My Off Road Worthy 6x10 Cargo Trailer Camper Build

Round 3…


As some of you know by now, I like to build my own campers…or so it seems. I started off building a basic 4x6 that offered off road ability and housed a RTT.




The moved to a 5x8 cargo trailer camper build that served us for many years.




Then we grew from a couple to a family and wanted some more room, but after trying some manufactured options, we decided to go back to the cargo trailer camper life and just build it bigger this time.

Here’s the new 6x10 cargo trailer we’re going to convert into an off road worthy camper.



Follow along if you’d like to see what we do. It’ll be a similar build to the last one though, with some tweaks.

We started by custom ordering the trailer from a manufacturer in Indiana. After researching a few options, we went with this company as they were willing to do a custom build, had a workable time frame on deliver and seemed to be of decent quality.

The custom touches we ordered were:

- 62” interior height (vs standard 72”)
- Barn rear doors (vs ramp or single side swing)
- No passenger side cargo door
- No side vents
- Black trim

They weren’t able to accommodate a custom axle request, so we ended up with a standard 5 lug, 3,500 lb drop axle with brakes.

The custom build order was expected to take 3 months, but ended up a touch over 4 months due to supplier issues.

We’ve been accumulating parts and plan to kick off the build soon, so I’ll be back with more soon.

Cheers.

 

Looking forward to see how it turns out.
Congratulations on the growing family.

 

I spend a few hours shortening the RV door we purchase second hand. Being a shorter trailer…we have to shorten a few other things. Thankfully, it was quick work, just a few measured cuts and reassembling things to match.

Cut 12” out of the door.

 

Picked up another used set of Jeep CJ7 rear leaf springs.



Pressed out the old bushings, freshened them up with new bushings and paint and got to installing them using all factory CJ7 mounts: front and rear leaf spring mounts, lower and upper shock mounts, u bolts, etc.



Gotta finished up some details on one side and install the shocks mounts, but it’s looking like 3-3.5” of lift and will be a much better ride off road.

 

Very nice work!

 

Finished up (sorta) the suspension install. Mounted the front and rear leaf springs mounts and welded them on, making sure they’re squared up.




Mounted the upper and lower shock mounts and installed some Skyjacker CJ7 shocks.

Tackled welding on my stabilizer jacks. I went with these, versus the trailer tongue jacks like last time, as the trailer tongue jacks had a little slop to them, required removal and storage and this trailer won’t be as high off the ground as the last one, so I was within the reach of the longer stabilizer jacks this time.




I also finished gutting the interior of the trailer to get ready for a few bracing supports for doors, windows and vents and to help ease access to some components for welding.




Here’s where I messed up though, I had thought I put the trailer off the jack stands enough to represent it being back on its own weight…but I was wrong….and that will mean I need to redo a few things.




The shocks (because of their upper mount location being limited by the rear leaf spring mount) are just too short and compressed. The rear leaf spring mount is also mounted the wrong way to create ample room for the upper shock mount to be positioned further back and the shackles are sitting at too much of an angle…shit.



I’ll need to grind the rear leaf spring mount off, flip it’s orientation and move it rearward an inch or so, then grind off the upper shock mount and move it back as well. Mistakes happen, I was in a rush and didn’t think it all through, so that’ll be 3-4 hours fixing that someday soon.

 

Vinyl wrapped the door yesterday. First time wrapping something this large, but it went well.


Ended up cutting it and leaving a little white showing, so figured the easiest remedy was to simply mask off a small line around the border and plastidip over it to hide it. Overall it came out decent and surely good enough for a off road campers RV door.

 

The trailer is at a welder friend of mines place getting the new tongue installed and reinforced, so not much to do for a week or two.

Been taking this time to plan out the electrical. Like the last one, our electrical plans are pretty basic and will include only 12 V DC circuits, no AC power. This serves our needs just fine and makes it pretty simple to achieve what we need.

I also decided to tackle the roof rack cross bars. We’ll be utilizing a set of three cross bars for the roof rack this time. They will mount an awning, solar and maybe a few other items in time.

I’m making the roof rack using ARB awning mounts as the roof rack base mounts and 1x3 steel tube for the cross bars.



I cut the cross bars to 80” long, so there’ll be a roughly 4” overhang on either side of the trailer. I welded end plates onto the bars to finish them off nicely.

Left to right: End cap plate set in place, welded on and then ground down to clean it up.



I also drilled small holes on either end on the underside of the cross bars. I’ll primarily be drilling through and bolting to these bars with the accessories and those holes will likely let some moisture in over time, so these are small drain/air holes so the cross bars don’t corrode from the inside out over time.



Painting them up with bed liner paint and will be throwing them on when I get the trailer back.

Cheers.

 

Unfortunately still waiting to get the trailer back, which is driving me a bit mad.

Ordered some “scratch and dent” SCS wheels for the trailer, but they only had matte dark bronze available, so I painted them matte gunmetal to match the Tacoma.

 

Picked the trailer back up from the welder friend, he did a great job.

Extended the tongue 3 feet, running the new tongue back several feet to just in front of the axle and relocated the safety chain mounts (ignore the chain situation in the pictures, didn’t know they were too short and didn’t pick it up prepared to correctly handle that issue).




I mean…she’s long now boys…





Half the intent of extending the tongue so long is being able to jackknife the trailer 90+ degrees for trail situations.



The other reasons are room for a front landing and it being way easier to reverse the trailer down trails when forced too. Major cons being its long and it takes corners with a tighter radius.

Now that I have the trailer back, I’m going to need to jump into several bigger items and knock them out soon. I’m trying to get the trailer bare bones useable before the dead of winter here.

- windows
- door
- roof vent
- axle hub swap to fit Toyotas lug pattern
- new trailer floor
- insulation

 

Sub'd for ideas. I'm thinking about doing something similar. It's late and I'm tired and I just happened to notice this, but I wanted to mention that I like what I see so far.

 

Thanks, and welcome to some cool stuff…maybe.

The beauty of doing something like this is you get exactly what you want (if you can build it). I see lots of DIYers doing it simply because it’s cheaper and more basic, but it’s not always just that. We’ve searched for a manufacturer that makes what we want…it doesn’t exist. There’s either not enough size or the right stuff or there’s $20k worth of extra “overlander” stuff we don’t want/need. We like something kinda in the middle of that and building it has been our only reliable go to. It’s not super budget oriented, it’s goal oriented…for us atleast.

Here’s a few extras of our last one, we loved it but needed room for a kiddo and the wife liked the idea of a bit more room for a porta potty and some floor space as well..so yeah, why not build whatcha need.

 

Got some good used tires for dirt cheap, size matches the 255/75R17s on my truck. They are NanKang Mud terrains…but should be just fine for the trailer. The pair is like new and was $136 shipped to my door…for both.



Also welded on my jack mount and painted the new tongue. Using Rustoleum Truck Bed Coating for all exterior painted frame/etc pieces.




Also got the roof rack mounts started. Measure them to be about 39” apart from eachother, with the rear two being nearly centered over the rear axle.

I’m happy with how my ARB Awning mounts worked as roof rack feet. Way cheaper than actual roof rack feet ($30 a set) and have no concerns that they’d be anything less than plenty strong enough.

 

Working towards getting the windows, doors and vent fan in. Started by mocking up the desired setup with blue tape and checking for good visual balance and functional location of it all.




Then measured twice, cut the vertical uprights and used an oscillating tool to free the studs from the ridiculous adhesive used to stick the screw-less skin to the studs.



We’re going to run two 31.5” wide by 13.5” tall top hinged Dometic Seitz S4 acrylic windows. We disliked the sliding windows in the last camper, you need to leave them open for ventilation and there would always be a little rain that got in overnight. These will help prevent that and serve as emergency exits…tight ones, but possible ones if truly needed.

Framed in the window supports with 1 inch square tube welded in place and painted it for a bit of corrosion protection.




I also put the lift shackle on and instead of reinstalling the shock mounts in a new location, I just opted to go for shorter shocks.

 

I got the windows in today and the sealant is setting up, used Sikaflex 221 to mount them. Windows are mounted in the same spot on either side of the trailer.







Door is in too, but I need to redo it a bit. The self tapping screws I bought to mount it are junk and need replaced. Annoyingly, the door sits true and plumb, but the bottom trim on the trailer is off kilt, so it looks a bit off.

 

Spent the morning with the fam before I got the afternoon free (thanks to the wifey) to get the roof rack buttoned up and awning mounted.

Drilled holes in the cross bars and mounted it with simple bolts, though I did put butyl tape under the washers and roof rack feet.

I’ve already gone quite a bit over budget, so trying to save a bit here and there and opted for the All-Top (Chinese knockoff) awning. Initial impressions are good for a super cheap $114 awning. It seems to be a very similar style/setup to the ARB we previously ran, so much so I’m pretty sure the spare ARB poles I have would be a direct fit. It’s 8.5” by 8.5”.




Welded in some angle iron and places a smaller piece of board in the ceiling, this will be a thicker section that allows me to mount my MaxxAir 6.5” ceiling vent fan. It’ll be right at the foot of the bed.




The Lippert axle I got with the trailer was suppose to be a custom ordered 6x5.5” lug 3,500 lb drop axle with brakes. The trailer manufacturer said they don’t offer that combination and I’d have to upgrade to a 7,000 lb straight axle (for $$$) to get it, so I politely declined and figured I’d just replace the axle with a custom Dexter axle for half the cost.

Turns out I wildly underestimated the cost of the right Dexter axle and it was proving difficult to assemble the right parts and keep it a drop axle.

I called Lippert and they said they didn’t offer a 6 lug brake drum for a 3,500 lb axle, but further digging showed they did offer one for a 4,400 lb axle that happened to have the exact same 10” brake drum and inner and outer bearings…which I found odd, so I confirmed with them and ordered a set for $290. Those came in…damaged, so waiting on replacements but was able to mock up one side to double check fitment, tire clearance and such.

Looks like it’s going to work perfectly and the wheel/tire will clear the trailer body by nearly 2” (yay skinny tires and mild offsets).




The door came out again, if you noticed in the pictures. I don’t wanna talk about it…that thing is fighting me. Another day…

 

Its best to work with butyl tape when it’s cold…

It was cold today, so fourth times the charm and I got the door in correctly. The tape kept falling, stretching and doubling up and thinning out in spots as I attempted to put the door up before. It wouldn’t have sealed well, it sat very wavy on the surface of the trailer and had a few spots that tweaked enough to cause interference when closing the door. Laying the door flat, working to apply the butyl tape when cold and having the mounting holes predrilled seemed to be the ticket I was needing.




Next is a lot of little things: sealing up the skin panels on the inside, parts of the frame and some wiring holes.

Clean up the factory wiring and add a secondary ground wire…while the trailer is wired to ground via self tapping screws to the frame currently, I will be grounding the system via a secondary ground wire that ties back to the truck through the 7-pin connector. The grounding screws will all be buried after construction of the inside and I’d really hate it if one worked loose enough to get a spotty connection and u couldn’t get to it’d thus the redundancy. Same with some of the factory connections, I’ll go through and remove mechanical crimps and solder each connection.

After that, I need to get the floor in.

 

Installed some porch lights, some under-body scene lights (affectionately called “ground effects” by my wife), cleaned up the fender holes…the used ones and the dozen or so misdrilled ones, cleaned up the 7 pin wiring and sealed up some nooks and cranny’s today.

The wild attempts of the worker at the factory to find solid metal to drill into.



I put the screws back in the holes that were successful, put butyl tape on the inside of those that weren’t and then dabbled some SikaFlex 221 on the outside.

I installed two porch lights on the entrance/awning side of the trailer, one on the opposite side.

There’s a white LED bar along the top trim, just left of the door and an amber below that. White will be the primary use light, while the amber will be for buggy nights or middle of the night quick trips outside.




Put one on the passenger side as well, for either future use with a shower/toilet/etc tent off that side or just general lighting to see what’s happening on that side.



The aforementioned “ground-effects” are just seven LED license plate lights that will be used for softer under trailer scene lighting for navigating around the camp site when we want a chiller vibe.

The A-liner camper, we bought to try most recently, has a single exterior under frame light right beside the steps into the RV and we really came to like that usability. Seven lights might turn out to be too much, but I could add a dimmer switch for them if so.

Placed 3 along each side of the trailer, on a cross support just inside the main frame rails, and one centered on the back by the galley.




Here's a better picture of the tire to trailer clearance with the fender off.



Aiming to get a little more wiring prep done and then the floor (and insulation maybe) in this weekend. We head to New York next weekend for Halloween, so gonna take a little break after that.

 

Got started on a few things, finished none of them.

Decided to replace the floor and reuse the original floor for the bed platform. The ‘cheapest of the cheap’ origional OSB was hacked up pretty decently with the install at the factory; damaged edges, misdrilled screw holes and a couple damaged spots.

I went with new better quality and rated OSB and am coating it with two coats of TotalBoat penetrating epoxy. This should seal up the OSB and prevent water from making it in and causing issues. I might also add an additional layer of paint (or truck bed liner?) over the bottom of the OSB once’s it’s installed in place.

One light layer of penetrating epoxy on and I ran out, so letting that sit while I wait for another jug.




Started running the electrical on the interior, unfortunately 100’ of wire turned out to be about half of what I needed, so that’s on pause as more comes in from my buddy Jeff Bezos.

Every 12V circuit will be 14 gauge stranded copper. Larger (relative) amp draw circuits (fans, charging ports) will have their own dedicated wiring while some of the lighter amp load circuits will share a 12V feed circuit and just unique runs after the switches.

Electrical plans are:

Single Renogy 200aH AGM battery
Renogy Battery Monitor
Victory Energy MPPT Solar Charge Controller
Two Renogy 100 watt solar panels
Using all Blue Seas outlets, power distribution blocks, fuses

Battery compartment will be in the front passenger side of the V-nose, under a bench/cabinet. The driver side of the V-nose will eventually house a propane heater (thinking Propex HS2000).

Outside there’ll be:

White LED porch lights on each side
Amber LED porch light on passenger side
Cigarette Lighter Power Port between fender and door on passenger side (for charging items and awning lights)
Soft white LED undercarriage ambient lighting

Inside there’ll be:

Two Cigarette Lighter power ports for heating blankets and such
MaxxAir 6.5” vent fan with dimmable LED light
Three dual USB charging ports for bedside and galley/storage area charging
Two bedside wall mounted LED lamps (dimmable)
8” Bedside wall mounted fan
LED lighting in the galley/storage area out back





I did get the ambient ground lighting in and done. I’m liking the end result a lot, especially for the ~$30 it took to do.



After running out of epoxy and wiring, I decided to install a bit of insulation..but ran out of time.



Cheers.

 

I'm sure you can't either, but I anxiously await the finished product. You do amazing work!