Short Bed (5.5 foot) Truck camper build || Start to Finish process

hey everyone welcome back to another episode of jb outdoors today i'm going to be starting my truck camper build on my 2021 ford f-150 so let's get to it [Music] [Music] don't want to [Music] so as you guys can see i have a five and a half foot bed here to work with so i'm going to build a platform here in the back building this based off of a queen size mattress my wife and i will be camping out of this together so my plan is to construct a platform and get up over the wheel wells and i will post a little picture uh right about here you can see how the framework was on my 2015 ford f-250 that i previously sold and bought this truck so this time i'll be getting up over the wheel wells a little bit higher this truck has a little bit different setup than my super duty did so um i'll show you the lumber that i bought the lumber that i have to be working with today i'm going to be using 2 by 10 by eight foot long uh i have two by three by eights and the only reason i went with two by three by eights opposed to a two by four is the price difference either these the two by threes will be my support across the top that will tie everything together and then i have four by eight sheets of plytanium plywood so in addition to the plywood the two by tens and the two by threes i have one by fours this is all number two yellow pine uh lumber just based off a price this isn't anything that has to be super pretty because it's framework it's going to be covered up by the finished product so that i will explain more of what all this or how all this is going to go but again here's the picture that i have from my 2015 f-250 as a general idea of how this is going to be constructed so let's get started [Music] safety first guys we are not going to the hospital today okay [Music] so as you guys just saw i ripped my cutoffs of my 2x10 i'm going to use that up here it's basically uh some structural integrity so this will this will keep the whole platform or any of the upright system that holds all the weight this is going to keep everything from twisting and doing weird stuff while we're driving so i had to rip some of it off because of the height of the rib truck so now that i have these together and cut down to height this is flush here so i'm just going to mark this where the center is and then i'm going to assemble this out of the truck and this is all going to get screwed together left one this is the right one so that's it i'm gonna do that and then we're gonna put the drawer slide on i have planned on incorporating that one by four or basically a drawer slide so the weight of the drawer isn't going to be sliding on my the bed of my truck at all this bed doesn't have any spray in bed line or anything yet there's plans too in the future but right now we're not going there so let's do it [Music] [Applause] [Music] i've got some drawer slides built up uh brad nailed on some nailers so now i'll be able to put these right onto the actual bed of the truck underneath and then have something to screw into the main frame for so pre-drill some holes get these things installed and then we'll start putting on our top slats so i've got all my slats measured out and cut so now moment of truth we get to see if they all fit well i'm up here [Music] okay one bits [Music] so [Music] last one [Music] hmm [Music] so our support's all done now i just got to deck it i was going to show you guys this this is what i basically base this off of so we put the drawer slides in earlier i'm going to build a drawer for that and the drawer is gonna house these coats so everything was kind of built around these totes we had these in our last truck camping setup and they were kind of everywhere and we had this weird pull stick to pull everything out so this time we'll be able to pull the whole drawer out and then we'll be able to use these totes um with that being said i have more room here on the on each side so i'll be able to put our chairs camping tables stuff like that it's gonna go down the sides this is really cool i really think i might do a little bit of support here but it's pretty solid you know there's it's really solid on each side so that with the real plywood is gonna really firm everything up so i have a little bit of work to do on the front there's tie hooks that i think i'm just going to take out of the bed because those aren't going to be used now so i'll take those out and then that'll alleviate some of the stress on that front board i'm taking a gamble doing it this way but trying to do it as clean as possible and this stuff is 15 30 seconds real plywood it's called platinium whatever whatever that means 52.99 a sheet so 4x8 sheet 52.99 so i don't really like gambling on that but we'll see i'm kind of worried about having to get it through the opening of the cap i'm hoping i can kind of fish it around if not i'm going to have to half the sheet depending on where where it lies in the truck the truck's actually almost as wide as it is long it's kind of funny yeah for those of you wondering no i don't have a table saw no i don't have help so we got it well i cut the piece in half again so that's okay there will be a seam down right down the center i might need to shave a little bit off anyway see if i would have gotten it in there then it wouldn't have worked out anyway so a little spot i might notch out with my my uh jigsaw so we'll see how that turns out nice that's pretty sweet [Music] i mean i would have liked there not to be a seam there but that's okay so that won't be bad there's obviously a seam there in the middle but there's plenty of screw points that everything can tighten up and fit perfectly my last piece is going to be a little tricky i'm going to take and rip uh lengthwise again so i'm hoping i can at least get that smaller piece to fit in there and then i'll have to notch out these corners so let's see how bad i can screw that up well i've got my last piece cut notched out this one should fit in nice so there's our deck deck drawer slides all that's technically done just gotta screw it down i think i'm gonna sand this off first and make it kind of nicer kind of mad at myself if i had to do it again i cut the section with the piano upside down and i didn't see this crack right here if you guys can see that so that is what it is i suppose but at least it's all in one piece so we're all set today today i'm going to be putting in the drawer system so i'm going to be putting in three drawers uh one big one here in the center the whole length of the bed and one on either side of the center so let's get started so today i'm working with a leftover sheeting that i had from my deck that i built on the truck camping setup so we're gonna use whatever we can for the actual base the whole bottom of the drawer is going to be this plywood and then i have one by sixes for the outside structure then we're just going to do something really simple pre-drill holes and run screws up into the one by sixes with a little bit of wood glue involved so let's take some measurements get started here i'll just ensure the fit make sure the piece fits inside the slides all the way through and through and make sure it's nice and smooth next i have to pre-drill holes and this one board has such a twist in it and or a bend in it so i'm going to have to drill a couple holes put a couple screws in and then work it out work it straight as i go no big deal we'll make it happen [Music] that's awesome got a little twist to it but i think some weight inside that drawer would probably take it out of there so let's see uh i want to show you guys what i basically based this whole drawer system off of so my wife and i bought these nice totes that held all of our camping stuff like this one has our all of our little rechargeable fans uh lanterns little bluetooth speakers some paracord stuff like that so we have a couple more of these can i base this off of the dimension of this that fits inside of there everything fits that is so awesome i love it when stuff works out the way you planned it so this will be able to pull all the way out might do something about that maybe put a stop in up top but you can pull it all the way out won't go anywhere the next two drawers i built quickly with what i had left over from my decking and the main drawer i used plywood but i had to cut it into sections but that's okay they were majority of them were four foot sections but i wanted to utilize the whole length of the bed for these skinnier drawers these skinnier drawers will be for our camping chairs we have a camping table that rolls up into a camping chair sized bag it's really neat and then also fishing tackle and and maybe even a shorter ultra light fishing pole will fit inside one of them [Music] hmm [Music] just added this extension what's neat about this extension is it folds up so it's actually a beauty plate for my drawers and then it also folds up to be the support for my mattress so i can now get in this and comfortably stretch out i have a tent that goes over the back of the cap and the tailgate that will have screened in windows with privacy windows too so this is still a work in progress but i wanted to show you guys what i did here i have some footage of of installing this and everything today i'm working on the drawers i noticed when i reached in to grab these drawers it's kind of a harsh uh it's just sanded number two pine so i'm going to be routering these with a half inch round over bit with my router so let's get to that [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] my the platform and the extension was all carpeted everything was just stapled down it was just a 6x8 area rug that was more or less just a commercial grade high traffic area rug that i bought from lowe's home improvement store this turned out so well i just took the extension off stapled and glued with uh super 77 so that was that turned out really well i was super happy with that and it's so clean now with the extension that folds down everything looks so nice with this truck being brand new i wanted everything to just turn out so clean and so nice i didn't want it to be a blotch together kind of build so this was so awesome turned out so well [Music] foreign [Music] oh [Music] so i'm getting ready to put the queen size mattress in i kind of want to talk to you guys a little bit before i uh did that i put the carpet on at one of my work facilities because it's been like in the 20s and 30s out so i did use a it's called super 77 adhesive um like a spray adhesive comes out of a spray can so i needed it to be warm and obviously for what i do it's extremely loud in our facilities so i just did uh some video clips with no audio doing that so i used i used the same carpet for for each side it was a six by eight sheet from lowe's home improvement store and i just had some remnants of that so i put it around the actual supports just to kind of dress it up thanks it looks so clean so we're getting ready to put the mattress in let's do it sweet i think it could work if you're okay with it i know you're afraid of busting the it works i mean that's not pushing on the back window but i think we've got a plan sweet that seals the whole windows got a seal around it that's nice and then it's got a whole seal on the bottom here so it shouldn't we should just leave it in there test it and make sure it's dry okay so now that we have the mattress in everything else is done i've got the drawers pretty much set up so now first things first right inside of this drawer is the tent that goes over the back of this so the back window is going to end up being down close to level so i have never put this on before i did buy this used from my younger brother that used to have a similar truck camping setup for a five and a half foot truck bed so let's get this thing put on never done it before so you can see me struggle through time lapse let's go with that okay guys so this is a key piece to the puzzle here this tent that goes over the back of the truck um it's pretty windy today so it's a good test before we actually have to use it there's still some adjustments that have to be made but for my first time doing this i guess i have it fairly down yes it didn't struggle too bad so the biggest thing is is we have these bungee cords that are kind of interwoven into the whole setup here you can see it's stitched there so i just have those hooked down on one of the running board mounts and this one hooked to the wheel itself and that goes all the way through this bottom piece so this is kind of neat because on the back of this well i can do this with one hand it has an inner and an outer you can tie the inner up with this tie right here and then you have a screen so if it's nice out you can tie it all up the only thing that i foresee might be an issue is the amount of room to get in so i'll set this camera up on a tripod and see how well i can get into this thing but so far i think this is really cool remy's hanging out inside she loves this truck truck bed camper she loved our last one that we did so on the inside it is uh fairly tidied up so i see down here in the corners this thing is just bungeed around the outside of the bed so i can we'll have to put something down in between there if it's cold or if it's windy because that's gonna be a easy access point for a lot of air to come up through as well as in between this tailgate and the actual bed so see that's a pretty decent gap right there we'll have to figure something out with that there are more grommets here we could probably bungee down to something but it's not really like fit and contoured to the bed being open so pretty neat though first time going on this truck bye there's definitely not much room to play climbing in but it's kind of neat because as far as like the edge of the bed you can see there's still some tailgate left so i actually think i have a an infrared heater that i'm going to put right here that is safe around fabric and stuff so it's more or less it's a big unit it's actually called an eden pure if any of you are familiar with that so we'll be able to put that right there we'll be able to put our shoes right here um plenty of room to put our shoes but here is a little tour of the inside of the truck remy loves it in my super duty that i had before i had enough room to just about sit up and i i don't quite have enough room inside of this now so we have pretty much just enough room to kind of comfortably sit up somewhat i know i love you too but it's nice with that uh truck tent that it's cutting any of the wind which is what it's meant to do now i can hopefully camp back here so we have a trip coming up we're gonna get to use it for the first time right but not you you're not gonna come with oh i know i know so even with this tent on we'll be able to reach in and this is the main drawer i have drawers on either side of this as well i'll be able to pull this out i've got the amenities up front i call this the first aid section so i actually do have a first aid kit toilet paper mosquito defense sunblock all that kind of stuff so that's right at the ready very first thing to grab pull out just a little bit further the next toe in would be our kitchen type stuff so we have dishes and and cooking stuff like that come out even further this next tote is all of our fans bluetooth speakers lanterns stuff like that once usually once we get that out it's out and we don't have to access that any further and then the next thing even further in i'm not going to pull the drawer any further out but i have a coleman cooker so it's two burner cooker and then i have the grate to my tripod and then this next little tote is spices looks like peanut butter to go and stuff like that so that's it that's that main drawer now i've got i've also got these side drawers these side drawers don't really house too much um i do have in this black bag right behind the tent bag is a fold up table that is a really cool it's really nice especially when you end up somewhere that doesn't have a any kind of picnic table or anything like that and then this this side drawer this has camping chairs and the tripod all right guys thanks for watching i just wanted to make this short video of using or installing this truck temp on my truck bed i've been working a lot on the platform for the mattress and the drawer system for this setup so i will do a new uh full in-depth truck camper tour of this probably when we actually go on our first trip will be one of those videos so stay tuned for that and again thanks everyone for watching i'm justin with jb outdoors remember to spend more time outdoors and i'll see you guys in the next video you

Channel: JB Outdoors

Views: 59,079

Keywords: Short bed truck camper, 5.5 ft truck camper, truck camping, platform, how to get started truck camping, can you camp in a short bed truck?, camping, sleeping in my truck, how to build, building a truck camper, start to finish, truck camping tent, DAC full size, tent, truck, plywood, plytanium, ford f150, 2.7 ecoboost, stx package, solo truck camping

Id: 4eWrwoWXcfc

Length: 35min 40sec (2140 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 14 2022