Truck Camper help please!

[ArielRae]

DH and I are looking into buying a slide in truck camper but there seems to be no dealers in or near southern New Jersey. Can anyone help us in our hunt for a good deal on a new or used truck camper. Let us know if your selling one. Also any tips or tricks on having a truck camper would be greatly appreciated.

 

[virginiamama]

Check rvtrader.com for used campers. We listed a hybrid travel trailer on there when we were selling to upgrade. I have seen very few (if any) truck campers around here in VA. Are you talking about a Fifth Wheel? I'd suggest finding an RV show and going to see what is available there. We went to shows to figure out what we wanted and then purchased from rvwholesalers.com for much less than the price our local dealer gave us. They are located in Ohio.

 

[heartbeeps]

things to consider:
do you have heavy duty suspension?
do you have a 6' bed or an 8' bed?
how many will you "typically" sleep in the camper?
do you NEED to have a toilet in the camper or will you be parking overnight in campgrounds that would allow you to use their facilities?
do you need hard sided camper or could you use a slide-in with a pop-up canvas top?

there's a couple of places that come to mind in Eastern PA that might work as far as dealers go. PM me if you're interested in knowing their names and I'll look them up for you.

We bought a used 8' truck camper (on an 8' Ram2500) to go cross country in 1999. It worked well but it did take a little getting used to driving the truck with all that weight on it. And, it did make the truck SUCK GAS big time! We had the pop-up canvas top which didn't cause as much drag as a standard hard-sided camper would; however, the downside was that it took a few minutes to open and close it and we could hear road noise when we parked in campgrounds near the interstates. (BTW, seemed like they were ALL by the Interstate!)

The advantage of having a truck camper was that we could drive into any roadside scenic area whereas those with 5th wheels and tag-a-long trailers had to park in specific areas - or not at all in some areas along the Oregon coast.

They're not the easiest to load on/off either as the clearance on either side is pretty slim. You'll need bigger side mirrors of course. If you get something more than 8' long, it'll be hanging over the back which will change your center of gravity on the truck. Get a 2nd battery for under the hood. We bought special brackets to tie it down to our truck. (We originally had a strap that went underneath the truck but it didn't work out very well.)

 

[CajunDixie]

I don't want you to feel unwelcome here but I wanted to let you know there are 2 camping boards here on the DIS. You can find them by scrolling down to "Forum Jump" drop down menu and choosing Camping Community Board or Camping at Disney. There are quite a few smart campers there!!

 

[musicmama]

You might want to check out Driftwood RV, I think it's near Avalon, NJ. I know it's between Sea Isle and Wildwood on Route 9 because I just drove that last week a bunch of times. We camp in Ocean View at Lake & Shore. I also noticed a sign for Ocean View RV (or something like that). Also, isn't there an RV show in Atlantic City coming up soon? You'd probably find quite a few dealers - and the last show we went to (in Allentown, PA) had a number of truck bed campers. They are kinda cool looking.

(If you're willing to venture into Pennsylvania, there's Media Camping which has 3 or 4 different locations and quite a few other dealers.)

Good luck!!

 

[RvUsa]

(I posted this on the camping board too)

Hey, I have some p/u campers listed on my site, (size, options, floor plans etc.) and there is a HUGE RV show at Hershey Pa the weekend of Sept 13-14th. It is the biggest Rv show in the country, so it would probably be worth the drive.

Here is the link to the campers on my site.... http://www.rvusa.org/dev/forum/viewforum.php?f=31

We have about 10 different campers on there. I hope that helps, and if you have any questions, just let me know.