Quality camping gear: when (and when not) to economize

A recent Facebook dialogue regarding the post “OCTK Lite part 2,” and its comparison of quality in outwardly similar tools, reminded me of a column I published in OutdoorX4 some time ago regarding equipment quality in general. I thought it was worth revisiting. Herewith:

I’ve been reviewing outdoor equipment for 30 years now, and using it for a lot longer, in conditions ranging from 115ºF Sonoran Desert summers to Beaufort Sea storms. In a few situations I’ve felt the sharp realization that my life was quite possibly hanging on the quality of my equipment—lost in a winter storm skiing the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, caught seven miles offshore in a sea kayak in a Sea of Cortez chubasco—but in the overwhelming majority of circumstances it’s only been comfort, or the lack thereof, that has been affected by the gear I was using.

Nevertheless, in that time I’ve become convinced of the near-universal truth of this axiom: The best gear is also the least expensive in the long run. Spend more in the beginning on a quality piece of gear, and it will not only perform better, enhancing your comfort (and potentially your safety), it will also last longer, justifying its price over and over. Just one example is the Marmot Gore-Tex Grouse goose-down sleeping bag I bought in 1983. Scandalously expensive at the time on a penurious college-student budget, it has since seen untold nights of use, and has lost, as best I can estimate, perhaps a half inch of loft. I could go on with many other examples.

Okay, as I’ve been adminished many times, that’s fine in theory. But what if one simply does not have, say, $500 to spend on a sleeping bag, and $200 on a stove, and $50 on a double-wall titanium coffee cup? Am I suggesting that person stay home and leave travel to those who can afford bespoke equipment?

Not at all. My overriding goal in being in this business is to encourage people to get out exploring. One can only truly appreciate something if it is experienced in person, and if we are to preserve the most beautiful parts of our country and the world, we need people there seeing those parts and developing a bond of stewardship. And traveling and experiencing other cultures is the best way to stave off the xenophobia and isolationism that seems to be gripping our country these days.

Thus when I offer equipment advice to those just starting out, or looking at replacing worn out gear, and who are on a budget, I emphasize a strategy of priority. There are areas where economizing can be done without much compromise in comfort (or safety), and others where compromising would be foolish. Here are my ideas of where you should and shouldn’t economize. 

Tent: This is the big one. While traveling and camping your tent is your home—your last line of defense against rain, snow, wind, and bugs. You can survive with a cheap sleeping bag, but if your $39.95 dome tent leaks in a shower, or collapses in a breeze, the best sleeping bag in the world won’t keep you comfortable—or safe. Whether you’re after a lightweight backpacking tent for motorcycle or bicycle travel, or a room-sized, stand-up model to carry in a vehicle, buy the best tent you can afford, and care for it well. (For an in-depth look at how to choose a good lightweight tent, see here.)

This Hilleberg is a good tent.

These are not good tents.

Sleeping bag: I own an exquisite, U.S.-made Western Mountaineering Sycamore MF sleeping bag stuffed with superb 850-plus fill-power goose down. It’s spacious, has a waterproof shell, is rated to 25ºF, and weighs barely two pounds. It cost $460, and I fully expect it to last the rest of my life. Yet, quite frankly, the $55 synthetic-fill Blue Jay bag from Wenzel, rated to the same temperature, would be just as warm, and cozier given the flannel lining. No, it won’t last as long, and it weighs over five pounds, which would be an issue if you’re motorcycling or pedaling, but for tossing in the back of the Tacoma, it’ll work just fine.

Sleeping pad: Yes, that $130 Thermarest LuxuryMap inflatable mattress is a dream to sleep on. But for about $70 you can buy a queen-size three-inch-think memory foam pad on eBay and cut two 30-inch wide sleeping pads from it.

Stove: Connoisseurs of outdoor cooking swear by the dual-burner Partner Steel stoves, made to survive professional river guide abuse and stout enough to be employed secondarily as a tire ramp for working under your vehicle. But in my FJ40 I keep a single-burner Stansport propane stove that cost me $12.50 ten years ago and is still going strong.

Camp chair: No matter how active you are, you’ll spend a lot of time in camp sitting. Do yourself a favor and skip the $20 specials with 30 plastic joints on them. I’ve lost count of the broken ones I’ve encountered—cleaning up after each Overland Expo we always find a half-dozen of them in dumpsters, a criminal waste of the planet’s resources. Look at the brilliant (and handsome), made in the U.S. Kermit Chair, which can be carried on a motorcycle or transformed into a full-size chair, the fine GCI Pico, or the bulkier but sturdy Picnic Time Sport Chair with its built-in cocktail table.

Coffee mug: Motorcycling or bicycling? Go for that Snow Peak titanium model. Driving a truck? If you spent more than $10 you’re just showing off.

Stove: $12.50. Mug: $45

P3 Solar—power an iPhone or an Expo

Even the most back-to-basics overland trips rely heavily on electronic equipment these days. Last fall I bicycled the length of Israel—about as back-to-basics as you can get short of walking—yet I still carried an iPhone to log the route and an iPad for taking notes.

Most of the time I was far from wilderness, but I planned to spend time in the Negev Desert, and also just wanted to be as independent as possible from the usual juggling act with outlets in hotel rooms. So I borrowed a Dynamo solar power pack kit from P3 Solar.

The Dynamo kit comprised a folding 20-watt PV panel, a 16,800 mAh lithium-ion battery pack, connectors for various devices, a set of alligator clips to jump an auto battery, and both 12VDC and AC units to recharge the battery from other sources if needed. 

The P3 panel soaking up early morning Negev Desert sun.

I originally intended to see if I could secure the open PV panel to the tops of my panniers behind me to get constant charge, but quickly realized that, since 90 percent of my route was trending southward, I’d be shading the panel most of the time. So I was mostly restricted to laying it out in the morning and evening to charge the power pack.

I needn’t have worried. The pack retained enough juice to keep the iPhone navigating and recording all day, and regained full charge easily with just a few hours of exposure. I rode all the way from the Lebanon border to the Red Sea praying I’d come across a motorist with a dead battery, so I could whip the P3 pack out of my handlebar pack and jump his car, but alas, Israelis apparently maintain their vehicles well despite being among the planet’s worst drivers.

The Dynamo kit nestled securely under my tent between the rear panniers.

With connectors pared down to only those I needed, the P3 kit with power pack added just 2.3 pounds to my load (I could have reduced that further if I'd left the case at home). Perfectly manageable on a bicycle, it would be virtually unnoticeable on a motorcycle. The kit is now called the Dynamo Plus and incorporates a 25-watt panel, so recharging devices will be even quicker. 

P3 Solar offers an array of products up to an impressive 200-watt rollable panel—available with a folding mount to secure and angle it properly—that will power a fully equipped overland vehicle campsite, fridge included. We used a pair of them along with two of P3’s Dynamo AC600 battery/sine-wave inverter pack to run the entire Overland Expo headquarters at the Biltmore last year, including lights, computers, and a printer. Check out the entire line here.

Two kits that will (almost) breakdown-proof your vehicle

Our modern four-wheel-drive vehicles, virtually without exception, are far, far better machines than those we traveled with 30 or 40 years ago, the rose-tinted recollections of some of us nothwithstanding. (See here for a direct comparison.) Yes, they are vastly more complex: The average car today has between 25 and 50 electronic control units or ECUs (the Bentley Bentayga has 90)—some linked, some independent—controlling everything from shock absorber adjustment to accident-avoidance braking. But those complex systems have brought us more power, better fuel economy, a huge improvement in safety, and cleaner air—all at once. 

Despite this complexity, vehicles in general are more reliable than ever. Solid-state ECUs are incredibly stable and durable; precision design and manufacturing processes and advances in metallurgy have made engines and other drivetrain components much longer-lasting. A car with 100,000 miles on the odometer used to be noteworthy; these days, beater pizza-delivery Civics with 200,000-plus under their faded paint are as common as Domino’s outlets. When something does go wrong, the car will quite likely be able to tell the mechanic what is is. How long will it be before a car can sense a part about to fail, then automatically log onto Amazon and have the piece waiting at the shop when the self-drive function reroutes you there?

These advances have made overland travel easier and safer as well, even if—to be fair to those rose-tinted recollections—if something does go wrong in the bush you won’t be regapping the points with a matchbook cover if the dwell shifts, or disassembling the carburetor and popping in a rebuild kit if a gasket goes bad. (But since we no longer have points or carburetors . . .)

One thing has not changed, and that is the two types of problems behind the vast majority of issues in the backcountry that bring a vehicle to a halt: tire punctures and dead batteries. (Number three—at least on the road—according to the AAA? Locking the keys in the car.) 

While tires and batteries have also been improved significantly in the last few decades, both are wear items and are subject to the whims of chance, whether it be a jagged root holing a tire or any number of things draining a battery. 

What this means, however, is that with just two kits in your vehicle you can fix the vast majority of things that are likely to go wrong in the backcountry.

• A backup for the starting battery
• An air compressor and tire repair kit

Let’s, er, start with the battery. A lot of people now have dual-battery systems in their overlanding vehicles, so the auxiliary can be used to power fridges, etc. without draining the starting battery. Most of these systems have a switch that will tie in the auxiliary to the starting circuit when needed, thus solving the problem of a dead main battery in a few seconds. If there is no switch, the auxiliary can be physically swapped with the main battery. Since the chances of two batteries dying simultaneously—at least when installed with a proper isolating system—are scant, you’re more or less immune to battery woes.

A dual-battery system with an automatic isolator, such as this excellent National Luna, will virtually guarantee starting power for your engine

If you have only a single battery for all your systems, I have just one word for you: Microstart. These have been around for several years now and I’ve been preaching their gospel to the point of fanaticism, but I still run into people who have never heard of the product and are blown away when I jump-start their dead 3/4-ton pickup with a battery the size of a VHS tape. I have used and abused a half-dozen of them (we keep one in every vehicle) and they’ve performed perfectly. Early on in their history, master fabricator Tim Scully and I wondered if they could be used for field welding. We duly hooked up three in series and produced several excellent beads, after which the trio continued to work perfectly for their intended use. When I called Scott Schafer at Antigravity Batteries he expressed mingled astonishment and horror at what we had accomplished. (Current Microstarts include an overload device that prevents such shenanigans. Blame Tim and me.) In any case, a Microstart will that ensure a dead starting battery will not leave you stranded. Buy the XP-1 if you have a gasoline-engined mid-size SUV, or the XP-10 if you have a big diesel-powered truck, and top it up (on either AC or DC) every four or five months.

The only real alternative to safeguard a single battery is a low-voltage cutout, which will shut off current flowing from the battery if it senses voltage dropping to levels that would make the vehicle difficult to start. While this might be fine as a backup, I've found that a lot of people who install them are overburdening their battery to begin with, for example by running a fridge while still relying on the battery to turn a high-amperage starter. Better to go with a dual-battery system if you have that much draw.

That leaves tires. As with batteries, they’re a lot tougher and longer-wearing than in years past, but still vulnerable to damage, especially when driven on rough roads and trails. Yet I’m surprised at how many overlanders confine their backup tire kit to a single spare and perhaps a can of Fix-a-Flat. We can do better, and all it takes is a compressor and a proper tire-repair kit.

The repair kit is easy. At its most basic you want a plug kit, which will handle the majority of punctures within the tread area, usually without even needed to remove the wheel and tire from the car. But skip the Pep Boys versions and get a good one. This isn’t just tool snobbery talking: plugging a tire involves shoving pretty hard on the reaming tool and the plug-inserting tool. You do not want a cheap plastic-handled tool breaking during the procedure. ARB makes an excellent plug kit with everything you need for most simple punctures. If you want to step up from that and be prepared to handle virtually any tire problem short of a carcass-shredding blowout (including sidewall splits and broken valve stems), get the Exptreme Outback Ultimate Puncture Repair Kit. It’s expensive at $99, but you’ll never have to buy anything else to repair tires as long as you live.

The ARB Speedy Seal kit includes a proper metal-handled reamer and plug inserter.

Once the tire is repaired you’ll need to re-inflate it. While there are air compressors available from $19.95 on up, skip the cheap ones. They fail with miserable frequency, and even when working are so slow that you could hike out, buy a better unit, and be back before your tire is properly inflated. At a bare minimum get one of the ubiquitous Super Flow MV50 units, which are available from around $60. The MV50s have their issues but in general are reliable and reasonably fast, and if you’re a tinkerer there are dozens of web articles detailing worthwhile hacks for the product. 

Personally I prefer buying a better compressor to start with, both for repairing tires and for the much more frequently needed function of airing all four tires back up after airing them down for trail driving. To step up in quality look at the Viair units and anything from Extreme Outback. My current favorite compressor is the blindingly fast ARB Twin, expensive but worth every penny. Use the Twin to air up and you’ll be finished with your own vehicle and a friend’s before someone with an MV50 has done two tires.

The ARB Twin is available either as the portable kit shown here,which includes an air tank for operating air tools, or as a stand-alone unit for hard mounting in the vehicle.

Part of what defines overlanding is self-sufficiency. Making sure battery and tire troubles can’t bring you to a halt will go a long way toward guaranteeing that self-sufficiency—and if you travel far off the beaten track might just save you a sat-phone call and a very expensive recovery.  

Pelican's brilliant Air cases

On the off chance you haven’t noticed, except perhaps for the fantastically wealthy among us airline travel is no longer this:

Or this:

Or:

I could go on. These days we’re more likely to feel kinship with passengers on the ships that sailed to Van Diemen’s Land in the 19th century.

The latest erosion of our humanity concerns our luggage. Airlines have realized that we’ve been being massively selfish to want to bring along spurious stuff like, say, clothing, on our vacations. Some have gone so far as to grant us the enormous favor of “First Bag Free!” offers, that we might grovel with gratitude. 

Then there are the carry-on items. (Brief interlude here: A vulture is getting on an airplane with a dead, stinking rabbit under his wing. The stewardess makes a face and says, “Uh, sir, may I check that for you?” And the vulture says, “No thanks, this is carrion.”)

Where was I? Right: I actually have no problem with reasonable carry-on restrictions. Way too much experience cringing in a aisle seat while someone tries to heave an overstuffed carry-on bag into the compartment directly over my head—endangering my skull and cervical vertebrae if he drops it—while viciously shoving aside my own smaller bag. Many of these bags clearly would not have fit in the little trial cage at the counter if anyone had challenged them.

Several years ago Roseann and I solved one problem by employing a pair of Pelican 1510 cases as our own carry-on bags. Completely crush-proof, we could store cameras and laptops inside with zero fear of damage from fellow passengers. They had rollers when needed, and served as decent seats in airports such as Nairobi International, where chairs are virtually non-existent. The capacity was reasonable but the case was significantly smaller than the overstuffed cheap bags, leaving our consciences untroubled. (Bonus: A Pelican case makes a fine impromptu safe in a vehicle when padlocked shut and cabled to a seat track.)

However, that protection had a cost. The 1510 weighs 13.6 pounds packed with nothing but atmosphere. Filled with Canon DSLR equipment mine was upwards of 33. And now many airlines are cracking down on carry-on weight, especially for intercontinental flights. We ran into it the first time last year when a desk agent insisted on weighing ours, expressed polite incredulity at mine, and forced us to stuff lenses and binoculars into our checked duffels. Not happy. 

Some international airlines now list a maximum carry-on weight of 22 pounds—but on others and for certain destinations it’s as low as 15 pounds. That’s a Pelican 1510 and a paperback War and Peace. We had to find new luggage. 

But how to do so without giving up the protection? I looked at the legendary Zero Halliburton aluminum cases; they weighed scarcely less than the Pelican, and were four times as expensive. No polycarbonate cases looked a tenth as stout as the Pelican; several I tried oil-canned at a bare touch. It began to look as though we’d have to go with soft cases and violently interdict anyone abusing them.

Then Pelican solved our problem for us, with the introduction of the Air line of cases. The new 1535 Air looks just like our 1510s, still has wheels, is virtually identical in volume—but weighs just 8.7 pounds, nearly a 40-percent reduction. And we’re still trying to figure out exactly where they lost the weight. It’s clear the material is somewhat lighter—pushing down on the middle of the lid results in a bit more flex than on the 1510—but the case retains virtually all its fragile-contents protection. And four pounds equals my Leica 10x40 binoculars plus a Lumix GX8 and 14-140mm lens, with a few ounces left over. Bravo Pelican.

An ARB diff lock for the FJ40

I waited 38 years to install an ARB differential locker in my FJ40.

Why so long, and what made me finally decide to do it? A number of reasons explain the delay. First is that the ARB diff lock did not exist until 1987—a pretty ironclad excuse for the first ten years I owned the vehicle. By the time I became aware of the product and its potential, in the early 1990s, I was using the Land Cruiser as a support vehicle for guiding sea kayak trips in Mexico. And sea kayak guides do not make enough to buy ARB lockers. Several years later I moved on to freelance writing—and freelance writers do not etc. etc.

By this time another factor was at work. Through much, much trial and error I had become intimately familiar with the vehicle and its capabilities on difficult trails, to the point that I could predict accurately when a wheel was going to lift, when a cross-axle obstacle would unload diagonal tires enough to steal traction, just how much momentum I needed to get through spots that would have been effortless with a locker. Thus I was beginning to enjoy successfully traversing trails in Arizona that were considered fairly advanced even with traction aids, and a sort of reverse snobbery seduced me. Of course there were plenty of challenges simply beyond the ability of an FJ40 with open diffs, a two-inch lift, and 31-inch-tall tires, but I was happy with the places I’d been.

The fun part: drilling a hole in a perfectly good differential housing.

That attitude began to change when I had a Jeep Wrangler Rubicon Unlimited for a year as a long-term review vehicle for Overland Journal. The Rubicon, with its compliant all-coil suspension, driver-disconnectable front anti-roll bar—and selectable diff locks front and rear—could traverse terrain elegantly that the FJ40 traversed awkwardly. At the time I was stressing—and, a few years later, at the Overland Expo, teaching—environmentally conscientious driving, techniques far beyond the facile “Stay on the trail” message of Tread Lightly. One overriding goal of this is to avoid wheelspin if at all possible—an approach that is easier on the vehicle, the tires, and the trail. In the FJ40 some wheelspin was almost inevitable to get through sections that unloaded two tires, even with judicious left-foot braking, which can reduce but not eliminate it. In the Wrangler I could scan the terrain in front, predict which spots might unload the tires, and engage one or both lockers ahead of time, resulting in perfectly smooth progress. (This, by the way, is the salient advantage of driver-selectable lockers over ABS-based traction-control systems, even the best of which which must detect some wheelspin before they activate.)

Also contributing to my change of mind was the increasing capabilities of almost all current four-wheel-drive vehicles—some, such as that Wrangler and our Tacoma, equipped with factory locking diffs, many others with increasingly sophisticated traction control, even "lesser" models firmly in the cute ute category. Despite its relative primitiveness, I’ve kept the FJ40 competitive in some ways—on Old Man Emu suspension it rides better than our Tacoma did stock and has excellent compliance; it has a best-in-class Warn 8274 winch, good driving lights, a superb no-longer-made Stout Equipment rear bumper and tire/can carrier, a fridge, even a stainless-steel 14-gallon water tank. But newer vehicles were simply outclassing it in traction. 

Fast-forward to earlier this year, when I shipped the Land Cruiser to Bill’s Toy Shop in Farmington, New Mexico, for a complete engine and transmission/transfer case rebuild. As long as it was up there . . . 

I decided on a single rear locker. Why not another up front? Two reasons. First, this damn thing is now worth roughly ten times what I paid for it all those years ago, so I’m a bit more careful about where I take it. I think full traction on three corners is all I’ll need. Second, and probably more important, I still have the factory non-power steering, and a locking diff in front with manual steering would be, if not actually dangerous, stupendously difficult to control.

I took it for granted that with 320,000 miles on it, a fair amount of which was pulling trailers holding, at various points in history, a 21-foot sailboat; sea kayaks plus gear, food, and water for six clients; and cargo trailers ferrying Expo equipment, the diff would need a new ring and pinion gear, if not spider gears as well. Not so, said Bill—they were still in excellent condition. He replaced bearings and seals and called it good. An ARB High Output compressor in the engine compartment will double for tire inflation, saving precious cargo space I used to have to devote to a portable unit. I voted for installing the two switches in the dash, but Bill whined so piteously about sawing two rectangular holes in my unspoiled dash that I let him put them in the overhead shelf that houses the two-meter radio.

I’m now looking forward to quite a transformation in the faithful Forty, given fresh power, reworked transmission, and 50 percent more traction. It will be on its way back to Arizona in a few days.

The fiendishly clever Brompton bicycle

There are folding bicycles.

Then there is the folding bicycle that will fit in the overhead bin on an airliner. 

Those who witness for the first time the origami trick that is a Brompton being deployed or un-deployed invariably exclaim in astonishment. An ancient Navajo gentleman on a sidewalk in Flagstaff, regal in several pounds of silver and turquoise jewelry, stopped to watch me like I was some street magician as I collapsed my new Brompton to carry it into a shop. The process, which I’ve not yet mastered, took me perhaps 20 seconds. When I finished and picked up the bike by its saddle/handle, he looked at me for a minute, then, in that deadpan Navajo drawl, pronounced, “Well, you can’t do that with a horse.”

The Brompton is the brainchild of Andrew Ritchie, who could also be described as a pioneer of crowd funding. With the downturn of the cycling boom in the late 1970s, he could find no commercial backing for his folding bicycle concept, so he pursuaded 30 people to pay him retail for a bike that did not yet exist, with the understanding that if the company were successful, he would refund their investment, leaving each with a free bike. Every backer was paid back in full, and Brompton is now the largest manufacturer of bicycles (of any type) in England. 

Notice I wrote in England, because every Brompton is still built in the factory in West London. The frames are brazed by hand by specialists trained in house for up to 18 months, and each of whom stamps his or her initials on the finished product. CNC milling machines produce other bespoke parts, and final assembly creates one of what the company claims is up to four million permutations, depending on gearing (one, two, three, or six speeds are available), handlebar choice, color (144 combinations), and innumerable rack and luggage options up to and including a pukka canvas-and-leather front satchel by Chapman—also hand made in England.

The Brompton next to an "ordinary" (and excellent) folding bicycle, the Montague. The front wheel on the Montague must be removed before folding. The Brompton's wheels fold with it and enclose the drivetrain to prevent you getting dirty while carrying it.

While I’ve known about the company for years, we finally found the justification to spring for one on our last trip to Australia. Town-bound for several days while the Land Cruiser was being serviced, we needed exercise. Roseann runs but I can’t. We needed to shop for incidentals, and the town was large enough to require a rental car. Both issues would be eliminated with a bicycle small enough to store inside or on the roof of the Troopy. So once back in Sydney we visited the excellent, quirky Omafiets bicycle shop. One look at the folded Bromptons displayed in nooks on shelves was enough to nearly convince us; watching one of the employees—herself a Brompton owner—perform the origami trick in about ten seconds further convinced us, and a short ride was the clincher. (Watch here for a genuine pro Brompton folder.)

There was just one complication: After riding the Brompton around a bit, Roseann mused, “Hmm . . . maybe we need two?” It made perfect sense—with two we could bop around towns without wielding the bulky Troopy through traffic, and a pair would still easily ride on the roof in the compact, bespoke hard cases available for them. We decided to leave the green example we bought in Sydney with friends, and buy another back in the U.S. so I’d have time to play with it before shipping it with us on the next trip to Oz. Thus, from the folding specialists PortaPedal Bike in Tempe, Arizona, we picked up the second, this one in the total-Brompton-geek “Raw Lacquer” finish that leaves the brass brazing visible on the frame. 

So what’s it like to ride with those small 16-inch wheels? My friend Bruce summed it up perfectly: “Just like the difference between a motorcycle and a scooter.” Those who point out the “compromises” in the Brompton’s handling—which can be described as either “responsive” or “twitchy,” depending on your attitude, are missing the point. The Brompton is essentially a different genus of bicycle. Complaining about its characteristics would be like complaining because a non-folding bicycle (or any other folding bike of which I’m aware) wouldn’t fit in that overhead locker. 

In fact, it’s a blast to pedal. The riding position is no different from a standard bicycle; people do long-distance touring on these things. The same physics that make the steering so quick—low rotational inertia—also make acceleration zippy. As a result of both you can really scoot around in tight quarters. The high-pressure tires don’t absorb much impact, and given their diameter you need to be cautious to cross railroad and trolley trackes at a right angle, but the rear suspension block helps make the ride surprisingly comfortable. The only limitation in my experience so far is dirt roads and trails that aren’t very well-packed. You’ll sink. This is an urban machine.

The front rack mount accepts all sorts of bags, from small Ortlieb handlebar bags to satchels large enough for grocery shopping. And, cunningly, when half-folded the Brompton becomes its own shopping cart, with the front bag mounted and the bike riding on the small wheels of the rear rack. Aftermarket companies sell larger versions of these wheels to make this even easier.

Ah, the accessories. The international Brompton community can fairly be described as “enthusiastic,” from the universe of custom carbon-fiber and titanium parts to replace the standard items, to the famous Brompton World Championship: a race held in the UK during which all entrants must conform to a strict dress code (think bow ties, tuxedos, period military garb . . .). The lightweight parts have the practical benefit of reducing the already reasonable weight of the Brompton for ease of handling and carrying. Some are affordable and whittle away minutely at the total, or you can go insane and order such things as a complete carbon-fiber front clip and stem for around $1700, instantly doubling the price of the bike and knocking off a whole pound.

I’m leery of the term “lifestyle,” yet there is a sort of captivating aura around a bicycle you can pedal to a cafe, then fold up and carry inside. Every time I take my raw-lacquered Brompton out I feel like I should really be dressed in knickers, a black turtleneck, and a beret. For all its undeniable practicality, its the fun of a Brompton that makes it worth every cent.

And then there's all that hay and oats you don't have to buy.

The Brompton next to a modest 31-inch-tall BFG

Among many aftermarket options is this excellent, wheeled hard case.

And what's this in the top tube?

A clever, rattle-free (optional) tool kit held in with a magnet. It includes tire levers and patches. 

Originals versus copies

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I remember distinctly my reaction when I first laid eyes on a set of the then-brand-new and revolutionary MaxTrax recovery mats. 

It was something along the lines of, “Eew.”

Plastic sand mats? Orange plastic sand mats?

At the time I was still firmly in the traditional PAP (perforated aluminum planking) camp—they were good enough for the Camel Trophy, right? If anything, I leaned toward the massive Mantec Bridging Ladders—bulky, heavy, but fully capable of spanning a void as well as providing soft-substrate flotation. And either simply looked right bolted to the roof rack of a Defender or Troopy.

Finally, under duress, I tried a set of MaxTrax, sort of squinting to one side the whole time so I didn’t have to look directly at them. And, well, they worked. Not only did they work, they worked better in sand than anything I’d ever tried—the combination of light weight, easy handling via molded-in handholds, and aggressive molded-in cleats resulted in blindingly quick and easy extraction. If they happened to kick up they didn’t produce the awful banging of PAP, much less the potential sheet-metal damage of the Mantecs (which to be fair are rigid and heavy enough that kick-up is rare). Even when torturously overloaded and distorted they sprang right back into shape—as when, for example, we used several sets to help recover the BFGoodrich semi truck that got stuck in the mud at Expo West. 

Suffice to say I was converted—to the point that, when we installed a set on our recently purchased and extremely pukka Land Cruiser Troopy, I didn’t even bother with one of the available earth tones. Our set is proudly the original and instantly recognizable MaxTrax orange—and they look just fine.

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In the interim I discovered that MaxTrax work as well in mud as they do in sand (although a MaxTrax packed with mud quickly loses its “light weight” advantage), and that they don’t work very well on ice—devices with sharp metal edges seem to bite a bit better. But I still think they’re still the best-performing all-around traction device available.

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The single most common gripe about MaxTrax has been their premium price (“Three hundred dollars for plastic sand mats?”), so it was inevitable that someone would—let’s be diplomatic and say replicate—the design and charge less. And several companies have done just that. The copies range from near-clones of good quality that sell for 20 to 30 percent less than the original, to absolute rubbish available for a third the price.

I’ll be honest up front and say that I find this business model extremely distasteful. Call it arbitrary prejudice, pointless idealism, or admirable moral high ground, per your own philosophy, but I’m firmly in John Ruskin’s camp on the issue. And considering MaxTrax versus competitors, I have some personal experience to reinforce the axiom that you get what you pay for. While that experience is by no means comprehensive enough to be considered statistically significant, I have never broken or even cracked a MaxTrax device, but I’ve now broken or been present at the breaking of no fewer than five lower-priced competitors.

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Why is this? Two potential reasons rise to the top. First, it’s possible that my experience is purely coincidental, and that a MaxTrax would also have broken if one had been in use in place of any or all of the units that failed. There is no way to confirm this—even side-by-side field testing cannot control for minute variations in stress. However, it’s also possible that the construction and the material used in the MaxTrax is superior, and less likely to fail under extreme conditions. MaxTrax are made from reinforced nylon, a material I have yet to find listed on any competitor’s product sheet. There’s polyolefin, polypropylene, and simply, mysteriously, “plastic.” Broadly speaking, “nylon” technically can refer to a number of polyamide thermoplastics, so the actual MaxTrax formula is difficult to specify (and no doubt a jealously guarded secret); however, Brad McCarthy, the creative force behind the company, told me it is a “mineral-filled, impact-modified, UV-stabilized Nylon 6.” 

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Whatever the proprietary formula, it’s obviously tough. Like all polymer traction products, you must exercise care not to spin your tires wildly when performing a recovery and climbing on to the MaxTrax—it’s possible to melt the cleats. If you do screw up, the MaxTrax has ramps at both ends, unlike some other products, so you can swap the leading edge. They even work pretty well upside down. (I note that the original discount copy and major competitor Tred now advertises a “pro” model with traction cleats claimed to be resistant to friction-induced melting—and a retail price higher than MaxTrax. An interesting approach.)

I don’t think less of those who choose to save on the purchase price and pick a copy of the MaxTrax. But for me, the original is worth the extra cost, both as a reward for imagining, developing, and proving the product in the first place—a massive investment—as well as for what I’ve concluded is arguably higher quality, which, as I’ve mentioned many times, often results in lower cost in the long run.

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The Troopy camper, continued

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A light-hearted comment from a reader regarding my use of the term “affordable” in the last post about our Land Cruiser Troopy led me to preface this one with a bit of background.

A decade ago Roseann and I had the idea to take the money we would have spent on, say, a new 4Runner, and instead refurbish a classic expedition vehicle—in that case a 1984 FJ60 Land Cruiser—with a modern turbodiesel engine and five-speed transmission, Old Man Emu suspension, and ARB diff locks. The result, after we re-engineered some egregious flaws in the original engine/transmission swap hack job done by a prestigious California company, was remarkable: a comfortable, capable FJ60 that had 40 percent more power than stock yet exceeded 25mpg on the highway. And since we had started with a straight and rust-free but tired FJ60 puchased for just $5,000, the total cost actually came in well under the sticker of a new 4Runner. And as you can imagine got a lot more attention.

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There are some obvious downsides to this concept. First, no matter how much refurbishing you do (short of a mega-dollar frame-off restoration), you’re still dealing with an old vehicle capable of concealing potential problem areas despite a thorough pre-purchase inspection—and you won’t have a 50,000-mile bumper-to-bumper warranty to fall back on. (On the other hand you’ll be dealing with a simpler vehicle with fewer advanced systems to fail . . .) Second, no bank is going to loan you funds sufficient to purchase a new 4Runner once you admit you’re actually planning to spend it on a 25-year-old Land Cruiser. You’ll have to have the money in hand, or figure out alternative financing (or plan on a gradual refurbishment process). Finally, securing full-coverage insurance for a vehicle you insist is worth five times its Blue Book value will be challenging. You’ll need to investigate classic-vehicle specialists. Nevertheless, we were delighted with the turbodiesel FJ60, and eager to try the same approach again. 

This time around our goal was more ambitious. We wanted to start with the vehicle we both feel is, all things considered, the best expedition machine on the planet, the Toyota Land Cruiser 70-Series Troop Carrier, or Troopy, powered by the company’s durable and efficient 1HZ overhead-cam diesel engine. With an excellent example secured for about $16,800 U.S. (see here), we were on our way. Next, we wanted to convert it to an efficient, self-contained camper which we could live out of comfortably for weeks or months on end if desired. This could easily have been accomplished by grafting on an oversized shell over the rear chassis, but neither of us wanted to do more than fractionally alter original lines of the vehicle, or risk the potential structural, handling, and GVWR issues of inflated non-stock bodywork—and doing so would have quickly blown through the target budget. So we limited surgical modifications to the excellent Mulgo pop-top roof conversion from the Expedition Centre in Sydney, which with a barely noticeable raising of the roofline gave us both full standing headroom and a full-size drop-down bed. Further initial modifications addressed fluid storage and outdoor shade (read here).

Next, Roseann sketched plans on her iPad Pro for interior cabinetry, using the experience gained with ownership of two Four Wheel Campers and several iterations of more basic camp setups. This was the most critical part of our modifications: Roseann likes to cook no matter where she is on the planet, so a well-stocked galley was mandatory. And we like to have as much luggage and equipment as possible stored in closed lockers rather than simply strapped down and visible to passers by.

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With some guidelines from Daniel at the Expedition Centre, who has overseen many such conversions, the layout included a bench on the passenger (left) side of the vehicle, to maintain rear-quarter visibility from the driver’s seat, and a galley and cabinet/drawer stack on the driver’s side, which, uniquely, included provisions for our Kanz Kitchen chuck box/stove so that it could be used in situ, or removed and set up on its legs outside, comprising along with the drop-down Front Runner tailgate table and Eezi-Awn Bat 270 awning an outdoor kitchen for fair-weather cooking.

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Also specifed by Roseann were two flat roller drawers, each securing a Wolf Pack cargo box containing kitchen supplies and basic foodstuffs. With the Wolf Packs pulled out and stacked near the Kanz she would have a complete kitchen with an unobstructed view (one of her—very few—complaints about our Four Wheel Camper is that its fixed galley necessitates cooking inside even in nice weather). The only fixed interior kitchen item would be the sink, fed with a pressure pump from the chassis-mounted 90-liter water tank. When cooking outdoors, water is available via the ingenious Nemo Helio, an air-pressurized water delivery system for shower or galley, with a 2.9-gallon capacity. The National Luna Weekender fridge-freezer, locked down crosswise just inside the rear doors, would be accessible from either inside or outside with its hinges configured longitudinally.

Next, Daniel sent CAD images of the plans, done to exact dimensions, and with the details sorted, we sent the okay to start construction.

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Critical last-minute tests of cabinet fit.

All this planning was done with measurements, drawings, and instinct, and organized from 6,000 miles away, so we had some apprehension until we saw the finished product installed. And one night’s use was enough to lay all doubts to rest. Cozy? Yes—but both of us could sit inside while one cooked if it was frightful outside and we wanted to be buttoned up. Storage space was simply massive—we were stunned at how much of our gear disappeared inside the side and front bench and cabinets. Total time to pitch camp, including raising the roof, deploying and staking down the awning, setting out the folding table that stores cunningly in a slot in the bench, and setting out our Kermit chairs, was under 10 minutes.

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Is it without compromise? No. It’s still the back of a stock-bodied Land Cruiser Troopy, not the interior of a 25-foot Airstream. The comfortable dinette of our FWC is missing: Although two can eat inside sitting on the benches and sharing the slide-out table, there are no backrests, and the neck-height ledge running down both sides of the back above the windows—the support for the bed when it’s dropped—precludes leaning back very far anyway. With the bed deployed there is only a two-foot-wide standing/climbing-up space between the back of it and the back of the vehicle, just enough room for one person to dress or undress. But these are mere quibbles when you consider we’ve constructed a home away from home completely contained inside an expedition vehicle of towering strength, reliability, and capability.

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This photo shows the wood front of the Kanz closed; it is dropped for cooking.

In terms of workmanship, the plywood cabinetry is of very good, void-free quality, but standard five-ply construction. Screw holes are filled, corners rounded, and shut lines uniform. In a perfect (and much more expensive) world I’d have had them made from multi-ply Baltic birch and had the drawers finger-jointed or dovetailed; however they look handsome as is and should be perfectly durable.

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The Kanz on its legs plus Wolf Packs comprise a complete outdoor kitchen. Roseann is recognizable by the spotted headscarf and numerous bits of weaponry on her belt.

Systems management is dealt with in two locations. In the face of the cabinet under the sink are a level gauge for the water tank and a power meter for the batteries (as well as the rocker switch for the faucet, which is on-or-off and could be improved with a variable-pressure control). And behind the driver’s seat is a recessed compartment containing the charge controller for the solar panel, a fuse panel, the easily replaceable water pump, and the hard-mounted ARB Twin compressor. There is room left over for the air hose and chuck for the compressor, and a tire repair kit. 

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Our best gauge for the success of a camp setup is that after several days out, when we take a break at a nice hotel to see a town and do laundry and shopping, we find ourselves missing the camp. That has definitely been the case with the Troopy after a tour of southern Australia and a loop through Tasmania. 

What’s next? We’ll be leaving the vehicle with Daniel again for some odds and ends: security bars for the windows, a center console yet to be designed, storage and ready access for our binoculars.

On a more major scale, the aftermarket rear springs, which were on the vehicle when we bought it, are not quite managing to hold up to the additional weight of our modifications. There’s a barely noticeable sag when fully laden with fuel and water, and neither of us can tolerate any sag. So we’ll be investigating options. I’d also like to have an ARB locker in the rear axle, since factory lockers were sadly not fitted to this particular Troopy. The brakes, despite being discs on all four corners, could use improvement. Other than that, there is very little we feel would actually enhance the vehicle.

How about the budget target? Going back to our 4Runner comparison, the current base list on a mid-range 4Runner, the TRD Off Road, is $37,335. We are just a touch above that now—including the vehicle, pop top conversion, solar panel, water tank, Kaymar rack, all the interior work, all the systems controls, and numerous odds and ends, we have spent $38,930. However, next I'll detail the addition of a pair of decidedly optional bits that will move us up closer to 4Runner Limited territory. (#recaro . . .) 

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