Got Lucky on First Try

[Chrish]

Hi, just wanted to say thank you all for all the information on your site.

I recently purchased a 2008 Granby for my Dodge 1500, 6'4" bed, 1700 lb load capacity truck.

I first encountered a FWC Hawk that a friend of my purchased a couple of winters ago.

I checked them out and the price drove me towards looking for other pop-up campers.

I actually placed a deposit on a Palomino SS 550 on eBay from a company called Cheyenne Camping out of Iowa. Price was under $10,000 so I thought it was a good deal and I was willing to put in the extremely long drive to pick it up, but then I started reading up on gross vehicle weight and camper weight and decided that camper would be way too heavy for my truck.

What to do?

Luckily the owner, who is quite a character, but a totally honest person and let me out of my contract because he agreed that camper wasn't a good match for my truck.

I started looking at used pop-up campers and a 2008 Granby showed up on RV Trader and it was in my home State.

I called the owner and immediately purchased it from the pictures even though it would take me a couple days to go look at it. So off to Lopez Island, Wa. where I encountered another totally honest person who held the camper for me for 2 days and was even willing to come down $900 in price. I was the first caller so I got lucky because he said there were many calls after mine.

Lots of great ideas on this forum which I'm going to implement such as a gray water holding tank made of 4" PVC,vented the battery box, and going to add a angle iron supporting the end of the camper in place of the tailgate for weight reduction and Rock Chip damage mitigation to the tailgate.

Also followed one of the recommendations for a bike rack here that swings out of the way of the door, I installed the Firestone coil Rite air bags which definitely leveled out the truck and removed the rear seat in the quad cab for weight reduction and dog comfort.

So thanks for the help.

It's kind of funny that now I'm seeing four-wheel campers on a lot of trucks out there where before I hadn't even noticed them.

 

[gaylon]

Sounds like fate . Welcome to the club.

 

[Cayuse]

Welcome to the board.

And welcome to the Grandby on a 6.5' bed club

 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

Welcome Chrish to WTW.
Hope you have many great trips with your new camper.
Don't forget we all like photos.
Frank

 

[Lineman]

Welcome, you are going to enjoy the extra space in the Grandby vs a Hawk. I also run a Grandby on a short bed and sure wouldn't want to give up any space, or turning radius.

You said you are going to add angle to the camper to support the over hang, you might check the space between the bed and the bumper. My Ford has just a hair over 2" which allowed me to run 2" square stock between them to vertical mounted receiver hitches below the bed to build a support off. It has been a while, but I think the whole thing weighs 28 lbs and my tailgate weighs 80 lbs.

 

[Chrish]

Thank you all for the warm welcome, and gaylon it does seem like fate in how everything lined up to find that camper. Luck of the Irish.

Lineman, that looks like a great idea to support the back of the Granby. Definitely worth looking into.

I agree,I like that extra 18" of space that the Granby model offers.

Still kind of Blown Away when I'm in that camper that I'm just hanging out in the back of a pickup truck. Very well designed and engineered product.

I was checking out what little information to be found on the floor pac design.

I noticed on my Grandby starting from the bottom is the 5/8 plywood stringers, then a sheet of 5/8 plywood, and then on top of that there is a 1 inch aluminum Square beam or floor joist, for lack of better word, running from the front to the back of the camper.

And on top of that it appears there is another wood support structure which the vertical plywood (piece that has the turnbuckles doors) of the four pac is stapled into.

I'm wondering if there is a complete aluminum floor joist system under there.

At any rate I called Stan at FWC and he said I definitely need to support the rear of the camper.

I'll post a pic when I figure out how to do that.

 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

Chrish ,one way to post photos. Export them, at large or smaller size, to desktop.
On the post go to the bottom of the "box" "More Reply Options" click that and it brings
up a screen that has attach files,go to browse that will bring up your desktop then choose from there.
Do one photo at a time. Usually 3 at a large size.
There are other ways but this is what works for me.
Frank

 

[Profkanz]

Just on thing to watch out for. The Grandbys tend to have the center of gravity more rearward than some others. You can mitigate this with careful loading of the truck and camper.

 

[Chrish]

Thanks Frank for the info on how to load a picture. Now I just need smaller files to load pics.

As for the Granby center of gravity, thanks for the heads up. I was wondering where that was on that camper.

Did FWC Mark the CG on each camper based upon options and interior configuration and was wondering why they put the reefer in the back.

From reading the discussions here on center of gravity I've been packing heavy stuff near the front and looking for ways to get more weight up to the front axle.

I thought about moving the auxiliary battery to the engine compartment but it would cost quite a bit of money to reconfigure the air intake from stock.

If the air intake was out of the way there are already bolt holes in place for a passenger side battery box and I read that there is one available for the Dodge Ram 1500.

It doesn't help that I added about a hundred pounds to the tow hitch, with a hitch extension, bike rack and loaded bikes.

That's one of the reasons I'm getting rid of the tailgate.

It would be nice to ditch the spare tire.

The only time I ever got a flat tire on a gravel road was checking on my bosses cattle with his son and he wasn't carrying a spare.

That was 35 years ago and we had to roll that flat tire down a hill about five miles down to the nearest town, Entiat Washington.

Walking the repaired tire back up was the hard part. The Forest Service guy we encountered trucking up that way would not give to give us a ride to the Forest Service grazing lease land. But we were young and didn't care too much.

Man I miss those Carefree days working on a cattle ranch, but I don't think I'm any smarter cuz I'm still thinking about ditching a spare.

 

[Chrish]

The picture was taken this summer at Rialto Beach, Wa.parking lot.

That's our dog Kodi who is now a little over 11 years old. We got him when he was 5 years old after living in a Seattle apartment and the owners could no longer keep him.

The previous owners saved him from a life on the streets of Los Angeles,CA. as a stray.

He moved to our place where he is free, untethered to be outside all he wants and enjoys x country skiing and hiking, mostly the North Cascades and the occasional beachwalk (he earned a "Bark Ranger" tag)

He's had quite a journey.

 

[radarcontact]

Been to Rialto many times, having lived in Washington in the past.

Great pic.

 

[Karlton]

First - I could not agree more with this..."Still kind of Blown Away when I'm in that camper that I'm just hanging out in the back of a pickup truck."

I've had my Hawk for a year, and still say that, out loud, sometimes.

Two questions - what load range tires are you running? Load E would be highly recommended if you have load C.

You mentioned airbags...have you done anything else to the suspension? I think of the F150, 1500s, Tundra, and Titan as similar payload when stock and adequate to carry a Hawk when suspension is upgraded. I tend to think of the Granby as a 250/2500 or even 350/3500 truck camper. Have you considered adding leaf springs to help with the payload?

That is a great dog. Awesome of you to take him on your journeys.

Karl

 

[Chrish]

Thanks radarcontact,my wife (41 years together),took that photo.

Karl, I'm still running the stock passenger tires.

From what I've read,the recommendation is to wear those out and then upgrade to light truck tires.

I've been able to reduce the stock truck weight by around 130 lbs by removing the tailgate and rear seat so that should help a bit.

The shipping weight on the Grandby says 840 lbs however it had a few factory upgrades. Artic pack, extra vent,3.0 cu foot 3 way fridge-freezer, extended bed, screen door, aux batt system, and jacks ( which I remove for travel) so I suspect it weighs a bit more.

The shower is a 1 gallon garden sprayer.

As far as the truck suspension, the newer Dodge 1500 tradesmen's have front and rear coil springs as well as front and rear anti-sway bars and as mentioned I self installed the firestone coil rite air bags.

Haven't weighed the truck and camper yet, but it seems to handle the load ok.

I've read many of the relevant treads here going back to 2007 and tried to follow most of the advice. Any suggestions would be welcome.


Kodi is a sweetie and attacks a lot of attention on the trail.

 

[Karlton]

I was a bit surprised between the difference of the shipping weight and the actual wet weight of my Hawk. Do you have the opportunity to get to a scale and weigh your rig? A certified scale at a highway rest stop that can weigh the front and rear axle would be best. If not a scale at a landfill for example would work too. This way you can evaluate your weight against the sticker posted on the inside of the door.

I am currently over the Tundra payload by about 500 lb. But with the leaf spring upgrade and the load e tires I feel very confident on and off road.

The weight of the options really add up, and I've seen posts where folks have gone through and calculated the weight of each option. And I think FWC was going to start posting the actual dry weight of the camper with options and not of the shell model, or whatever it is they post the weight of on the plate on the back.