That’s a modification I’ve been wanting to do for years. Nice work!

 

Nicely done. Let us know how the tuning affects power and mileage.

 

Truck is looking great!

 

Well, after several months of searching, I finally found a decent camper at a reasonable price! It’s a 2011 Wolf Creek 850. It’s manufactured by Northwood Industries (they also make Arctic Fox) and is a four season camper with aluminum frame construction, double pane windows, hard fibreglass sides etc. so very well constructed. Dry weight is 2100 lbs and while the F350 settled about 2 inches in the rear (with full 30 gallon water tank) , it’s not even close to touching the overloads yet. Still need to build/install frame mounted tie downs and sort out the camper wiring but my pup is pretty excited about going camping again!

 

Very NICE! Always liked those Wolf Creek campers. I've had my Amerigo since 1992 and so far I just can't justify looking for a replacement. Your truck looks like it is "comfortable" with that camper and sits nicely.

It would be great if you could find a set of the OEM tie downs and frame mounts. I got lucky and they came with my truck when I bought it. Plus, they would be a bolt on deal.

I used the factory connector and harness for the lighting but I ran a separate circuit for power to the camper. The factory one was just too light duty. I don't have a battery in my slide in, I just use the aux battery under the hood for power.

Good luck with your project but it looks like you have things well in hand.

Erich

 

Nice find. Looks good.

 

Thanks AmerigoHauler and by the way, your truck looks beautiful!!!!

Unfortunately the factor tie down mounts for my truck are MIA. No big deal as the camper came with tie downs and the bars that slip into the mounts. I will just fab up some brackets with 3/8 plate and some square tubing. I should be able to bolt them to the frame using the factory mounting holes.

I have the factory camper wiring under the box which goes to an electrical connector mounted inside of the box. I plugged the camper in but nothing appears to work. Not surprising as I probably removed a 1/2 mile (okay maybe not that much...) of random wiring from under the dash and the engine bay as there were loose and disconnected wires everywhere from various add ons over the years.

I will see if I can get the factory harness working but if not, I will just run new wiring. At very minimum, I will need to install a battery isolator solenoid under the hood and run a 12 volt charge wire for the battery mounted in the camper. I've included a photo of the supplied tie-downs. Not sure of the make but they appear to be spring loaded and decent quality.

 

So I finally got some camper tie down brackets made up and installed. My Argon tank is in getting pressure tested so tried out some flux core wire in my Miller mig welder as I wanted to get this project done. Welds are not the prettiest but no one is gonna be crawling under my truck except me… 😜 The front mounts shown bolt to the frame using the existing camper tie down holes.

I welded the rear mounting tubes to plates on the side of my trailer hitch so they were easy enough along with some extra bracing. Camper is now installed and electrical/ batter isolator etc is all done.

Maiden voyage this afternoon and am really impressed with how nice this truck drives with the added weight of the camper. It actually drives and handles nicer now than it does when empty.

Looking forward to the first camping trip (soon). The engine has no issues but at highway speeds, the exhaust note is definitely a bit louder. Going to be interesting to see what fuel mileage (or lack there of ) looks like now. That being said, I’m not making payments on a brand new F350 so I can afford to spend a little on gasoline ( with hopefully a little left over for some cold beer and steaks at the campground)…., 😎🍻🥩

 

Truck is finally ready to go camping! Ran it over the scales with camper installed and full freshwater tank (33 gallons) came in at 3570 kilograms which converts to 7870 lbs. Not too bad as my gvw on this truck is 8900 lbs and that was before addition of super singles on rear which brings it up to 10,000 lbs according to Ford specs. Lots of reserve capacity for steaks and beer!

One nice surprise is how much nicer the truck rides with the added weight of the camper in the back. Feels like the suspension is actually working now and it no longer rides like a buckboard. Ford engineers sure did their homework when designing this truck. With the factory sway bars and extended wheel base it is very stable at highway speeds and corners don't even faze it.

Also swapped out the stock steering wheel for Grant Classic Nostalgia wheel. My stock wheel is in really good shape and I was going to leave it but the grip is so skinny that it’s uncomfortable to drive and difficult to maintain a good grip for good control. I can always reinstall the original wheel down the road but pretty happy with the look and feel of the new wheel!

 

Not as heavy as I would have thought. I like the steering wheel, too. I have a similar one in my '66 Fairlane GT convt.

 

Awesome rig!

 

So after chasing a drivability issue for months, it seems I have finally fixed it. Truck would go lean and lose power at wide open throttle as if the mechanical fuel pump could not keep up.

Blew out fuel lines, changed out all rubber hoses as some were dry rotted and cracked. Issue improved but still did not entirely go away. Specifically when merging onto highway at wide open throttle.

Today I bit the bullet and installed a Carter 4594 electric fuel pump. Bypassed the nearly new mechanical pump (which I left in place in case of electric pump failure) and also installed new fuel filter. The old clear filter looked okay but clearly was not when I tried to blow through it after removal….

Short story long, the engine accelerates like a bandit with no more loss of power or going lean as per my afr gauge. All in with new fuel line, relay, various wiring connectors etc the install ran me about $200 when all was said and done.

Very happy with the resulting performance and now I would be confident driving this rig across country if need be ( and if I owned shares in a large petroleum company… &#128556

 

Sounds good. Glad you got it running better. Driving across the country is fun.
in 2015 i drove my 79 F250 (460) super cab from Montana to Alaska. Before I even got to Canada it gave me a scare getting up to speed from a stop after it idled a few minutes. It was anemic for 30 seconds, then ran good after that. I only had the issue if it idled for a few minutes. Never figured it out and it never died on me.
I tried to use all the gas in Canada on that drive. Averaged less than 8 pmg for 2600 miles

 

FWIW....wife and I are currently on a epic road trip across the country pulling a 24ft travel trailer with a 19 F150 with the 3.5EB....and I'm averaging 8mpg. Going east was slightly better as we had a good tailwind here n there but yesterday was bad. Coming into Casper WY...had a 40mph headwind...the truck got real thirsty.

 

Wow, that’s surprisingly poor fuel economy for the 3.5 but a decent sized trailer and a 40 mph headwind will definitely have an impact!

Now that my truck is running good and the tuning is pretty much spot on, I will see what I’m getting for mileage with the camper on at my next fill up. I’m fully expecting sub 10 mpg but after seeing your numbers, I maybe won’t feel so bad now ; )

Of note, in my area we are currently paying $1.82 per litre of fuel which works out to about $5.14 US per US gallon…..I think we have the highest priced fuel in all of Canada. 😬