1. Truck Model

In buying your most awaited truck camper, you must take a moment to assess your truck. Manufacturers out there enable a car to carry a trailer correctly on its back, so you might want to check if yours is one of them before pushing through.

The Chevy Silverado, Nissan Titan, Toyota Tundra, GMC Sierra, Dodge Ram, and Ford F-Series are the usual truck models combined with a camper. If you own one of them, you might want to visit the official website of Camping101 to know more about the type of trailers that would perfectly suit the trailer the truck model you have.

2. Size

If your truck is one of the example models above, then your next step is to check the size truck bed you have. For truck campers, you would typically look for short and long bed sizes.

The weights may vary between a half-ton, three-fourth ton, one ton, and above; it is essential to make sure your truck would handle the right size camper.

3. Purpose

Whether for road trips or camp trips, it is essential to identify your purpose in buying a truck camper. The amenities and design of your trailer may vary on how and where you would usually use it.

4. Stabilizer

It would be best to know if your vehicle requires a sway bar or stabilizer if you tow a boat or other trailer when the camper is in place.

The improper weight distribution could damage the trailer you are towing and even your vehicle. Beefing up the suspension or adding anti-sway bars on your truck might be a great option to counter the additional load weight.

5. Storage Capacity

Before making a final decision to purchase, you must always check what your truck camper would and could hold.  Your particular situation and purpose would dictate what you require the trailer to keep and what equipment is not essential. However, there are basic things you should check for in terms of storage capacity.

It would help if you chose a camper that could hold items like bedsheets, sleeping bags, RV-friendly toilet paper, containers, and cooking supplies. You also need storage for other supplies such as flashlights, camping chairs, rope, tarp, and camper locks too. Some campers have a storage extension kit.

In short, you must assess what you would use the camper for, how often you would use it, and identify the things you would store in your trailer.

6. Tow capacity

You also need to analyze your truck’s hitch and tow capacity if you ate considering buying a camper. You have to make sure that your vehicle fits to handle the rig you wanted.

You could check your truck’s manual and call your mechanic to get some initial advice. If your vehicle needs to modify a camper’s installation, note that it could require additional costs.

7. Camper Type (Hard Side or Pop-Up)

There are two traditional types of campers known as Hard side and Pop-up. Pop-ups weigh less and more comfortable to maneuver, and of course, it would cost you less. At the same time, Hard Side campers offer more storage capacity, improved insulation, and are altogether more cozy and homey. Either of the two would work best if you choose to base on your needs, destinations, and time of travel.

8. Potential Expenses

Before getting a truck camper, you might want to assess and evaluate the potential expenses you might incur. Indeed, having your trailer could allow you to save money in the long run, especially if you travel and book hotels frequently.

However, it could help if you kept in mind that there’s also a need to spend money on essential things, including electricity and water connections and dumping fees for waste management of your own camper’s restroom.

You might also want to examine the difference in your gas mileage for added weight, the truck or car maintenance costs, and for screens, windows, and seals on your camper.

It would be wise to determine the camper features and configurations that satisfy your requirements and even your budget.

9. Insurance and Taxes

Purchasing a truck camper would never be complete without those pesky details such as taxes, insurance, and transferring the title to the rig.

Not all states require insurance, so you might want to look first at your local regulations for further details. Still, it would be a wise move to purchase insurance for your truck camper in case of an emergency.

Also, be mindful that you have to pay taxes for purchase costs and few additional fees for title transferring; these fees are quite inconsiderable along with any insurance requirements. You have to consider it in determining the costs you might have to pay.

10. Examine the Features

Lastly, before getting a camper, you must examine the features it is equipped with to make sure it would meet your specific needs. For example, most of the smaller camper options do not have a bathroom at all. Instead, you have to use on-site facilities or other alternatives; While most larger campers offer a full-service bathroom with a shower, toilet, and even a sink.

If you choose a slide-out camper, you have much more space to relax and rest in than you would without adjustable slides. But, you must note that slide-out campers might come at a much higher cost, and they also weigh more than non-sliding ones.

Conclusion

In purchasing not just a camper but also in anything, you must always evaluate your investment’s purpose, decide how often you would use it, and what you plan to do with it.

Preparing and planning is a must; there are several things to consider to make your investment and expenses worthy.

The post 10 Things to Consider When Buying a Truck Camper appeared first on Along the Boards.

If you are looking to add some personality to your vehicle while also adding some functionality, you may want to look at adding some aftermarket parts. There are thousands of options for anyone looking to add to the usability of their vehicle.

1. Lift Kit

If you drive a truck, there are lots of options for you. You may want to go for a strong rugged look with your truck. You can have your truck lifted up with a lift kit. This will make the truck sit higher off of the ground. There are a number of different lift kits out there, so if you don’t want to look like a monster truck driver, there are lift kits that don’t go very much higher than the stock ride height.

If you have a lift kit installed on your truck, you will probably want to have some aftermarket wheels and tires for your truck. You can go with bigger wheel size, or even keep the same wheel size and go with bigger tire size.

2. Tires

All terrain tires are a great alternative if you want a tough look, but they are more suitable to daily driving than mud tires. Mud tires are not made for everyday highway driving and will wear differently and have more road noise. Fender flares may be needed if your tires are wider than the original size tires.

There are laws that forbid tires from extending out past the fenders. Adding fender flairs to your truck’s fenders will extend your fenders out farther than the original fenders, making wider tires easier to fit legally.

3. Nerf Bars

If your truck is lifted, or even if the stock ride height is high, a great accessory is a set of steps, or Nerf bars. These come in a large selection of choices including plastic, chrome, powder coated, steel, tubular shaped, plastic, diamond plate, and camouflage. These can make climbing into your truck much easier.

4. Grill Guard

Another great look for your truck is to have a grill guard put on the front. They also come in a variety of different colors, materials and designs. Grill guards are functional because some models have light guards that protect your headlights, and most have bars across them that will protect the front of your truck from getting hit by large objects.

5. Fog Lights

Another functional accessory is a set of fog lights. These can attach easily to your front bumper or to a grill guard. Fog lights can really help your visibility when driving through the fog. This is a critical accessory for those who live in places where there is low visibility due to heavy rains, thick fog and dust storms. The rules for fog light vary per state, so remember to chek your state’s laws regarding it before installing one.

6. Bed Liners & Covers

Bed covers are a great way to add storage space on your truck. They cover the entire bed of the truck making the bed waterproof. Many bed covers are easily removable so you are able to have the bed open to haul things. Bed liners, on the other hand, keep the interior of the truck bed protected, but if you want to spruce up the look of your truck bed, you can pick different designs based on your bedliner type: spray in, drop in, or roll on bedliners (check out on this blog).

7. Tail Light Tint

Tinting a tail light is the process of darkening the plastic to make it dimmer. This is a popular car mod amongst enthusiasts, and is gaining popularity as of late. Tinting the tail lights on your car, SUV, or truck a simple mod that will make it stand out from the crowd, and that has relatively little chance of being messed up.

Before heading down the hard-to-reverse process of tinting your tail lights, check with your local law enforcement agency first. In some states and local areas, it is illegal to tint or alter in any way the rear lights on your vehicle; in other areas, it is perfectly legal. Know the rules before proceeding.

8. Electronic Gadgets

Additional sources of passenger entertainment are constantly being offered to the everyday motorist. For passengers, there are DVD players, even LCD monitors in headrests that have touch screen controls, and personal headphone jacks. Nowadays, cares are run by computers. Everything can be controlled by the click of a button. Most cars nowadays can even understand commands that you say to them!

And it’s not only new gadgets that are making cars better and more comfortable today. They’re much safer. They can provide much better protection than cars of old. If the brakes are slammed hard, or the steering wheel is ripped to one side, the seat belts will lock up to prevent the passenger from being thrown everywhere and hitting things. In the rare occurrence that you do actually hit something, the seatbelts and airbags work together to prevent injury to the passenger.

Conclusion

Other accessories that can really add to the functionality of your truck are bug shields, bed rails, camper shells, tail light covers, window tint, headache racks, and many other accessories. These parts all have a certain function that will either protect parts of your truck or will help you use your truck to its full potential.

Every day now, cars are becoming safer, more reliable, and more comfortable. People start to expect more out of cars, and manufacturers are always looking to please the customer. However, cars these days can cost a lot of money, but people are willing to pay it for comfort.

The post 8 Most Popular Truck Accessories in 2023 appeared first on Along the Boards.