Pickup bed cover

[Shorty Cox]

I need your thoughts. I’ve got a 31.5 fbhs with the reese revolution pen box. This is my first fifth wheel. I was amazed at the amount of wind turbulence created in the bed of the pickup. It will lift an ice chest as well as wood blocks i use to place under the landing gears. The reese revolution hook up moves all pivot well above the top of the tow vehicle bed box sides. In other words, there is no movement within the pickup bed. With that in mind, i’m considering fabricating a bed cover that would set on the bed and under the fifth wheel well below the pivot point.
What is your thoughts on the topic and ideas on design? Or, am i just crazy?

Shorty

[tinlizzie23]

Could it be that the shape of the front cap on your 5er is directing a lot of wind down into the bed ? I have carried a multitude of things in my P/U bed, both in front of and behind the hitch, and not much of anything moves.

As for the cover you are thinking about making, if all your pivoting, both front-to-back and side-to-side, is above the bed rails, then I don't see why your idea wouldn't work. The only other thing that might decrease the turbulence would be a replacement tailgate that lets air through, like some of the bar or lattice types.

[Bird Dawg]

I would tend to agree that an open tail gate may be the solution. If you purchased the type with the cutout for hitching a 5th wheel you wouldn't necessarily have to put the tail gate down to hook up. I have even seen a couple of these with the option for the rear camera. I don't have any problems with turbulence when pulling our Pinnacle. We were thinking about a folding panel cover for the bed but we worried that on a tight turn we might hit the folded sections and instead we opted for a vinyl roll up cover. Haven't pulled with the new cover yet, so the jury is still out.

Fred

[3330]

Just so you know that Shorty isn't the only one that has noticed that stuff can be sucked out by the turbulence, I've noticed it with two of the three 5ers that I have owned. The first was a biggy, on the last trip of a move we lost a suitcase full of my wife's prized sweaters. Never found them. On the Montana we used last year I lost a cooler and had the cover on a folding chair ripped to shreds by the wind. So far on this trip I've finally gotten smart enough to not put anything more fragile or lighter than a big rock back there

[djalbrec]

I had the same problem with one of my 5th wheels. I noticed that the bottom of the fifth wheel was considerably higher than the bed rails of the truck, so I lowered my hitch one notch and never had another problem. You just need to make certain that you have enough clearance so that the camper doesn't hit the bed of your truck.