Wedge Life

Guess I never got the memo I need to disassemble the bed in my SP to get out of the camper cuz I've never done that. Mattress doesn't lay on top of the removable panels.

 

Can you share a photo or two of what you mean?

Thanks

 

yeah, their marketing and photos make it seem like the bed covers the panels when set up.

Or maybe it would be for my uses where I need to pull the mattress back away from the small end of the wedge so my feet clear.

 

Perhaps old news for this community, but Vagabond has sadly closed. This thread gets juicy starting on page 25:
https://forum.expeditionportal.com/threads/vagabond-outdoors-drifter.208530/page-25

 

I think they were one of the best campers out there and I really wanted one from them but they have been basically pulling a pelfrybilt and scamming people for the last few years. Dude should have just sold his business I hope everyone he scammed gets some kind of compensation or justice

 

What a bummer to hear this. They were one of the pioneers and IMHO the best product. If I was going with a wedge I would have gotten a VO.

 

It’s never too late to get one. I’ll be selling my Vagabond Drifter sometime in the next year. It’s a product that will outlive us.

 

Sounds like Jerry at BAMF might be trying to make things as right as possible with folks bike scraping what he can together. I really hope he can make something work. The campers are really top notch. Sucks that they were so bad at running the operation.

 

Yep, that’s exactly it. He knows how to run a business and while he states he isn’t going to lose money helping people out, he also knows that its good for his business in brand awareness and getting his name out there for helping out again (like the pelfrey fiasco).

 

Here ya go, sorry for the wait. The main sleep platform is 80" long, I think the Exped is 78". The removable panels are 20" long. I just use the panels as a bedside table, the bed only covers the main sleeping platform. So I can remove 1 panel and drop down to the truck bed or most of the time I just go out the rear door and climb down the tailgate.

No ladder needed, SP designed the X1 so the rear hatch leaves the top of the tailgate exposed so you can use it as a step. May not work for Gen 1 and 2 tacos, or other truck brands. Of course you can sabotage that use by getting a 270 awning. Personally I found climbing down the back way easier than climbing down from inside and going out the rear hatch/tailgate. I carry a dual sport on a hitch mounted carrier a lot which eliminates that as an option when the bike is loaded.

If you're tall you might need to slide the mattress and bedding forward over the removable panels a bit. I occasionally touch my toes to the narrow part of the wedge when sleeping on my back. But I think the platform length is similar in the SP and Drifter.

GFC is bigger overall IIRC but panels are shaped different and not as easy to move to get down into the truck bed unless you're solo.

 

Any of you all getting condensation under your mattresses? We leave our vent open at night but it’s been pretty cold so we are keeping the windows closed most nights. We found our mattress was pretty soaked underneath a few nights ago and had to pull it out of the cover and dry it out. We are getting in the habit of flipping the mattress over in the morning but I was thinking about carpeting the tops of the panels to keep the condensation down. Curious if anyone else has had similar issues.

Here’s a pic from last week for the heck of it.

 

Pretty common in cooler weather to have condensation under the bed. I’m sure you know this but it’s caused by the temperature differential between inside and outside of the camper. Of course on the overhang the outside air is very cool and where you’re lying is going to be very warm.

https://dasmule.com/products/alu-cab-rooftop-tent-mattress-condensation-mat

maybe try something like this to help a little but it’s always going to be a problem unless you can insulate it better.

 

Brilliant! Thank you!

 

Like the other poster suggested, some kind of anti-condensation mat will help a lot. It won't reduce the amount of condensation created, it just allows a small amount of space for air between the mattress and the floor which keeps it much drier.

 

Lego 60182 its a great set and i like it more as truck with a wedge topper

 

That looks great! Thank you for the feedback. Sorry I'm so late to the party.

I ended up putting down some insulation and carpeting throughout the entire bed of my truck and the inside of the Drifter walls including the gullwing doors.

 

Yup I have. I bought and use a material under the mattress that has fabric on one side and some plastic mesh on the other. I think its called Hypervent. I had the supplier cut it in half so as to be able to remove the front piece when deploying that part over the cab. It definitely helps. However, I found this spring that after some very cold days of winter use (-14 to around 0 F) there was leftover moisture under the Hypervent over the truck cab area, that I did not notice when I buttoned it up from that trip. It was not so much in the mattress, though I did put it out to dry. I think this was from the fact that it was the area over the truck cab which had a tendency to be colder than the area over the truck bed. I did not have any noticeable moisture in the truck bed area. I was using ceramic heaters to keep out cold and moisture. Obviously this was in a campground with electric(I normally use a propex which is not as dry). Worked great except in area just noted. I think this winter I'll try to direct some air to the area under the mattress that extends over the cab. Not sure how though.
That's my experience.

 

I think it's gonna be pretty hard to eliminate all moisture in extreme rain or cold conditions. I keep some towels around and wipe away condensation when I find it.

 

Condensation on the tent walls doesn’t bother me. It’s when it’s trapped under the mattress, then the foam can get moldy. We are living in our camper pretty much full time at the moment as we travel around the country. We are now in the habit of flipping the mattress up in the morning and reliably find condensation under it every morning, in temperatures as warm as 50 degrees overnight, so not exactly extreme cold. We will get one of those anti condensation pads to try out once we get to a spot where we can order it.

 

I'm thinking about picking up a Sherpa roof rack during their black Friday sale for my Vagabond setup in an effort to reduce wind noise in the cabin. To those with a rack / fairing, how much of an improvement in cabin wind noise did you find? Any improvement in gas mileage? Trying to determine whether it's worth the ~$500 or if the reduction in noise is marginal.

Also, pic for attention.