Iggy's $1 Taco

Yeah, I'm going with the plastic ones in the video. Same here, I have all my drinks including water in the fridge, but I would like the water to be potable in an emergency.

 

Ohh yeah that's right! You've got the shell I was getting ahead of myself there lol

 

Dude, that custom pop up is SICK. I've been looking for something like that !!

 

No new updates on the camper. Waiting on the manufacturer to get squared away on the fabric before we get a final product.

In the mean time I've been working on getting a legit drawer setup. I ended up with the Front Runner drawer with 6 wolf packs. The site says it won't fit a Tacoma, but I cut a board the same size and it fit, so I took a chance. It ended up fitting perfect like it was made for the truck. There is maybe a few mm gap between the wheel wells.











The bad. After putting it on the truck and checking it out, I immediately noticed the top would bow if I pressed on the top between the tie down rail and a piece of metal that connected to the plywood.

After reaching out to FR the max capacity is 150lbs evenly distributed. Not good since we'll be using the top to add supplies and walk on to get the bed. So we need about 300-400 capacity up top.

I didn't want to deal with the hastle of returning it since it's almost perfect, so true to nature I have to modify it. The first step was to remove the plywood and see what I had to work with. Then I riveted the tie down rail to the supporting piece so they both relay on each other for horizontal support.





Here's the biggest problem. The plywood is so flimsy it can't even support its own weight. This is getting replaced with some Russian birch unless I can find some 1/2" honeycomb aluminum. The next layer, the one which currently has carpet, is getting replaced with a laminate that covers the entire bed to have flat surface.



So this is a lot more work than I expected to do, but at least it will end up being exactly what I'm looking for.

 

Fit to meet your needs, and an improvement on design. That's a win!

 

That's pretty disappointing how much modification the front runner drawers need. Why would they make the top so weak, for something like that where it essentially becomes the floor for the bed, it should be able to support more weight than that. Sad to see products that cost a premium but the quality doesn't reflect that. Hope your modifications get you the final product you want though.

 

I agree, but the other options that could support the weight out of the box were at least twice as much and weigh a lot more.

I took the chance to save some money as well knowing I have the ability to make the changes I need, but I would be pretty bummed if I was not prepared for that.

I got all the gear through Blueline Expedition Outfitters and Johns suggestions were spot on for an out of the box solution. I was just really stuck on this slide.

 

Wow, @Iggy - I just finished reading all 39 pages of the thread since coming across it two days ago.

I currently have an ARE DCU shell of similar construction - aluminum frame with steel sheet cover - and up until seeing this thread (I saw a photo of an early prototype from @Overlanerd a while back), I was sold on placing an order for a Habitat since I don't want to deal with a used and potentially issue ridden Flippac.

I don't see anything I would change with the setup - the 18oz vinyl coated polyester fabric for true 4-season use, no increase in the effective vehicle footprint with raised (like the Flippac / unlike the Habitat), and tall standing area upon entering the rear of the truck.

I have seen a few people ask for a timeline and didn't find an answer. I totally understand that most of this is out of your hands since you are just assisting the company, but any rough (even if incorrect) guess would be helpful for my planning. Are we talking "any time now", a few months or is this still 6-12 months out?

I appreciate any insight you can offer and MANY THANKS TO YOU AND @Overlanerd FOR ALL YOUR PROTOTYPING AND WORK!!!

 

This looks awesome! Add me to the list of buyers once y'all get production up and running. Keep up the great work!

 

@Iggy / @Overlanerd - Last night while sleeping and dreaming about my future setup, I realized that both of your trucks are 2nd gens. Will this company be making one that fits or adapts to the 1st gen short bed?

 

Hey Jason, I sold my Flippac to someone with a DCSB 1st gen and it fit fine. I think FRP used the same mold. The 2nd gen version should fit fine, but they will probably make them for 1st gens.

 

Do you know what size aluminum you used for that platform? I was originally thinking 1" square tubing (lower profile and half the price of 1.5" tubing) , but it looks like it might not be strong enough to support 2 people. Guess I could just buy a piece and do some destructive testing to find out for sure.

http://metalgeek.com/static/deflection.php

 

Use 4 pieces across the bed and deflection goes down to 0.7" (i.e. 0.28" divided by 4). Then add whatever plywood? you're using as a skin, and deflection is further reduced due to the stiffness of the wood. 1" square tubing plus 1/4" ply top and bottom should be pretty stiff, for an overall thickness of 1.5".

 

I should point out that this is a little over-simplified. If you kneel in the middle of one tube, the load isn't really distributed so the deflection could be excessive. But as I was told early on in engineering school, engineering is the application of real-world judgment to pure science. The judgment isn't always good.

 

Looks like my progression fist soft topper w rtt then camper shell w rtt now habitat duel batt solar and fridge got rid of the heavy steel bumpers now runnin with alum ones.

 

The topper looks amazing and was incredibly happy with the AL one I had on my Tundra years back. Id like to get one made for my Tacoma and seeing if you can comment on the outfit that built this. Would like to give them some business.

thanks

 

Sub'd

Awesome build. Love your attention to detail and great work on the topper!

 

I used 1x2" 1/8" wall square tubing. I cut away enough so that 3/8" of it sat on the rail and I used a piece of 3/8" Russian birch plywood for the top. The total is 3/4 just like the deck that came with it.

 

Ok so a quick update on the drawers. I got them finished and made a test surface to go an a trip to see what I need to improve upon before i get the formica laminated stuff.

So the one part of this whole process that I didn't get pictures of was the aluminum paneling I put in to strengthen the cabinet. I ended up using 1/4" aluminum that I threaded with 6mm so that the top board can bolt straight into it. The original 1/2" board on the bottom had some threaded inserts for the same thing.

Here's what the compete cabinet looks like


It has these counter sunk washers that I will replace later as well.


Here's the next layer after the carpet is removed. There are rails so that you can mount some tie downs to strap things down, and after removing those we have the final layer of plywood.




Part of the problem with supporting the weight is how the tie down track and metal support bracket interact. The tie down track sits on top of a Z shaped piece of metal that mounts over the plywood and under the track. Since there is nothing to support the center, the plywood will bow with the metal support. What I did is join the two parts together with some stainless rivets. Now the metal support brackets and tie down track are one piece that can support a whole lot more weight. I think this alone could have fixed the problem, but I wanted to be sure and took things a step further.





The next step was to wrap up the rear portion of the bed. With the drawers in place I wanted to make sure the entire top surface was flat to maximize storage and usage. I made a frame out of 1.5" square tubing to support the top. It's a little over kill but it doesn't need any additional supports or bracing. Sorry the next two pics are little blurry.




After that was in place, the drawer itself needed to be secured. So the front had two holes drilled through and bolted straight to the bed. The rear is going to have a square cargo track so it can be tied down.




For the top I used 3/4" ply wood to make a test surface to make sure all the dimensions I had worked. I had everything cut and grooved on a CNC and had to make a few final adjustments. The next step will be to order up some nice laminated plywood to give it a finished look. I replaced the plastic counter sunk screws with aluminum ones. They are a little bigger and I think they'll look better once it's all finished.


Here it is all finished up with the fridge still in place from the test trip. There are two small strips of tie down track for the fridge that are threaded straight into the metal frame below. So far it worked great! No deflection and it's a solid surface to stand and work on while in the camper.


My next step is to use the dead space on the driver side to add a water tank. I got a rotomold 10gal tank and after mounting it, I think I might be able to fit a 12gal. But this will be the next step. I'll be adding a pump and strainer in the back, and plumb connections out to the front side spaces with quick disconnect fittings so that I can get water out and also pump water back in. That way I can fill the tank from the back or circulate water through a heater so I can have warm water in the tank. When I get around to making the mount for it, I'll probably angle the tank a bit with the fill spout up so that all the water can be emptied.


That's it for now!

 

This is a CLEAN install!