FWC Camper - The Problem With Turnbuckles

My FWC (Four Wheel Camper) is held down to the truck bed by 4 turnbuckles.  

The turnbuckles that came from the camper are aluminum with steel hooks. Above 

There are many complaints about the factory turnbuckles on social media that echo my problems.  They loosen while driving is the biggest concern.  A loose turnbuckle is frustrating as the camper shifts in the truck bed.

Note: I added the nut on the left of the turnbuckle above to help lock the turnbuckle from unwinding.  There should be one nut on both sides of the turnbuckle, but the turnbuckles have one right hand thread hook and the other side left hand thread.  The single nut did help with loosing, but they eventually did loosen.

Above is an Amazon screen capture

This is my third year with the camper so I decided to replace the factory turnbuckles with all steel ones with backup nuts on both sides, based on posts from other FWC owners.

I have four of the two doors in the picture above to access the turnbuckles. The one to the left (rear of camper) is the easiest to access to fix the turnbuckle. 

Above is a picture of the turnbuckle bottom connection on the rear truck mount.

Rear top turnbuckle connection

The two front door turnbuckle (above) have to be put in and tightened using feel only, as you can’t see the mounting location while installing.  To install you need to lay on your belly and extend one arm in and set and tighten the turnbuckle.

Above picture shows the turnbuckle as it is off to the side of door opening.

Above I have the camera facing the front turnbuckle near the front of the truck bed.

In order to tighten the turnbuckle it works best with putting a small tool between the turnbuckle bars.

Initially I tried to tighten the backing nuts with an open wrench.  The wrench would slide off the nut and I would have to find the nut and put wrench in again.  It was a big pain.

I then tried a tubing wrench to tighten the backing nut. The wrench didn’t slip off, but since the space inside where turnbuckle is located is not large enough to rotate the wrench, I had to take the wrench off and rotate it to tighten more.  I kept doing this until but was tight.  This was a pain too but better than open end wrench.

Above is an Amazon screen capture

Then I found this ratchet head tubing wrench with articulating head.  Now I can not slide off the nut and I can ratchet tighten the nut without repositioning the wrench and where the space is narrow, I can bend the wrench.

I have told people about the turnbuckle problem as it isn’t easy to do and can be frustrating, but now with locking turnbuckles and a tubing wrench that ratchets and bends, it is much better to set and tighten the turnbuckles.

This is a big relief!

Brent

macaloney@hotmail.com