Tradesman Truck Tops commercial style topper/shell

It’s a custom shop, they will work with you to build anything you want.

Tornado, when I saw your OP , I knew what I was going to get.
Living in Sacramento made it easy,Thanks!
When TacoMarin posted his in cement, I smashed the skinny pedal on the right and headed for Winters to put my cash on the table!
That said, should be a week or two for mine, then the pimping starts.

 

Picking mine up 3rd week of July. Put in my Bedrug today. Time to start working on the drawer/platform.

 

Yeah when I was saw my first Tradesman topper then found out how customizable they are I knew I had to have one. Post pics when you get yours!

 

Post pics when you get it installed!

 

Of course. Hoping the shakedown trip will be in Owen's Valley somewhere.

 

Damn, now I want to have a shake down in the Owens.
Love that area.

 

Do it!

 

I'm also planning on purchasing one of the Tradesman truck shells. After reading everyone's reviews on them I think my mind is made up. Will be going with something very similar to @tacomarin and @Toynado 26" tall for adequate headroom while camping. Thank you guys so much for all the great content!

My two main issues that I'm having trouble deciding on will be the roof rack and the insulation.

I definitely think the insulation is the way to go, but I figure I can do this myself to save some money, but in the end with the cost of supplies and all that extra time I'm sure it would be simple enough just to pay Tradesman to do it. So still deciding on the insulation? Any input on this?

The other would be a roof rack. I was planning on building my own around the items I carry with for camping, or possibly bolting down some type of universal T-track system? Also I would assume you could use a 1/4-20 RivNut on any of the .060 1"x1" aluminum tube frame? This would allow lots of customization. Also would be nice to be able to use the roof to move materials, similar to a lumber rack just with limited capacity.

 

You're going to love your top! I often have the dilemma with a lot of work on my truck and house - I can often do the work myself, but I also have a full time job, spouse, dog, and lots of hobbies. So where it makes sense, I do the work myself. And when it doesn't, I let other professionals do it. It's always painful knowing you could do something yourself for the cost of materials. For us, we just wanted a turnkey top that would be warm and comfortable. We plan on having this truck for a long time and doing a ton of camping with it. So was it worth it for me to pay to have the insulation done? 100%. I've got enough other stuff to do to keep me busy and that kind of project would give me very little gratification. It's like all the french drains I put in around my house. I know how back breaking that work was but no one besides my wife and I appreciate it! So now I go for all the glory projects like installing lights.

The roof rack installation... probably still worth it but it would be super easy to drill holes, run a silicone bead, and mount the Yakima tracks. But it's way easier to do when they're building the top because they can make sure it's in the most structurally sound location, and I know it's done right. And if I ever have issues with it, they will fix it. We got a good deal on Yakima tracks so we went with those, but yes, any T-track should work and they just bolt it through the frame. They used some thumb nuts on the inside of the top to tighten it down, but a RivNut would probably work also.

All this stuff adds up so you definitely need to have a budget in mind and adjust to your needs accordingly. There is certainly no limit to how much you can spend on anything, and these tops are no exception! After having it for a few months and using it a lot, I don't think there is anything I would change on it, except to have run some wiring for lights while they were building it up.

 

I was going to run flood lights on the out side, but was told they would have to make the doors shorter for the 4” square plate to reinforce the mounting location. So I decided to not get floods.
I will get my install next Thursday, I can’t wait!

 

Awesome! Good call on the floods. If I were going to do it I would probably just mount some to the rack (that I don't have yet). The light strips that I put at the end of the doors work really well too

 

I thought about the rack as well, I’ll figure it out when I get the rack and batwing.
I like the idea of lights on the bottom of the doors,
That would throw decent light.

 

@tacomarin You make a whole lot of sense on these decisions! I think I need to get this thing ordered already so I can start enjoying it for the rest of summer! I assume the roof rack will be easy enough to build and mount myself, I'll have to see how much they charge to do the rail system. I want to visit the factory when I place the order, see their process and how they do the insulation, maybe gets some Ideas if I end up doing it myself, although at the moment I'm leaning towards having them do it.

Looking forward to seeing yours in person soon. I think I'll be ordering it right after that!

 

@tacomarin summed it up perfectly and my thoughts exactly.

I always struggle with any project truck or house of doing it myself or paying someone to do it.

It be camped back there on some cold nights where my friends in the RTTs are waking up cold and complaining and I was back there all toasty. Plus the carpet on the inside holds the condensation if you didn’t crack the vent and windows enough.

Also as he stated it’d be easy to drill the holes to mount some tracks so long as you don’t hit a rib.

For sure go tour the factory.

I am totally confident you’ll love your shell!

 

@Toynado I'm so impressed with how you've figured everything out. I especially like the placement of your solar shower. Seems like a great spot to aid in aerodynamics as well. I have an access cab and was not planning on retrofitting a roof rack over the cab. The roof on the access cab has to be drilled out and some sort of threaded anchor installed to utilize any substantial roof rack, so placing the solar shower perpendicular to the front of the topper with an air dam attached could be a cool option to help the flow of the truck topper, or maybe just for looks!

 

Here's an ARE DCU topper I spotted while in Yosemite a few weeks ago. Right under Yosemite falls. This looks like a taller version maybe 29" Still a pretty nice set up! The ARE Shells are made of .030 skin, when the tradesman have .040. I'm definitely convinced the tradesman are superior units for camping after reading through this thread!

 

Here's the inside of my camper set up with my Softopper on and off. Just to give you guys some ideas on build outs. I came across a few designs like this and really like it. Camping in a small space like the back of your truck always has it compromises, but this one seemed to be the best of everything that I wanted. I wanted to keep it light, so I utilized two bins for storage, and flip storage panels further into the bed. I also wanted to be able to put my feet down so I made three movable panels in the middle to make it somewhat modular. The right cabinet works great for storing clothes, and the shelf is great too. The rear has a spot for water in a jerry-can, and I used Akro Mills plastic bins for some of my cooking supplies that fit in the dead space near the built in bed storage compartments.

 

Actually those panels just get placed up on top of my Plano boxes if I’m out hiking/away from the truck for more than a day and want them locked to the rack. Usually they are set up facing the sun



Stay tuned as I just placed an order to do two thin 50W panels afixed to the top of the topper - one on each side of the vent. I’ll post up once I get them all wired up.

 

Life goals!

 

So this happened. It was ready a month ahead of schedule. So I took a trip to Owens Valley on the way home.