help me hook up my truck bed for camping

[Greggk]

ok so i got some ideas rolling around inside my peahead about what needs to be done to the truck of my bed before I go camping at yellowstone national park this summer, on my mid deployment leave. So I guess the best thing to do is describe the situation, and what I have, and my needs.

The situation- I need a place to go camping with myself and my wife, while the kids sleep in the tent on the ground.

The Vehicle- 1999 Ford F250 with the powerstroke diesel, 8 foot bed with a cab height canopy.

Needs- I need comfort (wife has a bad back from a car accident almost 10 years ago).

Ok so with that said my thoughts are to buy a queen size 3" memory foam mattress topper (we have a memory foam bed in our house and it is the best sleep we ever had, hense why we are thinking a topper for the truck bed), and use that as a base for our 2 person 0*F sleeping bag.

We are also thinking of making some kind of curtain system for the windows on the canopy, because, well, we are kinda frisky when we have alone time, if you get my drift.

power source for laptop charging, watching dvd's, charging ipod's etc.

anything else i missed? if you have suggestions on my needs or my current ideas, please by all means throw them at me.

Thanks, Gregg

 

[StromHawk60]

save the combat pay and stay at a lodge!

You're on mid-tour! Enjoy the time in comfort and tell your wife she deserves it after watching the kids while you're gone. I know my wife has it harder than me this year!:wings:

 

[greentruck]

You can spend a lot of cash on curtains, especially if neither your wife or you sew. I went with something simple and quick.

You can buy a roll of landscape fabric for around $15, more than enough for any set of curtains (usually 50' or 100' rolls). It comes in different quality/thicknesses, so don't get it too thin. Also get some small plastic-covered hooks (say 3/4" diameter) and some hot glue, also.

I used a long bungee cord around the top of the cabin in our 80 series Land Cruiser, weaving and attaching it to the oh-****! handles, etc, to form the curtain "rod."

I cut a bunch of small pieces of hardwood about 3/8" thick. I cut pieces of the landscape fabric to approx. size for the curtains you want. Fold over the top edge onto the small wood blocks about every 12" and hot glue the seam and blocks.

Take the hooks and drill a hole, then screw them into the top of the wood blocks captured in the top seam of the curtain you just made. All you need to do then is hang your curtains.

We've never really used ours yet, but we tend to camp way back in the boonies. The black curtains will heat the interior quickly in the morning sun, but you didn't go to the woods to sleep in, did you?
Can't beat the cost and ease of whipping these curtains up, though.

 

[Greggk]

You're on mid-tour! Enjoy the time in comfort and tell your wife she deserves it after watching the kids while you're gone. I know my wife has it harder than me this year!:wings:

not home on leave yet.. got a few months to go yet, but planning/spending now, so its ready to go when i get there!

Less about camping, more about comfort.

My wife, who has chronic neck and back pain, enjoys this 12v massage pillow for roadtrips.

I will show her this and see what she says. Thank you!

You can spend a lot of cash on curtains, especially if neither your wife or you sew. I went with something simple and quick.

You can buy a roll of landscape fabric for around $15, more than enough for any set of curtains (usually 50' or 100' rolls). It comes in different quality/thicknesses, so don't get it too thin. Also get some small plastic-covered hooks (say 3/4" diameter) and some hot glue, also.

I used a long bungee cord around the top of the cabin in our 80 series Land Cruiser, weaving and attaching it to the oh-****! handles, etc, to form the curtain "rod."

I cut a bunch of small pieces of hardwood about 3/8" thick. I cut pieces of the landscape fabric to approx. size for the curtains you want. Fold over the top edge onto the small wood blocks about every 12" and hot glue the seam and blocks.

Take the hooks and drill a hole, then screw them into the top of the wood blocks captured in the top seam of the curtain you just made. All you need to do then is hang your curtains.

We've never really used ours yet, but we tend to camp way back in the boonies. The black curtains will heat the interior quickly in the morning sun, but you didn't go to the woods to sleep in, did you?
Can't beat the cost and ease of whipping these curtains up, though.

good idea and thank you!

 

[Mc Taco]

...We are also thinking of making some kind of curtain system for the windows on the canopy...

If the interior of the canopy is lined, Velcro tabs stick pretty well. Sewing a hem on a piece of fabric isn't really that hard. But I'll bet there is a seamstress near you that could do it for you for cheap. Let your wife pick out fabric she would like (retain refusal rights :elkgrin: ) so she has some of the input on the project.

 

[mustangwarrior]

i would say for curtains just use fabric and velcro, and what type of canopy do you have?

if you get a topper, you could get a suv tent and attach it to the back, like this but in the topper

 

[Greggk]

If the interior of the canopy is lined, Velcro tabs stick pretty well. Sewing a hem on a piece of fabric isn't really that hard. But I'll bet there is a seamstress near you that could do it for you for cheap. Let your wife pick out fabric she would like (retain refusal rights :elkgrin: ) so she has some of the input on the project.

i will check it out!

i would say for curtains just use fabric and velcro, and what type of canopy do you have?

if you get a topper, you could get a suv tent and attach it to the back, like this but in the topper

we already have a tent. he have a Swiss brand tent that is HUGE! but we have been looking for a replacement..... so i will check this out

 

[Greggk]

any other suggestions? keep them coming, as im coming up some good plans thank to yall

 

[greentruck]

We've got an awning that we use instead of the tent pictured above when we want a camp for more than one night.

For just an overnight camp, we also have a DAC tailgate tent. I converted the back of our 80 series Land Cruiser into a sleeper and the DAC tent offers a quick set-up to screen the tailgate area when it's open. It can be used with or without the awning and costs just over $100.

 

[Greggk]

We've got an awning that we use instead of the tent pictured above when we want a camp for more than one night.

For just an overnight camp, we also have a DAC tailgate tent. I converted the back of our 80 series Land Cruiser into a sleeper and the DAC tent offers a quick set-up to screen the tailgate area when it's open. It can be used with or without the awning and costs just over $100.

Can i see some pic? Also do you have a link to the awning and the DAC for sale?

 

[greentruck]

The DAC tailgate tent:
http://www.eatel.net/~dacinc/trucks.html

I got ours through Campmor, which offers free shipping on orders over $100.

The awning we used is one of the new 8x10 awnings made specifically for tailgating. These fit into a spot about the size of a parking space. I used the nets/walls that fit a 10x10 awning.

This provides some extra material that you can then use to enclose around the back of the truck at the 8' wide vehicle/awning interface, as well as providing an overlapping door at the opposite narrow end. I even found a 8' wide section with a window in it.

This awning is also taller than many, which works better with the taller opening that the 80 series Land Cruiser has, permitting the upper hatch to be opened up even underneath the edge of the awning. Most pickups with toppers are not so tall, so you may be able to get away with using a lower awning?

You can see how this works in the first two pics, although I'd ordinarily pick a more level spot in the woods than my sharply sloping drive to set it up.

The last pic show how I used an extra netting panel for a 10x10 awning and a couple of bungee cords to form a insect barrier underneath the truck's tailgate area. This is also where the DAC tailgate tent would attach. Not seen in this pic is the new sleeper interior I installed since in the 80, but your pickup would be different.

 

[Greggk]

thats a pretty neat setup there. i like that!

 

[Accrete]

Greetings and have fun with the reunion once stateside (my 2 kids are in the USAF so i know how that goes!)

On your build, i agree with Mc TACO on the velcro idea inside if your shell is lined. That is how we did ours so there were no rods or bungies, they just rolled up as seen in the image below. And we could just remove and stow the fabric when not in use. Also, at least for our use we were happy our fabric was vinyl ther than cotton as we had condensation on the fabric nearly every morning.

what is not shown in the above image is the truck-bed air mattress we would set up for my wife and i to lounge/sleep on. It was fairly comfortable, and would be much more so in your larger width truck bed.

Also, the sportz tent show below on our rig worked fantastic (as others have shared on their rigs+tent). Highly recommend the idea as it will allow access to/from family members is deisired.

cheers,
thom

 

[Greggk]

Greetings and have fun with the reunion once stateside (my 2 kids are in the USAF so i know how that goes!)

On your build, i agree with Mc TACO on the velcro idea inside if your shell is lined. That is how we did ours so there were no rods or bungies, they just rolled up as seen in the image below. And we could just remove and stow the fabric when not in use. Also, at least for our use we were happy our fabric was vinyl ther than cotton as we had condensation on the fabric nearly every morning.

what is not shown in the above image is the truck-bed air mattress we would set up for my wife and i to lounge/sleep on. It was fairly comfortable, and would be much more so in your larger width truck bed.

Also, the sportz tent show below on our rig worked fantastic (as others have shared on their rigs+tent). Highly recommend the idea as it will allow access to/from family members is deisired.

cheers,
thom

that window treatment is fantastic. i like that a lot.. is that an actual window shade cut to fit the windows of the shell? also is that the suv tent model or???

 

[Greggk]

so i got the following link given to me on another forum, and this is somewhat close to what im thinking of doing.

http://www.bajataco.com/Camper1.html

Discuss your opinions and what you would change, remember i have an 8 foot bed Ford F250, so i obviously have a longer, wider and taller bed area....

my thoughts is the center area would drop down approximately 8 inches as a relief area for a mattress. this way we have a little more room to move inside the truck.