Kingdom Camping Trailers

[rehammer81]

Sure, here are some basic items:

We've been living and traveling full time for more than 10 years, and researching our next trailer for the last three years, so we have a pretty good idea of what we want/need out of a trailer. We have three pages of specs (and growing) into Jamin at Kingdom, and he is easily handling them all. We are building differently than most people so our requests will seem odd at times. The important thing to note, is that the size of trailer will accommodate all kinds of sleeping and living arrangements.

We are two adults and two big dogs, so we're building without a dinette of any other built-in furniture in the main area. This will give us a larger space to have dog beds and provide our own "portable" chairs and tables as needed. It will also give us room to have a privacy partition between the north/south queen bed, which isn't usually seen in off road travel trailers of this side.

A wet bathroom is a must for us (we hate wet baths). After living with an 80 gallon black tank for all these years, and after a lot of research, we're skipping the black tank and going with a dry flush toilet (Separett Tiny).

Another big issue for us is true four season capability. All of the aluminum studs in the box will have insulation INSIDE the studs as well as insulation and vapor barriers to prevent thermal transfer through the studs as much as possible. The underbelly will be enclosed and insulated with heat ducted to the any areas where there is any plumbing. The fresh and gray tanks will also have 12v heating pads. We will use a Truma Combi for on demand hot water and ducted heat.

We'll be running everything on electric (except the Truma Combi) and will never be plugged in to shore power, so we have a big solar system planned. The only thing on the roof will a 12v AC unit and solar panels. The panels will be mounted on a racking system rather than glued, screwed, and Dicored into the roof. We may be able to fit 1,800 watts up there. There will be a 50 amp service, 3,000W inverter and possibly a 48v system rather than the usual RV 12v system.

To support all this, we'll have a steel frame that hot dipped galvanized (inside and outside), followed by a primer coat and a black coat finish (no shiny metal anywhere).

That's a pretty good start! Since we're still in design stage, if you have any other ideas, let us know. Thanks!

I like what I'm reading and if you can hit the neighborhood or the Ember pricing for their larger models, then you will have a TRUE game changer of a trailer. Honestly, you described a perfect trailer for me, my wife and our dog. When the time comes I'll have to evaluate my thoughts on size. I'm just afraid of going so big it kind of negates the point of an off-road trailer. I'm not trying to do the Rubicon with it but want to get further off the well visited path than the average dispersed camper. It should be more durable however.

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[Chasingopenspaces]

Sure, here are some basic items:

We've been living and traveling full time for more than 10 years, and researching our next trailer for the last three years, so we have a pretty good idea of what we want/need out of a trailer. We have three pages of specs (and growing) into Jamin at Kingdom, and he is easily handling them all. We are building differently than most people so our requests will seem odd at times. The important thing to note, is that the size of trailer will accommodate all kinds of sleeping and living arrangements.

We are two adults and two big dogs, so we're building without a dinette of any other built-in furniture in the main area. This will give us a larger space to have dog beds and provide our own "portable" chairs and tables as needed. It will also give us room to have a privacy partition between the north/south queen bed, which isn't usually seen in off road travel trailers of this side.

A wet bathroom is a must for us (we hate wet baths). After living with an 80 gallon black tank for all these years, and after a lot of research, we're skipping the black tank and going with a dry flush toilet (Separett Tiny).

Another big issue for us is true four season capability. All of the aluminum studs in the box will have insulation INSIDE the studs as well as insulation and vapor barriers to prevent thermal transfer through the studs as much as possible. The underbelly will be enclosed and insulated with heat ducted to the any areas where there is any plumbing. The fresh and gray tanks will also have 12v heating pads. We will use a Truma Combi for on demand hot water and ducted heat.

We'll be running everything on electric (except the Truma Combi) and will never be plugged in to shore power, so we have a big solar system planned. The only thing on the roof will a 12v AC unit and solar panels. The panels will be mounted on a racking system rather than glued, screwed, and Dicored into the roof. We may be able to fit 1,800 watts up there. There will be a 50 amp service, 3,000W inverter and possibly a 48v system rather than the usual RV 12v system.

To support all this, we'll have a steel frame that hot dipped galvanized (inside and outside), followed by a primer coat and a black coat finish (no shiny metal anywhere).

That's a pretty good start! Since we're still in design stage, if you have any other ideas, let us know. Thanks!

Sounds intriguing. Their current large trailer is on my short list. Did you have a chance to see one of their models in person yet? I’d be interested what you thought of the build quality.

Not sure insulation inside the studs will help. The cold/heat would just conduct around the insulation through the steel (aluminum?) and very little thermal energy would be moving through the still air inside the studs. At least if I’m picturing this correctly and you’re talking about square metal tubing “studs” in the trailer walls.

 

[Treefarmer]

Sounds intriguing. Their current large trailer is on my short list. Did you have a chance to see one of their models in person yet? I’d be interested what you thought of the build quality.

Not sure insulation inside the studs will help. The cold/heat would just conduct around the insulation through the steel (aluminum?) and very little thermal energy would be moving through the still air inside the studs. At least if I’m picturing this correctly and you’re talking about square metal tubing “studs” in the trailer walls.

Good point. If there is a continuous sheet of insulation on the outside of the studs and then again on the inside of the studs, that should be about as effective as you can get. Filling the studs with additional insulation shouldn't give you any real bump up in thermal bridging.

 

[rehammer81]

TreeFarmer, is there a target length (min/max) you guys are targeting?

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[Treefarmer]

We should come in with about a 20' box and 25' hitch to end of spare tire (we'll have a big storage box on the front as well). It's "downsizing" for us since we've been boondocking in a 31' 5th wheel for 10 years. We want something more off road capable, but we're not overlanders. We just want to get past those last few nasty arroyos that most trailers can't reach. We tow with an F350, so it will easily handle a 9,000+lb trailer. Right now we're limited to where the 5th wheel can go. With the new trailer we'll be able to go where the F350 can go.

 

[rehammer81]

We should come in with about a 20' box and 25' hitch to end of spare tire (we'll have a big storage box on the front as well). It's "downsizing" for us since we've been boondocking in a 31' 5th wheel for 10 years. We want something more off road capable, but we're not overlanders. We just want to get past those last few nasty arroyos that most trailers can't reach. We tow with an F350, so it will easily handle a 9,000+lb trailer. Right now we're limited to where the 5th wheel can go. With the new trailer we'll be able to go where the F350 can go.

It's on the large end for an off-road rig probably but not horribly bad depending on use case like you mentioned. I like it. My Power Wagon should be able to handle it just fine as well. You might be building my trailer too. We only have one 50lb dog so we would want probably a couch. I like the idea of a free moving table instead of something fixed.

I really like the direction you guys are headed.

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[Treefarmer]

You would be shocked at the places we've been able to get a 31', 18,000 lb 5th wheel into without doing any damage to the trailer ( it has a very well engineered steel frame). It has an independent suspension, but it's the MorRyde rubber spring with one shock per tire system, nothing near as capable as the CM ATX. We only have about 12" of clearance, but if you're careful, you can do pretty well getting into some remote boondocking sites, especially in the wide open desert southwest. We won't be going rock crawling with the new trailer, but going from 18,000 lbs to 9,000 lbs and 12" of clearance to 24+" of clearance will feel like floating on a cloud to us! ?

 

[rehammer81]

TreeFarmer,

Where are used based out of most of the time? I'm temporarily working out of state but will be back in AZ next spring. That's when I'm looking to pull the trigger on a trailer.

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[Treefarmer]

We boondock at our tree farm in north Idaho for about half the year and then spend the other half traveling the western states (ID, MT, WY, NM, UT, NV, AZ). This year will primarily be Utah before we end up in AZ. For the past few winters we've been spending more and more time in AZ. Either in the middle of the desert in the southwest corner or in the higher elevation grasslands in the southeast corner.

 

[DFNDER]

Sounds like an amazing, and large trailer. I was hoping Kingdom would build something smaller one of these days. Something that could go anywhere, smaller than their current offering but larger than a square drop. I consider their current offering too big for off road in my world. Guess I’ll have to wait to see that.

 

[Treefarmer]

That's funny. We had to talk them into making a larger, four wheel, model for the first time because everything they make is too small for us! The Adventure Pro Mini has a dry weight of 1,500lbs and could be optioned at an even lower weight if you skipped things like the roof rack. How small are you looking to go?

 

[Obsessed2findARuggedHybid]

I think Dendfr is saying the mini is to small but the ATS is to big. I bet Jamin could shorten and lighten up the ATS to hit that sweet spot.

 

[rehammer81]

Someone in the US needs to take a page out of the Kimberley Karavans playbook and come up with a well insulated and sturdy hi-lo design. I really like the flexibility of the Karavan and it would be top of my list except a couple things that stop me from pulling the trigger. I would like it to be better insulated for the US environments I want to camp (desert SW and Rocky Mountains). I don't need it to be good down to -40*F. I guess I'm not that hardcore. The Kimberleys are well built and not cheap and then adding the import fee on just drives the price beyond where I'm willing to go. Finally, a minor nitpick, they don't currently move the entry door to the passenger side for the US market. That isn't an issue for dispersed camping where I would typically be but in the occasion I make a stop at a campground, they are always arranged for passenger entry and awning deployment.

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[Treefarmer]

Someone in the US needs to take a page out of the Kimberley Karavans playbook and come up with a well insulated and sturdy hi-lo design. I really like the flexibility of the Karavan and it would be top of my list except a couple things that stop me from pulling the trigger. I would like it to be better insulated for the US environments I want to camp (desert SW and Rocky Mountains). I don't need it to be good down to -40*F. I guess I'm not that hardcore. The Kimberleys are well built and not cheap and then adding the import fee on just drives the price beyond where I'm willing to go. Finally, a minor nitpick, they don't currently move the entry door to the passenger side for the US market. That isn't an issue for dispersed camping where I would typically be but in the occasion I make a stop at a campground, they are always arranged for passenger entry and awning deployment.

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When I read that Kimberly owners are advised to drive down the road with their heating systems on because they might hit 30 degree temperatures along the way, I immediately rule those trailers out (unless you exclusively camp and travel when it's well above freezing). We don't seek out cold weather, but as fulltimers we commonly get caught in single digit temperatures in the late fall, winter, and early spring. We need a four season rig, not because we don't like to be cold inside the rig, but because having plumbing freeze ups are a pain in the ass and can cause some expensive repairs. When you're in AZ for the winter, it's also kind of nice to be able to confidently camp in the colder parts of AZ where the snowbirds fear to go. The same is true of UT, NV, NM, and TX from November through March. The Kimberleys are extremely well made, but for that kind of money, I would want more cold weather performance. You could spend a lot of money to cold harden a Kimberley, but I'd rather spend the money on building a trailer the way I want the first time.

 

[Treefarmer]

I think Dendfr is saying the mini is to small but the ATS is to big. I bet Jamin could shorten and lighten up the ATS to hit that sweet spot.

OK, I get it. The two wheel ATS comes in at around 4,100lbs dry. There's a lot of weight between 1,500lbs and 4,100lbs. We've never made decisions based on trailer weight before. We've always looked for what performance we needed from a trailer and then matched the tow vehicle to the final trailer. As a result we'll be towing our next trailer with far more truck than we need, but we like being as comfortable as possible , especially when it comes time to cross the Rockies in 90 degree heat or a snow squall.