Hello WtW!
tl;dr: Raising the roof is easy enough, but lowering is pretty difficult and requires two people. Any suggestions? See pic for mechanism.
New member and first post here after a few months of lurking. After a few years of looking at campers, prices finally seemed to come down to a level we were okay with trying and we purchased a 2006 Phoenix Brave pop-up truck camper. It rides on a 2015 F-250.
We took our first trip in the camper this past weekend and were very happy with our new cabin on wheels, though we did run into a question about lowering the roof. One person can raise it just fine, however when it's time to pack up camp, it's a real chore to lower the roof. Two people are needed to pull down on the bars to get the roof down and both sides don't come down evenly. We're pulling on the white horizontal bars in the attached picture as two relatively fit, younger adults. I'd like my parents who are older to be able to use this when I'm working during the week and I don't believe they'd be able to come close to closing the camper on their own.
My questions are these:
The camper on our maiden voyage:
tl;dr: Raising the roof is easy enough, but lowering is pretty difficult and requires two people. Any suggestions? See pic for mechanism.
New member and first post here after a few months of lurking. After a few years of looking at campers, prices finally seemed to come down to a level we were okay with trying and we purchased a 2006 Phoenix Brave pop-up truck camper. It rides on a 2015 F-250.
We took our first trip in the camper this past weekend and were very happy with our new cabin on wheels, though we did run into a question about lowering the roof. One person can raise it just fine, however when it's time to pack up camp, it's a real chore to lower the roof. Two people are needed to pull down on the bars to get the roof down and both sides don't come down evenly. We're pulling on the white horizontal bars in the attached picture as two relatively fit, younger adults. I'd like my parents who are older to be able to use this when I'm working during the week and I don't believe they'd be able to come close to closing the camper on their own.
My questions are these:
- Can anyone give me a name for the style of mechanism? I've tried searching pretty far and wide on this forum and others and haven't been able to identify it.
- Does anyone have any tips for closing this with just one person? I can't believe that the current level of effort required is necessary.
- I assume some sort of maintenance is recommended, and my hope is that it is just past due. Is it simply "grease as necessary"? Or are there other steps that may be required?
The camper on our maiden voyage:
