AT Habitat, Atlas, & Summit Pictures, ideas, aaand BS

So the bed rails are coming off completely and they don’t put anything down other than the bulb seal? Would you have just filled them with rtv silicon?

 

They did with mine, but again I'm not sure if that's still the case. I would guess it is though. At some point I'd like to try to lift my Habitat to address the sealing, but that's a bit of a challenge for me right now.

 

Thanks moogle!

 

i'd pull the bed rail caps, seal it to your desire, and make sure the slide rails are well fastened to the bed. it seems to be a work in progress as to means of fastening the Habitat to the Tacoma.

 

The fridge has been AMAZING to have. You could definitely get by with one smaller than we purchased. We often just use the small side as a fridge and don't even turn on the larger side (just use it for ambient temp food storage).

And don't stress or go overboard on your electrical. Lotsa good options without going crazy. Originally I wasn't a fan of Goal Zero "solar generators" and the like, but they are sure a dead simple solution. Looking back, I'd prolly still go with the deep cycle truck batteries though, as I like them being "permanent".

BTW, being able to jump myself has already been handy! I really need to replace the OEM battery under my hood, lol.

 

I've always been able to get by with a cooler, I just can't justify the cost of a fridge, then there's the weight and space requirements. I could very well change my mind someday though! Yeah whatever I put in the truck, power system included, I'd like to be able to pull out relatively quickly & easily if I ever need my "truck" back lol

 

I haven't pulled the bed rails off yet, so I don't know how big the holes are going to be. Is RTV the best option, or something like Gorilla tape?

 

I'm in the same boat, probably going to pick up some kind of sealant today. Just to make 100% sure I'm on the same page, what y'all are calling bed rails are the plastic things on the top sides of the bed, right? The things on the sides the habitat will be sitting on top of? I can just see myself taking the time to seal components only to find out I sealed everything but the ones I was supposed to, lol

 

Second to last trip with a cooler (before the Habitat), we ended up having to go back into town for ice as it was a hot few days. Next trip we decided to haul a second cooler JUST for ice, and that worked well, but it took up a hunk of space.

Now that we have a fridge, I can't say enough good things about it. No ice/melted water to dig through or drain. No concern of any food getting soggy. Cardboard type containers safe from disintegrating. Not to mention the ice itself takes up a lot of room in the cooler, and adds weight. You could prolly get a smaller volume fridge than your cooler, since you don't need to waste space with ice. One of my favorite things is getting home LATE and not wanting to transfer any food stuffs left over into the fridge or freezer in the house. I can wait a day or two until I have time to deal with it. Lazy? Maybe. But knowing it'll stay as good in the truck as it would in the house? Why not leave it, specially if i'm going camping again the following weekend!

One of my friends convinced his parents to buy a small ARB for camping (which they rarely do), but his mom now can't live without it. Loves being able to pick up ice cream and not worry about it melting. Also handy for snacks and juice or whatever for kiddos.

@MacFly , definitely not saying you need to jump on a fridge, but I just think it's worthwhile to bump it up a lil higher on the priorities/comfort list once you have the Habitat.

 

Those are all good points, lol. I'm definitely not saying I'll never get one And honestly, I think I'd probably be more likely to buy a fridge than one of those stupidly expensive coolers if it ever comes to that.

 

Your comment about one of those coolers made me wanna do a quick comparison. I looked up my fridge and it said it held 113 cans, so I looked for a Yeti that was closest to that number.

CFX75DZW - MSRP $1100 (I didn't pay this much) - 19x20x35inch - holds 113 cans

YETI Tundra 160 - MSRP $679.99 - 20x22x46inch - holds 115 cans & 141 lbs of ice (when filled with suggested ratio of 2:1 Ice to can ratio)

Now, once again, I'll put the disclaimer up that I seldom use the entire fridge, so a smaller one would work fine, but DANG!! you'd need 141 pounds of ice?!? lol.


I'd definitely stick with a cheap Coleman or two from Big Lots until it was time to invest in a fridge

 

This is the same logic set I used when time came for a new cooler or fridge. But when you add in a cost analysis for the ice, things start to become more clear.

Yeti Tundra 160 - $679.99
10lb bag of ice - $3.48 x 14 = $48.86

Average a ice resupply of 1 bag per day for melt on a 17 day trip, minus initial two days is $3.48 x 15 = 52.20

Total ice consumption for trip is 29 bags totaling $101.06

Fridge cost minus Cooler plus ice $1100.00 - $781.05 = $318.95

$318.95 / $3.48 per 10lb bag = 91.65 bags of ice.

91.65 bags total / 29 bags per trip = 3.16 trips.

So, three 17 day trips is about the break even point for the fridge. Now this is excluding other variables like extra fuel consumption and greater maintenance costs due to greater weight of the cooler, and the loss of valuable real estate in the bed.

For us with the 43qt fridge vs our cooler, we were past break even in one year.

I tell everyone, the fridge is the most necessary non-necessity in the truck. Ask anyone that has it and they will tell you the same. “Ice chests are great, they do the job, but I’ll never go back”

 

Bingo. I doubt anything has been as handy as having the fridge.

Nice calculations btw. I'm glad I'm not the only person that does the math once in awhile.

 

I'm very curious to know what the naked bedrails look like, and what you used to seal them.
Pics if you can

 

Yeah, I've heard those coolers really shine when you put the whole thing in a walk in freezer for a few days with the cooler loaded, but of course you have to have access to a walk in for that to work. I think they even tried to market themselves as "bear proof" or "bear resistant", I've seen the pieces of those coolers brought back by angry hunters lol.

 

I haven't sealed it yet, but the plan is to run a bead all the way down the rail, and maybe around each hole. Just going to use "RTV Silicone" from Ace

 

Wow... that's a lot of holes.

 

I’m thinking a poly tape, like that use by auto manufacturers to seal over body holes would be better than an rtv like substance.

Maybe something like this.

https://www.uline.com/Product/Detai...VkLrACh3TOAUPEAQYECABEgJBWPD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

 

Would it seal around the holes once I put the rail back on? I'd be worried about the rail tabs creating too large of a hole for the tape to seal properly once I put it back on...

 

The black plastic bed rail stays off when you install the habitat. The habitat sits directly on the metal.