GoFastCamper GFC Mods, Tips, and Tricks thread.

I struggled to open mine this weekend as well. Had to pull really hard to get them to slide. Lots of water in there from the looks of it...

I lubed them with some bike chain lube and that helped short term.

 

I do (-40°F winters) and haven’t had problems with the hinges yet.

 

I was thinking cold weather can make plastic brittle. Maybe it was just a bad hinge.

 

I live in Orange County, so weather should not play a factor in the hinge giving out. As far as use, I don't think I use my GFC any more than anyone else. I sleep in it at least once a month and the side doors get opened a few times a week.

I have contacted them, and they offered to take my GFC back and give it an overhaul with a 4-6 week turn around. Unfortunately, I have my summer trips planned out already and I can't go 4-6 weeks without the GFC. Plus, they can't give me a date for the actual pick up, so I came up with an alternative plan of action.

I suggested they send me a replacement hinge and rivets, and I'll replace everything myself. I'm not an engineer but I believe I can put it back together and have it hold well enough until they can give it an overhaul.

I'm still using my busted tent too, and thats been waiting to be replaced since March 28th, 2019 when I first notified them

Less than a month from getting the GFC last year, I had the main tent struts pop off because all the track nuts behind weren't tightened down plus were too small. I came out to the truck looking like this:
I was able to secure it enough to drive back home, and luckily Graeme was down in OC that week and brought me slightly bigger track nuts and replaced all of them.



Has ANYone else had any catastrophic failures on their GFC, or is my #44 GFC just cursed....

 

Mine is holding up great so far, I think it was build 50 something and I haven't had anything break yet. Even with our much more wet than normal winter I have not had any issues with water intrusion with their original sealing design.

My only gripe is the steel tube front hinge that keeps leaking rusty water on my truck - supposedly aluminum replacements are in the works.

 

I'd be pretty wary of any promised pickup timeframes for warranty work.

Maybe there's a market for a third party GFC repair company with better communications? I'd be willing to pay for someone to fix the water intrusion issue in my camper, but the seemingly impossible task of sending it home to Belgrade appears to be my only option.

 

Don’t have mine back yet. I think it’s done? I’m trying to sort out a delivery date or pick up. Not the fastest communication happening.

 

Wow... mine was #45 I believe. What happened to your tent?

 

Mine has been in sealant curing for 13 days, seems like things have slowed down.

 

Frustrating to say the least

 

From the looks of instagram Graeme and Wiley are both out traveling after Overland Expo. Could be that they're the ones that update the leaderboard and in their absence no updates are made?

I'm scheming on a little shelf to hold three frontrunner cub packs and a set of max trax along the cab of the truck. Looking to up-level current setup which is a milk crate full of shit tied to the cargo tie-down in the corner. Camp chairs and an eventual aux battery would live below. Chairs can move easily to give me access to the full length of the bed when i need to carry something long.

Forgive my terrible SketchUp, I'm just a software engineer not a more legit discipline.

 

My powdercoat is absolute ass, it was a weird matte finish and seems to have discoloration reactions to oils or something. I have blotchy marks in places I don't even touch, and some random chipping. I have since seen later versions with much better powdercoats. May take mine in at a later date, or whenever this "overhaul" that is promised takes place

My tent came to me with some of the dot snaps unsnapped. If you haven't dealt with "military style" dot snaps, they are horrendously difficult to snap or unsnap. Near the front hinge, there are two rows of snaps, one of top and one on the bottom. The top snaps are on the inside of the tent, the bottom on the outside. One whole row was unsnapped, which could not be snapped before the other row.

The unsnapped snaps were letting it a ton of dust and water, even while the tent was closed. I let Mike from GFC know, and he sent me a great video on how to laboriously rectify the issue. Unfortunately I had a snap that just didn't want to come unsnapped, and the tent material around it ripped. I was told the new tent material wouldn't have ripped with this issue, and I've been promised a new tent with install. That was two months ago...

Love the concept and most of the product, but sorting through the issues has been a real pain. Driving around with a ratchet strap holding my side door closed isn't fun either.

 

You seem to have all the bad luck. Mine was built way earlier than yours and has had none of those problems.

 

#74 in build, but had a mix up with paint, so actual build time frame was closer to dec 18/jan 19 time frame. Live in midwest where salt is king and have little to no rust. The front/rear tubes are my main issue; fluid film has fixed that for me. Popped the front bolts to the tubes and sprayed it all down until no water came out. So far since I did that I haven't found any rusty water leaking anymore. It used to leak daily. Probably going to pop the main bolts holding the tent down to check those out now.

BTW for those waiting on Aluminum front/rear tubes....they gave me a time frame of 'end of summer'. So I would recommend spraying the tubes out with fluid film, etc for the time being

 

When did you hear end of summer? After posting about my rust issues I had another GFC owner message me saying they shipped him an aluminum tube ASAP. I'm hoping I can get them quicker by driving to the shop.

 

Just last week. I had a lot of success with fluid film in the tubes. The front was leaking all over my truck so I took one bolt out and shook the truck to get as much as I could out and then just sprayed it until it forced all the water out. Haven't seen any leaking rust since. Should hold me off till they can send replacements.

 

I'll go the fluid film route. I did a quick google search comparing Fluid Film with other suggestions I've seen such as Boeshield and found this great experiment. https://forums.mtbr.com/fat-bikes/anti-corrosion-product-shootout-1073581.html

It's not apples to apples when compared to the inside of the GFC tubes, but looks like a legit test.

 

Anyone have suggestions for removing the rust from the tubes before applying the fluid film? Or is that a wasted effort and I should just apply over the top of the rust? I really haven't dealt with rust before but looks like this and my steel bumpers are going to make me learn really quick.

 

I'm 187. I've been living out of mine for 20+ days (with a ton more to go). Today one of the locks popped off. Thank god I was at a gas station and saw it. I can't get it back in now. I found water in my tubes and was given a reason for that which I'm not totally convinced of. I need to email them about this lock but I'm not holding my breath for a response since they were supposed to respond to me 5 weeks ago or so with some specs on something and never did, and then I've been waiting for a call back for 3 weeks now on the terrible condensation this tent has asking for help with trouble shooting I've never experienced it this bad. Have already tried insulation which does nothing (and it sucks doing on the road mods btw). Waiting to pick up a small dehumidifier when I see my friends in a couple weeks that I mailed to their house and hopefully that helps. Otherwise I'm gonna find a skilled person to drill me a damn vent in the roof which should be an option for this camper.