Family Camper/Dirt Bike Hauler – 2005 Ram 1500 Build Out

[CWhite87]

I’ve been reading on this forum for a long time and finally decided to join and post. Here is my 2005 Ram 1500 SLT 4x4 hemi. Not your typical overland truck, but perfect for us. We mostly use the truck for hauling my dirt bike and gear, and camping at the races and in the desert. My father-in-law was the original owner and it was his baby. The truck is basically stock at the moment. Pop had the spray-in bed liner installed, and put on some Hankook Dynapro ATM tires. I added a K&N air filter, 78 antenna ball, and the top-of-the-line front seat covers that you see below.





I got back into racing dirt bikes a few years ago and we bought a Kodiak truck bed tent. This was a great inexpensive set up for a while, but has a few downsides. The truck bed tent can only really sleep two people, it takes some time to set up, and it is hard to keep gear organized when you have to pull everything out of the truck bed to set it up. My wife, dad, and I are usually all going to the races together, and we’re planning to start taking my two-year-old son with us at some point, so we need some more sleeping space and preferably something with less set up time and effort. I also need something within a reasonable budget and do not have the space for a trailer. I decided that I needed a hitch mount bike hauler and then had to choose between a slide in camper, topper, or roof top tent. We looked at a used slide-in camper, but it needed some work that I don’t really have the time for, and it would not likely have room for the four of us. I figured that a topper within our budget would be the same, so we decided a roof top tent was best.



The shocks on the truck were original from 16 years ago with over 140K miles, so addressing the suspension was first on my list. I day dreamed about a lift kit with some 35’s, but there are limited suspension options for this truck, it’s not really in the budget, and honestly would make loading gear and my oversized toddler much more difficult. We also put a lot of highway miles on this truck, so keeping the ride comfortable and gas mileage as good as it can be for a 5.7 liter hemi is important. I decided to go with some trusty Rancho 5000 shocks for now. I’ve had good luck with Ranchos in the past, they were affordable, and should suit my current needs for this truck. Unfortunately, the packaging from Rancho was missing some mounting hardware, so I had to improvise a bit when installing the shocks. If needed for the weight, I will add-a-leaf, but I want to see how things work out and am thinking it might not be necessary.


The Hankook tires are still in great shape, so I’m sticking with those on the stock rims for now. Unfortunately, the spare doesn’t match, but it is full sized so should get me out of a pinch if I need it. I might snatch up a high lift jack, because using the stock bottle jack in the sand seems like it could be problematic.

The new dirt bike is worth quite a bit more than the truck at this point, so getting a good bike hauler was very important to me. After a ton of research, I pulled the trigger on the Switch Hauler by All Jacked Up. It is one of the more expensive haulers out there, but it got rave reviews from actual dirt bike riders. Will report back on how it works out.

For the bed rack, I decided to go with an RCI, 18-inch tall, 58 inch long, universal bed rack. This should give me plenty of room for gear underneath, and hopefully enough visibility so I can see the bike through the back window. It should also be a good height for an annex room, which will likely be my dad’s sleeping area. I like to think about bolting on a road shower (or a homemade version) and some RotoPax water jugs, but those will probably be down the road a bit. I just got the rack in the mail this week and will report back on how it goes together and holds up.

Yes, I am currently in the “collecting many large boxes” phase of this build.

The final big purchase will be the roof top tent. I’m pretty sure we’re going to go with the Tuff Stuff Elite 5-person tent, because it’s massive, affordable, and well-reviewed. If anyone has suggestions otherwise, please let me know!

Cheers for now. Will report back after I get the tent and get everything mounted on to the truck.

 

[tinbasher]

i had an "old man tan" 2003 ram 1500 like yours (mine had the 4.7l) before my current truck and i loved it, if the body hadn't rusted away i'd still be driving it

 

[CWhite87]

I recently did a trial run of the Switch Hauler from All Jacked Up. Wanted to test that out before mounting the bed rack and roof top tent. Putting the hauler together was pretty easy, but mounting the bike was more work than expected. Hoping the process gets easier the more I use it. The hauler clamps down on the foot pegs plus you put two tie downs on. It takes quite a few pumps of the jack to lift the bike to the proper height. Once lifted, there are two large wing bolts that secure everything in place. After it was all strapped down, the bike was solid. No slop, no bounce, nothing. It worked very well. I drove through the city, about 90 minutes on the highway, and then down a dirt road for about two miles. Worked great in all conditions. There are two versions of this rack, one with a straight hitch, and one with a drop hitch. I got the drop hitch version, which allowed me to open my tailgate after the bike was removed without having to remove the rack from the hitch. I’ve heard that’s not the case with other haulers. There are a lot of parts to keep track of, so I bought a small tool bag to keep everything together with the hauler. Once home, I easily removed the platform, so the hauler doesn’t take up much room in my garage. This is a big plus for me. All-in-all I was happy with it for the first run.

Just bought my Tuff Stuff Elite tent, and hoping to get that on soon!

 

[CWhite87]

I put my RCI bed rack on this weekend. It is the 18 inch high, 58 inch long universal rack. There are quite a few nuts and bolts with the universal rack, but it went together well. I was able to assemble and install the rack by myself, but a second set of hands would have been helpful and might have avoided the close call of almost breaking my rear window. After unboxing everything, I noticed that one of the cross bars was slightly bent towards the end, but I was able to bend it back in place without too much hassle. I mounted the rack using RCI’s no drill c-clamps. Overall it is very sturdy and a great looking product! Took the new set up to the races this weekend and all went well. The Tuff Stuff Elite tent delivers tomorrow and should be mounted this week!

 

[CWhite87]

I got my Tuff Stuff Elite roof top tent, and put it on last weekend! Overall the set up and installation went well!

I enlisted my wife to help get the tent set up and ready to mount. You could do most of it alone, but would need help bolting one of the mounting rails on to the bottom of the tent. We had three people to lift the tent up on the rack, but you could probably do it with two if needed. The bolts provided by Tuff Stuff were too short for the rails on my RCI rack, so had to get some longer ones. I sprung for the “security nuts” from Tuff Stuff for added security, but not sure if it was worth it. Also, one of the security nuts was the wrong size so TS is sending me a new one. Their customer service was very helpful.

I set the tent up in my driveway, but haven’t opened it up in the wild yet. Set up took some time by myself for the first time, but it will definitely get easier with time, and I don’t expect I’ll have to do it alone very often. I was unable to fully set up the little cover over the front window because of how close the tent was to the cab of the truck. No big deal. I also got an anti-condensation mat and put that in.

I also moved the side rails of my RCI rack down as low as they can go. Looks a little funny that way, but much easier to get gear in and out of the bed. I suppose I will have to move them back up if I ever want to mount stuff on them.

I drove for the first time with the tent yesterday. and had the bike on the back. You can definitely feel that much weight up that high. That will take some getting used to. My wife said a lot of people were checking out the set up as we drove.

Going camping after Christmas, and excited to try the tent out for the first time!

 

[CWhite87]

I just got back from my first trip with the new set up. I knew I was going to be doing some driving at night, and got a little paranoid about the bike being on the carrier, so I bought towing lights off Amazon for added visibility. The lights stick to the rack via magnets and plug into the trailer light wiring on the truck. I ran the wires through the rack to keep it all tidy. They worked out well.


The tent worked great! Still working out the kinks with the set up, but I’m sure it will keep getting easier. The temperature got down into the 20’s at night, so we cut our trip a little short. Unfortunately, the annex room tore when setting it up. Tuff Stuff customer service has been great, and they are already shipping me a new one. While we didn’t get the annex up all the way, it is definitely going to be a process to set it up, so not sure how frequently we will be using it in the future.

Going to camp at the races next weekend, so we’ll get to test it out some more then!