Hi GFC community,
I’m very excited to be getting a used GFC. Me and the first owner are planning on doing the swap between our trucks soon. I was wondering if there is a recommended torque to tighten the bed mount bracket bolts? The camper is coming off a 3rd gen Tacoma and getting installed on a 2nd gen (short bed).
Thanks!
There is actually not a recommended torque spec but I do have some recommendations.
-Make sure the bolt is tightened as close to the truck bed side as possible (there is a slit that allows for side to side adjustment on top of the mount, make sure its as close to the bed side as possible)
-Utilize new lock nuts, technically the nylocks are one and done so get some 1/2" nylock lock nuts
-Good n tight is typically tight enough but you can use some crosscheck torque seal to monitor whether or not the nut is loosening
you will need some double bulb seal, to fill the front of the ‘header’ - the second gen is not like the 3rd gen which is level, gfc uses two there on 2nd gen (only one on 3rd gen) something like this but @Mike_GFCUSA can probably give you a better link
and replace the rear seal on the back door, gfc has them for like $25 - the two gens are different there too
@Mike_GFCUSA good info about the nylocks, wouldn’t have thought of that. How many do I need? 6 I think?
@d.shaw Thanks for the info. I’ve got the bulb seal ready to go. I actually got 2 different ones - one from amazon and one from Trim Lok via Grainger, the latter of which looks like the ones that GFC uses. I will definitely have enough to fill the gap in the front bed rail.
As for the rear door seal, should I reach out to GFC directly via the support email to purchase the 2nd gen specific one?
Thank you both for your help!
its probably easiest to reach out to them, and cheap enough. the 2nd gen seals so much better… ha ha they may just give you a link to the product
We buy straight from Trimlok so that seal is definitely going to be more like what we use. You can also send an email to support if you need more and likely buy direct from us. @d.shaw is right, the second gen will need the extra length of bulb seal at the front of the camper between the bed rail and the camper rail. You will likely also need a longer tailgate seal. We can sell that as well. For the short bed you will need (6) new nylocks and for the long bed you will need (8).
@d.shaw @Mike_GFCUSA Thanks for the advice! We did the install this weekend in my driveway and everything went smoothly. I did a double layer of bulb seal at the front and measured a bunch before laying down the seal on the sides. It lined up great, and everything seals nicely!
I have a longer rear hatch seal coming in the mail from some RV supply company, but if that doesn’t work out I will definitely reach out to support about buying some directly from you guys. It looks like this is the one I’ve seen on other 2nd gens, but the smallest length I can buy from Grainger is 25 ft, which is still 5x more than I need haha.
Any additional advice on mounting bracket location and tightness?
We’ve broken one bracket. And, after 2 technical off-road drives, the new brackets are loose and the camper shifter forward (flush with the cabin window).
We’ve broken the cab window twice already. We’ll keep an eye on the brackets before/after each drive… any other best practice?
Seems like we’re going to need to install some sort of protection between the camper and the rear cab windows (or just replace the windows with a more durable surface).
Hey Brooke, that seems pretty unfortunate! I haven’t had any issues with my camper since I installed it 2 years ago while following Big Mike’s guidelines in the 2nd post in this thread. I got brand new nylock nuts from the hardware store and probably tightened them down in the neighborhood of ~20-30 ft-lb. I’ve driven miles and miles of dirt road (some at high speeds) but never any hardcore wheeling.
The only issue I’ve had is one of the bolts that fastened the camper bracket to my Tacoma’s bed rail came loose. I only found out after I checked randomly when I was cleaning the camper. I checked all of the others and they were all still tight.
The only potential solution I can think of is maybe use some blue loctite?