My Truck Build – What Would A Geek Do

My Goals

Originally I wanted my truck to look and feel stock as much as possible, with a few little features and protections for the trails. I wanted to be able to use it as a truck, and not have it be a single purpose vehicle. The truck needs to be versatile and be useful for a variety of purposes. I should be able to add or remove components easily, be ready to camp with short notice, and be able to haul a bunch of stuff without having to unbolt a ton of things.

Eventually I caved and installed the GFC and multiple bolt-ons, but I’m still able to load up the bed of the truck with cargo. I’ve used it to haul wood, to move furniture, and for many months used it as a work truck hauling tools and supplies out to my boat while I worked on it. Being able to load up a large amount of gear and lock it has been great. I have suffered some mileage from the added surface area of the camper, as well as the beefier tires I installed, but it still rides great and performs well.

For the time being, I’m not lifting the truck so I can still keep it in my garage. So far, the stock ride height has been fine on the trails I’ve been on and I still have 2″ of clearance left when pulling into the garage. It’s a tight fit, but it works and my truck stays much cleaner and cooler having the shelter of the garage.

How it Began

Like many others during the COVID pandemic, I found myself restless and looking for ways to get out of the house and to explore. I live next to the desert in the southwestern part of Las Vegas, so the area is ripe for exploration. First I considered a motorcycle, then started looking at used Jeeps, and finally used Tacomas. I liked the idea of having a truck since they’re so versatile, and having had one in the past I missed the ride height and the feel.

I can’t recall quite how I discovered overlanding, or the Vegas Overlanding group, but once I saw the fun they were having I knew I wanted to be a part of it. I’d been wanting to camp for a long time but hadn’t had many opportunities. Further, I didn’t enjoy large campgrounds with screaming children or 20-somethings partying into the wee hours. I wanted smaller groups, more seclusion, and experiencing things that few others had.

After researching used vehicles, I realized they were very far more expensive than I’d expected. That led me to looking at new options which honestly weren’t that much more and included a warranty. I had driven an automatic Tacoma a few years prior as a rental vehicle, and found it to be a bit sluggish so I decided I’d get a manual transmission. This was a second vehicle after all, and I’d enjoyed driving a stick shift when given the chance. Finally I’d settled on a White 2021 Tacoma TRD Off-Road with a 6-speed manual transmission.

Less than a month later was my first outing with Vegas Overlanding on a weekend trip to Gold Butte. This was where I first met @kadenventures, @makethemostofthedash, and @mojitoadventures.

Talking to everyone, the advice I got was that I should invest in armor before anything else, and that my stock height should be fine for most of what the group would be doing. Not long after, I invested in some rock sliders from Cali Raised, and also picked up a pair of their ditch lights too. I’ll admit, I’ve only used the ditch lights a handful of times, but they are useful when wheeling at night.

Fast forward a bit, and I’ve done a few small mods like Seat Jackers, the Dashtop Multi Mount from Seat Jackers, dual-color LED interior lights from Meso Customs, and a Mountain Hatch tailgate . So far everything has been a quality of life improvement, and nothing too expensive.

For many of my trips, we would often stay in a new location each night, so I often had to set up and tear down. An August trip to Canyonlands was going to be multiple days of this, so I decided I wanted either a rooftop tent or a camper like the GFC. I considered finding a setup where I could lift a rooftop tent off the truck in the garage to store it so I wouldn’t have to drive around with a tent all of the time, but it seemed too complicated and I worried I wouldn’t have the space. I liked the idea of the camper since it meant I could store more things in the back of the truck and could lock it. Being able to stand was another bonus. Finally I ordered the camper and started to prepare for it.

I figured I’d probably want a roof rack to help deflect some of the air away and to add more storage space, so I went with Sherpa’s Animas rack. I’d also heard stories about the Tacoma’s composite bed flexing with heavy loads and off-roading, so I opted for Total Chaos’s bed stiffeners. I followed some tutorials and posts online and sealed up the bed as much as I could so I could reduce the amount of dust that came in once the camper was on. Now it was time to head north to Montana to pick up the camper!

First night in the GFC. I camped in West Yellowstone.

Not long after I added an Overland Vehicle Systems Nomadic 270 awning. I wanted to be able to remove it easily, so I paired it with three RacksBrax removeable mounts. This setup has been great, and while it’s not something that should be done with one person, installing or removing with the RacksBrax makes it very easy to do with two.

At this point I had purchased an Iceco JP30 electric refrigerator and had it paired with a small Jackery 240. This worked fine for shorter trips, but the Jackery 240 wasn’t enough to handle longer trips or hotter weather. I decided I needed a better battery solution, and I wanted something that would charge off of the alternator automatically. I installed a 100ah LiFePo4 battery and a RedArc BCDC1225 DC-DC charger behind the rear passenger seats. This worked great, and kept the fridge running without any problems, but I had to keep the fridge in the back seat and I was conflicted trying to find a decent way to run power to the truck bed.

My friend Jags from RTE called me up asking if he could use my GFC for a bit to get the dimensions. Absolutely I said, and the next thing you know and I’ve got the first prototype of their Power Wall Elite installed in the back of my truck.

The Power Wall Elite was an awesome piece of kit. A large 200ah Lithium battery, RedArc components including their new Alpha 50R, and 2000 watt inverter. The Alpha has a lot of great bells and whistles, just like their previous BCDC line, but now it can even charge your starter battery for you, and cleanly integrates with their TVMS Rogue and RedVision system. This had all the reserve power I’d need, the ability to charge off the alternator at a very high rate, support for solar, electronic switching, multiple sensors, and a beefy enough alternator to run most anything I’d want. It’s only a few inches deep too, so it hardly takes up any space and the cargo area of the truck is still free to load up.

I was asked to join the RTE team at Overland Expo Mountain West 2025. I had a few projects in mind already to take advantage of the new Powerwall Elite, but now with a deadline I had to hurry up and get them done. The first two were to extend power to the business end of the truck – the tailgate! This is where I do most of my work, whether it be cooking or fixing something. On the right I added a 6′ extension cord with a flat angled plug that works nicely with the Inverter. I wrapped it in split look and zip-tied it under the accessory rails to keep it tucked and out of the way. On the left I used a project box and a couple of Blue Sea Systems 12v accessory outlets and a PowerWerx Anderson PowerPole outlet. Each of the three outlets are tied directly to the TVMS Rogue to take advantage of the full 10 amp output.

I chose these types of outlets because they offer a ton of flexibility. 12v accessory outlets (cigarette lighters for you old-schoolers) are very standard, and most fridges, fans, electric blankets, chargers, etc., will work with them. You might ask why there are no USB charging ports, and that’s because those standards tend to change over time. Why constantly change from USB to USB-Mini, to USB-Micro, or USB-C outlets when you can buy a $15-20 12v charging adapter off of Amazon that supports whatever the latest format is? As for the Anderson PowerPole, that’s a format popular with the Ham Radio crowd, but works great for any sort of custom 12v project you might have. The connectors are color-coded, alignment is simple, and they lock securely into place. They’re very easy to work with, but do require a special crimping tool to make the connectors. I’ve used these for all of my connections to the TVMS Rogue so it’s easy to swap or replace connections as needed.

The final three were fairly simple. I added a dedicated power connection for Starlink, using an adapter that outputs the necessary voltage it requires. I didn’t want to worry about a series of adapters coming loose or having to hack up existing power supplies, and the device was pretty cheap. I added a dedicated fire extinguisher in the truck bed with a quick disconnect from the holder. Previously I kept a smaller extinguisher in a tote with dog items (water bowls, leash, leads, extra food and snacks), but felt this was a better location for it and liked the larger capacity of this one. Finally I added the Bed Mat, which looks great and makes it a far more comfortable surface to sit on or hang out in.

Gear List

Here’s a nearly complete list of upgrades or components I’ve used for my truck.