Lehel and Laura's New Camper

[lehel1]

hello all

well, here it is. the new camper. we have it set up to be easily removed with a forklift or jacks. it sits on a regular type flatbed.

i hope i'll be able to load a few pic's now. the last one is some of the weather i encountered in the sierra's on the way home. the 395 hwy closed as i approached bridgeport in calif and i got to see how the rig handled in severe snow on side roads, and that was awesome ; )

now we'll be needing a bed mattress, cushions and we plan to mount a catalitic heater. we'll see how the jacks work this weekend when we take the rig off. should be straight forward and a quick process.

the camper came in under weight, only 3000 lbs. but alittle taller at 12' 2" to the top of the air conditioning.

well, i'll stop here and try and load a few pic's

cheers lehel and laura (happy campers ; )

 

[lehel1]

and the inside

the inside of the camper

 

[lehel1]

well, alright

there alittle small but i got a few pic's loaded. soon i'll be a pro lol

cheers laura

 

[VicHanson]

Looks great Lehel and Laura! Enjoy!

Vic

 

[ozzyfishaman]

Hi Lehel,If you dont mind what sort of cost do you think it will owe you when it is finished.
Cheers Ozzyfishaman

there alittle small but i got a few pic's loaded. soon i'll be a pro lol

cheers laura

 

[ozzyfishaman]

hello all

well, here it is. the new camper. we have it set up to be easily removed with a forklift or jacks. it sits on a regular type flatbed.

The camper came in under weight, only 3000 lbs. but alittle taller at 12' 2" to the top of the air conditioning.
Cheers lehel and laura (happy campers ; )

Looks Really Nice Guys,Congratulations well done,BTW what is you bed over height.
Cheers John

 

[alan]

looks great! congradulations!

 

[lehel1]

new camper questions ?

hello all

the cost of the camper minus cushions came in under $20000. we also will be putting in a catalic heater (the builder missed that request and put in electric, good comunication can be important lol), but not much more needed inside. outside the camper we'll be adding a new front winch bumper, a rack on the rear for our yamaha motorbike, solar on the roof and kayak mounts and hoist. the suspension ungrades are wonderfull and the ride is total smooth on the pavement. washboard roads might be another story, we'll find that out on next trip to the desert.
the under side will be getting national fleet tool boxs and rear fenders. without fenders the truck becomes a real mess on dirt roads we're finding, we hope they'll help.
the total height is 12' 2", 48" to the flatbed, then 96" to the top of the air conditioning unit. the height was the minimum we could do to do the cabover and have any kind of room up there. the benefit as well is the bathroom floor is raised about 10", allowing all the holding tanks to be part of the camper unit under the floor there.

the cab cannot be tilted with the camper on, the titan jack stands we'll be using are colapsable and i'll carry them with. received them yesterday and the worm gear drives are really nice on them. we wanted the cabover bed, the dinete also makes into a bed but we didn't want to have to make that up and down all the time.

so far everything is working nicely. alittle bit of a funny story though, with all the cold weather on the trip home i learned the benefit of draining the plumbing lines (not tank) even while driving and using the camper, broke a few water lines. so i'm putting in two drains (hot and cold) for draining the water lines themselves without having to drain the water tank. hadn't even had a chance to use the system for the first time when i found the leaks lol

we'll be taking the rig down to the gravel bar soon to see how the twisting action will be. at the moment we have not installed a flex type mount system under the flatbed. the fuso rep and the camper builder both agree it may not be needed, and we'll see how this comes out and keep you posted. we plan to see many remote locations but in most of our travels with our unimog camper we have not seen the extreme 4wd trails that might require a flex frame. the suspension upgrades seem to absorb alot now.

just got some pic's of atwarriors new coil suspension, sure wish they were here in the states. i'd be there second truck done lol

enjoy your day, cheers lehel and laura

p.s. the overall weight right now is 11000 lbs with 2 full propane tanks and both deisel tanks full (but empty water or holding tanks), its looking like with the motorbike and all our gear we'll be able to keep well under the max gvwr of 14050 lbs. thats the hope anyways ; )

 

[justduck]

Hi Lehel, that looks great! I'm anxious to see it in person, but in reality that probably won't be until the snow melts on Page Mt.

Earl

 

[dzzz]

nice. the flatbed should keep it from getting twisted.
.........................

The tradeoff is that a stiff flatbed will hold a wheel off the road. That's why the optimal subframe will allow the frame to flex, within design limits, while supporting the camper. But often we don't need optimal - good enough is fine. This seems especially true with the light FG frame. The flatbed is engineered for the truck which eliminates guessing about frame attachment.

 

[lehel1]

our first trip soon ??

hello all

well, we're just about ready to leave for our first vacation in the new camper (although just a short 10-12 day trip) hopefully leaving next wed.
the camper came off in just 5 min when i got home from our delivery last month, it will be interesting if all goes as smoothly putting the camper back on, especially lining up the mounting holes.

our plan is to head down toward death valley and surrounding area's. laura's hoping we don't run into any real cold weather in the sierra's mountains, as we hav'nt got the catalitic heater in yet. always seems to be more projects i hav'nt got to yet ; ) but that is alot of the fun for me, putting the rig togeather. perhaps i'll surprize her with a little portable catalitic ; )

we got our mattress built and in but still waiting on cushions, so it will be pillows for the seating for now.
the lastest projects we've been working on, a long box to go between the cab and camper to hold our titan jacks (we want to carry these for longer trips as we can't tilt the cab with the cabover) along with shovels, hi jack and such things. we ordered but still waiting to receive some composit rear fenders and 3 under body tool boxs (all from national fleet).

we're well into designing a alum front bumper and rear motorcycle rack (steel for this). hoping to get these started building soon.

hope you all enjoyed the holidays cheers lehel and laura

 

[Bajaroad]

Nice job

It's great to see a new rig come to fruition - nice job Lehel.

I started working on mine again this last fall - maybe I'll have something to show in the next couple months. Can I borrow your ladder when you're finished

I'm in Ventura CA, so someday we'll have to meet in the desert.

-Brent

 

[kerry]

Glad to hear you're working on it again Brent.

 

[lehel1]

side trip to san diego

It's great to see a new rig come to fruition - nice job Lehel.

I started working on mine again this last fall - maybe I'll have something to show in the next couple months. Can I borrow your ladder when you're finished

I'm in Ventura CA, so someday we'll have to meet in the desert.

-Brent

hello brent

thanks for the note. it was actually a view of your truck that got us onto the fuso track and build ; )

late next week we'll be heading to aluminess in san diego to measure up for a new front bumper and such before heading home. if you are up for a visit we might be able to stop by. feel free to e-mail me if you'd like and we'll try and check it before we hit san diego lehel@3crows.net or our cell 510-468-5255 we'll most likely be out of cell service while were in the mountains till next thurs.

cheers lehel and laura

 

[lehel1]

back from the overland expo ??

hello all

great to see all the new camper builds coming along so well. i do hope we can all organize at some point and perhaps do a trip ; ) we did see a older canter with a new four wheel non-popup camper at the expo.

we'll we just got back from the overland expo, really had a good time, although we learned to participate in any events to get signed up early. we were just considered daypassers and missed out on all the neat events. signing up 5 weeks ahead wasn't soon enough, but did get to see the different movies and such.
lots of cool trucks and gear.

here's our lastest truck pic's. almost done. aluminess did a fantastic job on the bumpers and motorbike rack. still working on the kayak roof racks, but the rear hoist turned out sweet.

anyhow, busy after being away. will try and write more on our trip and how the systems on the camper are working out so far

cheers lehel and laura