M416 Build to go behind my CJ

[Mark Harley]

Looks great, I will need to do this with my 101A2 or buy a tent without anex. and use a shower house tent for changes.
Is that a new toyota truck I see? Thanks for all the great build ideas.
Mark Harley

 

[Area52]

This is a great effort and a beautiful outcome.

Jim

 

[DonBeasley]

Looks great, I will need to do this with my 101A2 or buy a tent without anex. and use a shower house tent for changes.
Is that a new toyota truck I see? Thanks for all the great build ideas.
Mark Harley

Yeah my son uses the trailer more than me. He traded in his 09 Tacoma Sport 2wd for a 12 Tacoma Sport 4wd so he can go more places.

 

[DonBeasley]

Looks good, and the first time I have seen someone do it.

I have my lift set up to 6'8" when at camp, I can say it is not tippy at all, and we have been through 1 thunderstorm with it on the trailer with 20+ mph winds. It shook a little, but it was all in the wheels of the trailer. I locked the parking brake and it is actually more stable and moves less than when it was on the roof of our H3. When my lift is lowered it is about the same height as yours.

That said, not being able to get into the trailer without raising the lift is a pain sometimes, and the only way I have found to jack it up has been a bit of a pain too.

I have watched your build with interest as I would like to figure out a way to lift the tent once I get onsite and use a full annex room. The ones I was speaking of were where it is lifted all of the time. It seems to work for many but it makes me nervous. My only choice was going the way you did or cutting the annex. With old age, a fused neck and a cracked back, my lifting ability is limited and I have yet to come up with an easy way to crank the tent up that will not hurt.

Someone on here is going to come up with a great idea on a lift like yours soon that works off of an easy crank or small 12 volt motor and then we will all have higher tents when we camp.

 

[jeepfreak81]

I have watched your build with interest as I would like to figure out a way to lift the tent once I get onsite and use a full annex room. The ones I was speaking of were where it is lifted all of the time. It seems to work for many but it makes me nervous. My only choice was going the way you did or cutting the annex. With old age, a fused neck and a cracked back, my lifting ability is limited and I have yet to come up with an easy way to crank the tent up that will not hurt.

Someone on here is going to come up with a great idea on a lift like yours soon that works off of an easy crank or small 12 volt motor and then we will all have higher tents when we camp.

I hope to stumble on a pop up camper with a crank system being parted out. I would like to try to adapt one. Right now I am stumped, as it is still a pain with 1 person. I honestly do not know how the guys that have them up all the time do it. I towed mine only a few blocks and could feel the wind taking the weight off the tongue.

Yours is a great option, and if I did not have a playpen down below where I will be down there all the time it probably would be the route I would have taken.

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Very kool idea with the annex?

I bought a CVT Mount Hood 4 person, and all the CVT tents come with the annex included. I was thinking the exact same thing just the other day when I was looking at the bag in my garage? Hmmm.... very kool idea, great place to store stuff and keep it dry.

 

[DonBeasley]

Thanks to a friendly reminder from Razorback I am posting some info on my HF box that I am using for my power source. When I bought the box the intent was always to put a battery in here and use it to power all of the gadgets we seem to "must have" these days.

Here are a few pictures of the box.

The left side has the plug in for the power cord that goes to the onboard charger and it has 3 12v sockets. Two sockets are standard cigarette lighter style and the one at the bottom is a Hella plug for my ARB frig.

Right side is the same except no outlet for the charging cord.

This is the inside of the box. It is pretty full. I used a Guest 16202 20 amp charger that can charge 2 batteries at 10 amps each or hook both to one battery and charge at 20 amps. I do this most of the time but I also have a Optima yellow top that I carry as a backup in the trailer and if needed can use it and recharge off the Guest charger.

The battery is a Deka group 31 deep cycle battery rated at 105 ah. I got it at Battery Plus with their label but the Deka distributer in Dallas says they get them in, put the Battery Plus label on them and send them out. It has dual posts and as you can see, i used them all. The battery tray is a stainless steel tray made for the Deka 31 and I got it from Artec Industries.

As you can probably tell from the picture, I wired everything directly to the battery with inline fuses on each one. It may seem the hard way but I wanted direct contact so I went this route.

I am still not finished as I have plans to make a flip-up interior cover from stainless steel that will house a battery monitor, a couple more sockets that can be out of the weather, and eventually a solar panel controller for a 60-90 watt foldable solar panel that I hope to get sometime in the future. I also plan to put an external switch panel on the right side to control more led lights that I am going to mount underneath and around the trailer for night time lighting.

The box is pretty full but I expected that. I have enough room left for the charging cord and some socket adapters that make some of the sockets usb ports as needed. Right now it powers the led tent lights, the ARB frig and charges my cell, my hotspot, ipad, and allows me to run laptops as needed. At overland expo in May we ran all of this stuff as needed for 3 days with no issue and the frig was plugged in the whole time.

My plans may change but this is what I have so far. I am by no means "Mr. Electrical" so if you see any problems please point them out.

 

[KA5IVR]

Don,
Tent turned out good!

 

[DonBeasley]

Yeah I am liking it. I cannot stand up straight but I will be sitting in this area most of the time anyway.

How is your project coming along?

 

[jeepfreak81]

I have that same connector for the 110v input to my charger... it broke the second time I plugged into it. I threw a buttload of epoxy down there with a stick for now to fix it as otherwise I have to remove and unhook a ton of stuff to repair it.

 

[KA5IVR]

Yeah I am liking it. I cannot stand up straight but I will be sitting in this area most of the time anyway.

How is your project coming along?

Have not hit a lick on it yet. The wife has me doing the Kitchen Remodel from Hell. Hopefully this winter some time. Also may be getting my old Jeep back too, so I want to do some work on it too.

How much head room is in there? You are pretty tall, so I can see why you can't stand. I think I would use it for sitting and putting my shoes on or just keeping stuff out of the weather.

 

[DonBeasley]

I am under 6' and the exact measurement was 5' 1.5" for the tent area. Since I am using the ARB tent with the overhang on the ladder, I can stand up there and that is 55" wide and about 3' extending. The ladder is somewhat in the way but I can still move around in this area without too much trouble. For me, this will work great.

My son's girlfriend is not much over 5' so the joke is that she will not have to watch where she walks! When my son uses it, they have 3 dogs between them so I know what will occupy this lower area at night.

I expect that I will use it as a dressing area, sitting area, boot storage area, etc. I am going to get a few more LED lights to wire to the area to provide nighttime lighting.

My next project is that I am looking at a small Oztent (RV-1) to act as an extra sleeping area (I snore and get kicked out). The RV-1 is 5'2" long so it will fit in the trailer and all their other models will not. It is just big enough for a cot area to sleep but has a front annex area of 7'2" x 7'. I am thinking I will face the OZ annex to the ARB annex and can make a weather protected cooking and sitting area. Still working on the details and measurements but part of my next phase for the trailer.

I am looking at the Oztent after seeing them for 2 years @ Overland Expo. I like the quick setup, almost as fast as the RTT. I watched them withstand 20-30 mph winds at OX12 @ Morman Lake and they did fine if staked down correctly.

I hate the honey-do projects. They eat into my own projects and the wife has no sense of humor!!!!!!!!!!

 

[DonBeasley]

I have that same connector for the 110v input to my charger... it broke the second time I plugged into it. I threw a buttload of epoxy down there with a stick for now to fix it as otherwise I have to remove and unhook a ton of stuff to repair it.

Mine wants to come loose all the time. Supposedly designed for the Guest cord to plug into the back and then just plug the cord to the outside. Everytime I do it, if I don't hold it on the inside, the cord on the inside comes loose. It looks like a weak snap that holds the inside cord in place. It is about to get a hose clamp attached that may help. Thank god mine is near the top and not at the bottom.

 

[hesterj]

And the license plate says it all:

I was rereading your thread this morning for something when i saw this pic......your tags are out now. Lol

 

[DonBeasley]

Thanks. I hadn't noticed and we may need to "bug out" Friday when the Mayan calendar ends! Guess no one would give me a ticket if that happened - LOL:wings: