Below is a real time video of me packing up my roof top tent.
After I made this video I cut the top half of my mattress down so that it was the same width as the bottom.
The top of the roof top tent is wider than the bottom – makes sense because the bottom folds into the top – and the mattress was wider at the top too.
I’ve always felt it was too wide. It pushes against the sides of the tent, and against the struts. It makes it harder to make the bed as the fitted sheet just doesn’t spread out evenly and I think it probably makes it harder to fold the canvas into the tent when packing it away.
So I cut it down.
And I was right. It is now much easier to make the bed and the sheet lies more comfortably. And it is much easier to pack up. The canvas pushes into the tent easily and I can even pull the shell down and latch it without having to climb onto the tent. I even have space at the side of the mattress now to put my wine glass if needed.
It’s easier and safer all round, and has saved me over a minute in pack up time.
EXCEPT it seems that being easier to pack up means it’s also easier for the latches to rattle loose over corrugations. As I found out.
I was driving down a dirt road when the person approaching me flashed their headlights. I immediately started checking gauges, switches, doors, etc to work out what was wrong when a voice came over the UHF “Your roof top tent’s open mate.”
Yet another reason to always have your 2 way on.
So now I put a lock on to keep the latch closed. That works well, so it’s a win all round.
