Hi. 
Long time follower and member of this great site, but mostly just a lurker.
I have a small camper that rides piggyback on an 8' flatbed platform. It's a relatively light rig. I say relatively light as it uses some older technology such as a chop-gun fiberglass shot into a mold and has some rather large and heavy windows. Basically this is a modified 18' Sunrader that has been shortened by about 2 feet as well as a slew of other body modifications that greatly enhance the usability of the rig while practically eliminating potentials for leaks or annoying maintenance needs. It's a great little camper despite some of its short comings and happy with how it turned out. If I could do it over again or build a shell from scratch, it would definitely be lighter and use smaller and more modern windows.
Here's a few pictures of the camper for reference:
The first truck was a 1994 Toyota 3.0L V6 4x4. GVW with myself + camper & most of the gear was a whopping 4.5K lbs, but under the GVWR of vehicle with some decent wiggle room remaining. Not heavy compared to other toyota motorhomes, but definitely not light. The flatbed on this truck was built as low to the frame as possible with wheel well boxes and voids in the frame for wheel travel. The wheel well boxes are removable and the camper shell has its own fiberglass wheel wells that fit over these voids in the frame.
My next truck is a 1995 Toyota T100 3.4L V6 4x4. While this truck isn't a heavy duty truck such as an F350, or even F250 for that matter, it is definitely "bigger" and this should provide a little better camper/truck proportions. The 3.4L plus engine bay room being a much desired improvement over the cramped and infamous 3.0. The cab is slightly taller as well requiring new mounting elevations.
On to the question and point of this thread:
While the low slung old design with wheel wells worked great in helping keeping the CofG low as well as the gap between cab roof and overhead bunk, it would be really nice to be able to do away with the wheel wells and build a true flatbed for the new truck. I haven't taken the bed off the new truck and backed it under the camper, but from some rudementary measurements, it appears will be able to pull this off with a little compromise in the cabover gap + wheel travel.
I should point out that this particular year truck has 15" wheels and newer years used 16" on the same chassis/body. And so as seen from the pictures, there is a lot of room in the wheel wells. A whopping 13.5" to be exact. And so plan to keep the 15" wheels to allow for a closer flatbed. I have a set of firestone air bags + can add a leaf if necessary.
Invariably there's going to be some give and take in terms of the cabover to roof gap and wheel travel, but what should a minimum wheel travel range be? Would 10" be sufficient? 8"? And any suggestions on how one might go about testing to find out how little wheel travel is needed for a particular application?
I should add that I am a conservative driver (friends say I drive like a little old lady haha) and try to avoid hitting big potholes/bumps at high speed. But these things are unavoidable. The occasional brief tire rub from these rare events prob wouldn't be too much of a concern?
Thanks for the audience and any feedback is greatly appreciated.
Steve H.
Long time follower and member of this great site, but mostly just a lurker.
I have a small camper that rides piggyback on an 8' flatbed platform. It's a relatively light rig. I say relatively light as it uses some older technology such as a chop-gun fiberglass shot into a mold and has some rather large and heavy windows. Basically this is a modified 18' Sunrader that has been shortened by about 2 feet as well as a slew of other body modifications that greatly enhance the usability of the rig while practically eliminating potentials for leaks or annoying maintenance needs. It's a great little camper despite some of its short comings and happy with how it turned out. If I could do it over again or build a shell from scratch, it would definitely be lighter and use smaller and more modern windows.
Here's a few pictures of the camper for reference:
The first truck was a 1994 Toyota 3.0L V6 4x4. GVW with myself + camper & most of the gear was a whopping 4.5K lbs, but under the GVWR of vehicle with some decent wiggle room remaining. Not heavy compared to other toyota motorhomes, but definitely not light. The flatbed on this truck was built as low to the frame as possible with wheel well boxes and voids in the frame for wheel travel. The wheel well boxes are removable and the camper shell has its own fiberglass wheel wells that fit over these voids in the frame.
My next truck is a 1995 Toyota T100 3.4L V6 4x4. While this truck isn't a heavy duty truck such as an F350, or even F250 for that matter, it is definitely "bigger" and this should provide a little better camper/truck proportions. The 3.4L plus engine bay room being a much desired improvement over the cramped and infamous 3.0. The cab is slightly taller as well requiring new mounting elevations.
On to the question and point of this thread:
While the low slung old design with wheel wells worked great in helping keeping the CofG low as well as the gap between cab roof and overhead bunk, it would be really nice to be able to do away with the wheel wells and build a true flatbed for the new truck. I haven't taken the bed off the new truck and backed it under the camper, but from some rudementary measurements, it appears will be able to pull this off with a little compromise in the cabover gap + wheel travel.
I should point out that this particular year truck has 15" wheels and newer years used 16" on the same chassis/body. And so as seen from the pictures, there is a lot of room in the wheel wells. A whopping 13.5" to be exact. And so plan to keep the 15" wheels to allow for a closer flatbed. I have a set of firestone air bags + can add a leaf if necessary.
Invariably there's going to be some give and take in terms of the cabover to roof gap and wheel travel, but what should a minimum wheel travel range be? Would 10" be sufficient? 8"? And any suggestions on how one might go about testing to find out how little wheel travel is needed for a particular application?
I should add that I am a conservative driver (friends say I drive like a little old lady haha) and try to avoid hitting big potholes/bumps at high speed. But these things are unavoidable. The occasional brief tire rub from these rare events prob wouldn't be too much of a concern?
Thanks for the audience and any feedback is greatly appreciated.
Steve H.
