Gas Lift Assist Rams for Pop Up Camper.

[VanIsle_Greg]

Hello All,
I am building my camper and am at the point I am looking for gas rams to help with the opening of the roof. I am hoping that someone can share some measurements with me from their Four Wheel Camper?

As I understand and from research the 4WC rams are a total or 40.6 inches long and they are 40# pressure. Those are the longer units for the taller inside height (6 foot 3 headroom). What I do not know is the closed / stroke length of the rams used? My fabric will be nearly 22" tall, and the interior height is the same as the 4WC at 6 foot 3 inches.

It would also be helpful if someone had the measurements between the mounting studs on the roof as well as the camper base? Anyone local to me in Victoria BC that I can come and measure off of? heh

Any help would be great as I want to order these ASAP!

Thanks!

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Not my pic BTW... something I found online while doing my research. I have not found much other than the total open length and the lift pressure.

Thanks!

 

[Stan@FourWheel]

lots of information here . . .

roof lifting helper shocks thingys - Truck Campers

Page 1 of 42 - roof lifting helper shocks thingys - posted in Truck Campers: I have seen the posts where people have added those shock things to the outside of there campers that help lift the roof. They look like they are attached to the roof and the body of the camper. What I need is help...

www.wanderthewest.com

.

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Thanks!

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

After much research and reading... I ordered a set of rams plus brackets from Lift Support Technologies (https://lstechnologies.ca/) who I have worked with before. Awesome selection of rams, sizes and brackets. Pretty stoked to get these in the mail.

Will post pics when installed.
Greg

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Just to close the loop on this...

I received the struts and brackets from LST a few weeks ago. They were, as always, very nicely done and the brackets are equally nice. I installed them this past weekend, and will be completing my roof lift system in the next few days. Well at least my first kick at it.

I needed to install the roof latches first. When we framed this up, and were putting on the inner skins, I glued in backing pieces, which were 2 x 1/2" thick plywood pieces to secure all external bits to. It was a guess (educated guess) and in hindsight I wish I had the lift strut plan better um, planned before. The clamps and brackets worked awesome, but interfered with where I wanted to mount the rams.

Here is what I came up with. Side mounts. The upper bracket is mounted to the roof surround, and they are very solid with 1 1/4" SS screws and Sika. The lower mounts are machine screws drilled and tapped into the main frame members running down both sides.

I tested it quickly, and the 50# lifting force should make opening and closing the roof pretty simple. The roof is heavier than a FWC roof, plus the 2 x Solar panels should be just about right. It was funny as when I opened the rear I neglected to put in a limiting strap, so the roof opened up nice and evenly up to about 9' off the ground.... oops. Grabs ladder to close roof again

Finished product. These are opposing inward, and are positioned like this mainly because of the big window on the passenger side below.



Drivers was same as passengers, just no window.



You can see that closed they are mostly all the way compressed. There is about 1/2" of rod showing.



Upper brackets.



Lowers... solid mount to .120 wall steel. I can lift the camper with these.... #Strong



In front of the latch mount.



Here are the front latches and mounts. I was not able to front mount the 2 front struts like I wanted, these were just a couple of inches too close to one another.


Pre-struts.



After doing a lot of reading on forums and watching a lot of videos, I realized that I had the right plan and the design would work (measure 20 times drill once). The LST struts are custom made, and worked out great! They are an awesome shop to work with and the shipping was fast!

Looking forward to getting this completed! I will post pics / video as soon as I get the inner tubing and brackets installed.

 

[Cooper2019]

Greg I just started building my own pop up camper ,do you have any pictures of the top up?
what material did you use for it

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

Greg I just started building my own pop up camper ,do you have any pictures of the top up?
what material did you use for it

I had a few pics, but no fabric yet. I ran into an issue with the lift tubes I made, I neglected to take into account the amount of bracket drop inside...aka I messed up and need to remake them. No fabric yet, but all of the folks I have spoken to recommend Sunbrella marine fabric. Waterproof, hard wearing and wont mould or mildew easily plus it is very UV stable. Standard PVC windows and screens.

I looked at Vinyl, there is LOTS of great deals on HD vinyl even RV flocked vinyl, but I worry about creases.

I will see if I can find the photos with the roof actually up. heh

 

[Cooper2019]

Ok thanks ,I'm going to set up a forum and post some pictures ,the ones I have ,I keep forgetting to take them at different stages .I'm thinking I may look at doing some type of hard folding sides ,I had got some budget pricing for vinyl and its not going to be cheap.

 

[Nelsmickaelson]

I love this build! Any pics with the top up? I'm looking at adding struts to my sun lite rebuild that has a failed HECO lift system. Do you have the specs on roof weight, strut lengths you used and bracket specs? Thank you for sharing your work.

 

[VanIsle_Greg]

I love this build! Any pics with the top up? I'm looking at adding struts to my sun lite rebuild that has a failed HECO lift system. Do you have the specs on roof weight, strut lengths you used and bracket specs? Thank you for sharing your work.

Thanks Nels.

My roof weight would be a guess, but with the vent fan and 2 solar panels, I think it weights about 120# ish... maybe 130#? The struts I used are all 50# lift force. Could have gone with 60#...would be a bit easier.

Video here... https://expeditionportal.com/forum/...ld-scratch-built-oasis-si.197711/post-3015886

Pics here... https://expeditionportal.com/forum/...ld-scratch-built-oasis-si.197711/post-3028734

Some more detail here... https://expeditionportal.com/forum/...ld-scratch-built-oasis-si.197711/post-2791633

Build thread has lost of details on the ever going saga of the roof. Honestly, I wish I built a hard top. heh