that vehicle doesn't leave the comfort of a heated garage from Dec to March to avoid salt and corrosion. This is mostly OK as we don't travel or vacation much during winter months and if we do it's flying somewhere warm to recover from the gloom of the NorthEast.
That said a big part of my life is fly fishing and winter months can be amazing from not only trout but steelhead up on the great lakes tributaries.
I have a 2023 F150 Lightning as a Daily Driver and absolutely love everything about it. It's sports car fast, comfortable, and has more power than anyone could need in a 1/2T pickup. I also drive it in the winter up here and don't worry about salt and rust on this particular vehicle.
Lately I have been thinking about being able to convert this vehicle to a part time adventure rig for winter camping mostly at fishing access locations or rest areas to allow me to steelhead fish for a couple days at a time without the need for a hotel.
My thoughts about making the Lightning a camper are to use a @Flated truck topper www.flated.com to seal off the bed and provide insulation. A bed rug or similar to provide some insulation and create a flat floor and most importantly a electric space heater to keep me warm and comfortable and to keep condensation to a minimum.
A Lightning has two power outlets in the bed, one is 30A at 240V (yes really) and the other is 20A at 120V. My thought was to seal off the truck bed with the inflatable (should be fairly insulated at 4" thick and air filled) cap from Flated sleep on a mattress that fits in the short bed between the wheel wells that is 50" wide and 66" long and sleep on the diagonal. I'll be fishing solo or with a friend in their own car so I think this would be plenty of space to sleep all night.
Heater wise I'd like to find an adjustable power heater, say 400W/800W that I can run on low power all night and use the 800W setting when first getting in or to help get me out of bed on a cold morning. I believe running this heater all night should also knock out any condensation problems that would normally occur.
I do need to be comfortable as a long day outside in the winter standing in icy water can be kind of brutal on the body and I'm not as young as I used to be lol.
In truth this won't be for much off road use, IE deep into the woods but obviously used as a normal F150 would. It's 100% electric and should get me into any location any other truck would, but it won't be a true overlanding vehicle and is much more of a car camper.
Charging isn't much of an issue as many places I fish and look have high speed charging nearby, the East coast seems more dense with chargers and my truck does have the ability to take power from RV outlets, standard home outlets as well as a plethora of more obscure choices with some of the adaptors I carry.
So my questions for the group, anyone have experience with a @Flated topper?, anyone use electric heat to keep warm/ battle condesation?, and finally anyone have experience sleeping in a short bed truck? Thoughts?
Thank you in advance for your opinions!.
-SAA
I have a full-on Overlanding/ Expedition camper and vehicle that I love but living in the Salt/ Rust belt of upstate NY that vehicle doesn't leave the comfort of a heated garage from Dec to March to avoid salt and corrosion. This is mostly OK as we don't travel or vacation much during winter months and if we do it's flying somewhere warm to recover from the gloom of the NorthEast.
That said a big part of my life is fly fishing and winter months can be amazing from not only trout but steelhead up on the great lakes tributaries.
I have a 2023 F150 Lightning as a Daily Driver and absolutely love everything about it. It's sports car fast, comfortable, and has more power than anyone could need in a 1/2T pickup. I also drive it in the winter up here and don't worry about salt and rust on this particular vehicle.
Lately I have been thinking about being able to convert this vehicle to a part time adventure rig for winter camping mostly at fishing access locations or rest areas to allow me to steelhead fish for a couple days at a time without the need for a hotel.
My thoughts about making the Lightning a camper are to use a @Flated truck topper www.flated.com to seal off the bed and provide insulation. A bed rug or similar to provide some insulation and create a flat floor and most importantly a electric space heater to keep me warm and comfortable and to keep condensation to a minimum.
A Lightning has two power outlets in the bed, one is 30A at 240V (yes really) and the other is 20A at 120V. My thought was to seal off the truck bed with the inflatable (should be fairly insulated at 4" thick and air filled) cap from Flated sleep on a mattress that fits in the short bed between the wheel wells that is 50" wide and 66" long and sleep on the diagonal. I'll be fishing solo or with a friend in their own car so I think this would be plenty of space to sleep all night.
Heater wise I'd like to find an adjustable power heater, say 400W/800W that I can run on low power all night and use the 800W setting when first getting in or to help get me out of bed on a cold morning. I believe running this heater all night should also knock out any condensation problems that would normally occur.
I do need to be comfortable as a long day outside in the winter standing in icy water can be kind of brutal on the body and I'm not as young as I used to be lol.
In truth this won't be for much off road use, IE deep into the woods but obviously used as a normal F150 would. It's 100% electric and should get me into any location any other truck would, but it won't be a true overlanding vehicle and is much more of a car camper.
Charging isn't much of an issue as many places I fish and look have high speed charging nearby, the East coast seems more dense with chargers and my truck does have the ability to take power from RV outlets, standard home outlets as well as a plethora of more obscure choices with some of the adaptors I carry.
So my questions for the group, anyone have experience with a @Flated topper?, anyone use electric heat to keep warm/ battle condesation?, and finally anyone have experience sleeping in a short bed truck? Thoughts?
Thank you in advance for your opinions!.
-SAA
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