KcEastSparks Hot Spring Finder 5000

I believe I saw pictures from your recent slick rock outing in the NorCal thread and they seem to be a little abused...

 

according to the doctor they still work...lol

 

Good enough for a weekend!

 

Got my Group 31, BAMF hangers and shackles, and all my nitrogen stuff today. Gunna be a busy evening tomorrow getting it all installed and tuned in!

 

Took about 4 hours to get everything installed and wired. First hanger went on super easy, the second I fought like hell because it seemed like the frame was pulled in towards the rear. I ended up ratchet strapping it to get the bolts started then it went together good. Samco said they charged my bumps to 150 psi, and even wrote 150 on them. But both were at 105 so I charged them up to 165 and will see how they feel after some off roading. The battery was a pain because it is heavy as fuck. I had to modify the stock tray, tie downs, and positive leads to make it work. None of my accessory wires fit onto the secondary post so eventually I’ll need to switch out all the ends and tidy it up but it works good enough for now.

Swapping my hangers didn’t change my ride height any which was kind of a bummer because that means it’s my whole leaf pack that isn’t right. So I’ll be giving Deaver a call tomorrow to see what the deal is and how they’re going to try and fix it.

 

awesome truck! looking to do a similar suspension set up

 

Thanks man!

 

Talked to Jeff with Deaver Spring for a while this morning. He’s going to be sending me some replacement leafs to try and beef up my pack and get me to where I should be as far as ride height and weight rating. He’s been super awesome to work with so far, hopefully we can get it sorted quickly!

 

Awesome to hear. Why did you choose the Deaver leaf packs? I am trying to lock in leafs for my build and am thinking the Dakar HDs are the best bet for me, but I am open to opinions. Glad to hear everything is getting fixed up for you.

 

Because they can build custom packs for extra weight. @jberry813 had them make a pack for his truck rated at 1300 pounds over stock and like 2.75” lift and it worked out perfectly for him.

With just my rack, RTT, and rear bumper I’m right about 600-700 pounds of extra weight with no gear. So once I loaded down with camping stuff the Dakar HDs (rated for 660 pounds) were in negative arch which (to my understanding) is bad for the pack and I didn’t like the squatted rear look.

 

Cool, thanks for the info! I will have to look into some options. I think I am only at around 4-500ish with all my gear right now but we'll see what it does.

Thanks for the info!

 

Great build so far though. Another one of those build pages where there's good info. Keep up the phenomenal work and pictures.

 

Thanks man!

 

After a week of weighing options and talking with my girlfriend I think we are pretty close to pulling the trigger on a Vagabond Outdoors Drifter

I had the chance to see 5 of them last weekend and it’s incredible seeing how many options are available to build out the beds to suit individual needs. And how stoked and detail oriented @Overlanerd and @Iggy are with putting them together and making sure they offer high quality, functional add ons.

The biggest draw back since selling my shell is everything in the bed getting super dirty and not as secure as I’d like. We tend to camp more in the winter with our schedules and having all our stuff enclosed was a huge help with keeping things clean and somewhat warm.

It’s kind of the best of both worlds between badass sleeping space and secured, customizable storage. The reason I sold my old camper van I built was because it couldn’t get me to certain places but I had so much fun building out the interior and making it my own.

It seems like the perfect hybrid style camper for our trucks.

One thing I know for sure is I’ll end up wrapping it like the red third gen did. Not sure if I’d want to try and color match blue or go with black or something a little different.

 

Talk to me about the power you ran to the bed. I assume you ran wiring from the battery. What gauge did you use? Any need for a relay?

I'm planning to do the same in the next couple of weeks to get a constant hot back there for usb, 12v outlet, and bed lights.

 

Yeah I ran both positive and negative from the battery back. I think I ran 10 or 8 with it double loomed along the run to protect it. I did not run a relay, just an in-line fuse at the battery with a 30A fuse. I got the blue sea panel off Amazon and it has two USB ports, a regular cigarette outlet, and a battery monitor. It has an On/Off switch built in so anytime I don’t need it I just switch it off. I love it so far, super simple install and really convenient to charge things and monitor my battery when we’re camping.

 

KYLE!!!

Hope to have you join the fam brotha!

 

Any reason you ran the negative from the battery instead of just grounding to the frame under the bed? I was planning to go this route but I'm an electrical noob.

 

I tried (albeit half assed) to ground under the bed and it didn’t work so I just said fuck it and ran to the battery. I probably could have found a better ground but I thought maybe the voltage display needed to be on the battery to work properly. I’m an electrical noob too haha.

 

Hell yeah! Shits getting real over here.

Just out of curiosity any reason you guys ruled out the Habitat? I really enjoy having all of the space, but those wedge campers look legit as well, still haven't seen one in person.