Pop-up Mods/Wish List

I have had a few people asking me about things that would be nice to have and modifications we want to do to our new-to-us pop-up. We would like to get a couple of cheap things done before July's camping madness (12 nights booked in July!) but since we are on a budget we'll have to pace ourselves. Here is a list of modifications we'd like to do as well as things that are on our wish list.

Lighting
One thing we noticed last trip was that we couldn't run the lights in the camper because we were afraid of draining the battery. With a deep cycle RV battery you should keep it above 12.06v and we had no idea if we were close to that. So I went on Ebay and purchased some LED light bulbs to replace all 10 of the iridescent bulbs (inside and outside). These bulbs will draw MUCH less power and have a life expectancy of 20+ years so we'll never have to replace them.

Here's a pic of the outside porch light with the LED replacement. This was a 906 size bulb in "bright white). Inside bulbs are 1141's in "soft white". All 10 bulbs cost me about $30. We have a 2007 Fleetwood Niagara for reference.

Voltmeter

This will give us an active display of the battery life. I haven't installed something like this in years so it will take some time to refresh my memory but I'm pretty sure I can figure it out - especially with my husbands help. I'll post pics when we get it done. These are cheap - less than $10. I plan on purchasing one in the next week or so before we leave on our next trip since we'll be dry camping. 

Radial Tires 

The bias tires we have now were manufactured in 2008 so our best guess is they were put on in 2009 or 2010 and its time to replace them. They have some significant wear on the inside. Bias tires are great for rugged roads but you really shouldn't go too fast with them and we anticipate 65-70mph on the freeway through Oregon. So we'll have to purchase 2 radial tires before the coast. The spare tire that we have is already a radial. This will cost about $150-160 but we won't have to worry as much about speed and we'll make it through our 1300 mile trip. 

Replace Smoke Detector/Carbon Monoxide

This is a must. Ours had a fault and wouldn't stop beeping no matter what we did so we removed it. For now we are bringing a portable battery operated carbon monoxide detector with us. I'm looking for a good sale on a hard wired version we can install. Cost is about $45 to get a combo fire and carbon monoxide detector. 

Digital Thermostat

I really dislike the RV thermostat we have in our pop-up. It's clunky and super hard for me to turn on and off. It doesn't seem to have any correlation to the temperature settings. It was set on 70 last weekend but it felt 85+ in there. I think the digital thermostat in our house is simple and would be perfect to relocate to the pop-up. Then we could just get a new thermostat for our house - maybe a smart one with wifi that you can control remotely. Hopefully my husband isn't reading this. Just in case I am not including the cost information. :) This one will have to wait. 

Bike Storage

We want to bring our bikes but we seem to have run out of room in the back of the truck, especially with the big bike trailer. We know what bike rack we want but we need about $250 which isn't in the budget right now. We also can't decide if we should mount it on the truck hitch and buy a dual receiver or if we should mount it on the back bumper of the pop-up. Still researching this one and hunting on craigslist for used options.

Bag Awning

We would love to have a 13ft Carefree Campout awning installed on our pop-up. After researching various bag awnings we feel like this one would be the best for us. Again, this is out of the budget with a price tag of nearly $400. 

Mattress Topper - Memory Foam

It's a well known fact that pop-up "mattresses" are not that comfortable. It's a very thin foam pad laid over some sheets of plywood. We have been searching for a king size memory foam mattress topper that we can trim a little bit to fit our bunk. The bunk is advertised as a king size but in reality its an RV king meaning a little bigger than a traditional queen but smaller than a king. One topper of decent density that is 3" thick runs about $175 on Amazon. This is another item that will have to wait. 

Outdoor Mat

I think having a large (at least 9ft x 12ft) outdoor mat would cut down on the amount of dirt we bring into the camper as well as give the girls a place to sit and play. These are about $60-$80. 

Pop Up Gizmos

These are solar end covers that help reflect heat to keep the inside cool or you can flip them the other direction and they keep the camper warm for cooler weather. They cost about $180 for all 3 covers (2 bunk ends and the slide out). 

Solar Panels

This is a total dream but eventually I would love a solar panel set up so we can boondock and not worry about power as much. I haven't even started looking or researching so I have no clue how much this mod will cost. 

I figure in total we have about $1500 in modifications and additional items we'd like to purchase to make things a little more comfortable and convenient. Yikes! As I said, most of these will have to wait or we'll keep looking for them used.