Riser options

[welsteach]

I have heard people say they use foam insulation board under their camper as a riser with a bed mat on top. I have heard others say they use the insulation foam but no rubber liner and have no camper travel issues. Chime in. If high density foam insulation gives me the rise without added weight, i am in. But if that isn't sufficient, I will buy the liner.
Does one need to put plywood on top of the foam? If so, I see no weight savings.
Don't have the camper yet. Truck has rhino liner.

[burningman]

Technically the lower the COG better but in reality you’ll never notice the difference raising the camper 2”.
I like at least a few inches between the cab and cabover because trucks and campers flex.

I’ve been doing the 2” thick 4x8 sheet of rigid foam insulation thing for years now.
Yeah it’s one more thing to do and I’ve worked to eliminate loading hassle as much as possible, but they really weigh nothing and you just drop it in. I may end up glueing it to the bottom of the camper but I do anticipate replacing the foam at some point so I kinda don’t wanna glue it on.

[mountainkowboy]

I built this......



for 2 reasons, the first and main reason was for support of the water tank for use off-truck. This model was never designed to be use off-truck and I was told by S&S that it was very possible for the full water tank to rip the floor out of the bottom without more support so....

The second reason was to keep it from hitting the cab lights, it had divots in it when I got it from them, and it sat very close to them.

[northshore]

This is an interesting subject.
My old camper 97 lance 165 on a 1999 f 250 short bed I used a spacer made of 2x4 layed down with 1/2 ply wood cross pieces, it gave me about 2 1/4 inches with a rubber mat. Never gave it any thought, the guy who I bought the old camper used the spacer and gave it to me when i bought it.
I gave the Lance 165 to my grandson and gave him the spacer too, he has a 2002 Dodge, he says the heck with the space and goes without any thing between the bed of the truck and the camper. He has about 1 inch between the cab and camper. So far no problem.
My new to me camper 2002 Lance on my 2006 f350 I use 3 each 2x6 laying down and styrofoam between the 2x6s I seem to have plenty of clearance between the cab and camper eyeballing about 2 1/2 inches.
My question is how much room do you need between the camper and cab of truck roof, I don't know if 1 or 2 inches makes much difference in COG but if it did having minimum clearance would be ok for me.

[deserteagle56]

Both my truck and my camper are "older". When I went to pick up the camper from the previous owner a few years ago I found that the cabover portion on the Bigfoot would sit right down on the cab of the truck without a 3" riser in the bed of the truck.

[Bedlam]

An older camper on a newer truck usually requires more cab over or bed rail clearance. SidcarFlip went the other way and probably has a healthy gap between cab and camper.

[SidecarFlip]

Grit dog wrote:
^Thats a nice story, although one can reasonably reduce that the OP anticipates NEEDING to raise his future camper to clear the truck.

You could be right, Especially a new Ferd with the high cab.

[flakjacket]

The weight of my camper is supported by the frame of the camper on 3 sides, the front and both sides, no weight is supported by the center/bottom. So I use 3/4" wood and a mat to raise mine.

[Grit_dog]

^Thats a nice story, although one can reasonably reduce that the OP anticipates NEEDING to raise his future camper to clear the truck.

[SidecarFlip]

I use NOTHING. The higher the unit is, the higher the vertical Cg is. The base of my TC is 3/4" plywood covered with textured aluminum sheet with roll formed steel runners front to back and one across the front and extreme rear.

[billyray50]

Used the 1 inch blue or pink foam board for years on my previous TC set ups. Laid it on top of rubber mat. Worked very well. No plywood.

[srschang]

The bottom of my camper is made of 1 1/2" wide framing. I bought a few pressure treated 2x4s, ripped them to the additional thickness I needed, and screwed them to the framing on the bottom of the camper. I then painted them flat black to match the existing bottom of the camper. I've always used a rubber bed mat in my trucks so the camper doesn't slide around.

I tried using pink foam when I bought the first truck that needed additional camper height, but it broke down over time, and was an additional thing I needed to to do (and store) when I installed or removed the camper from the truck. That's why I went with the permanent solution of adding the 2x4s.