Roof Top Tent Install Hoist

This project is currently on hold.

Vanultra created the first prototype in May 2023 for Overland Expo West and show cased the prototype hoist at the expo. The fully functional unit was able to lift a roof top tent up 8 feet high and lower it down to 2 feet from the ground. The system is controlled by one input, a worn gear winch, located at the side of the frame. The output of the winch is 4 vertical independent cable ends with carabiners for clipping in four corners of the tent, ensuring that the tent remains level and stable during lifting and lowering. The winch has an optional drill attachment for quickly and easily raising and lowering the tent at the push of a button.

The RTT Install Hoist received very positive feedback at the expo and gathered a lot of interest from other companies and RTT owners. The hoist was featured by Kelly and Trevor from Adventure Build in this video.

The key benefit of this hoist system is the ability for anyone to safely, quickly and easily install their roof top tent by themselves without throwing out their back, getting a hernia or damaging their vehicle. This means that you no longer have to bribe your friends and neighbors with beer and pizza for them to come over and install or remove your roof top tent.

An additional benefit of the stand alone design is the ability to easily move the tent from one vehicle to another, or from vehicle to trailer. Simply clip in and lift the tent, drive away, then pull the trailer straight forward and reinstall.

With the stand alone frame design, full size vehicles, included lifted trucks with oversized tires can drive right up to the frame. Typically, these vehicles cannot pull into garages to utilize a garage hoist system because most garage doors are only 7 feet tall. Which eliminates most modified overland vehicles.

After building the prototype, the Vanultra team quickly realized that the company was not ready to sell such a large product. A product of this scale requires to ship freight on a pallet ($500) rather than UPS ground. The frame system weighs roughly 300 pounds, and the uprights are 9 feet long.

Vanultra also learned that the price point for this product is higher than the average RTT owner can afford. The raw materials alone cost more than $1,000. After manufacturing, welding, paint and mark up, the product would need to cost $2,000 or more for the product to be profitable. For these reasons, the team decided to put this project on hold and rethink the hoist.

On December 2023, the project was restarted. Based on lessons learned, the team worked on creating a Build Kit eliminating the need to ship large oversized raw materials, greatly reducing the cost of the system. By focusing on the key components necessary for the hoist to function properly, the team is creating a kit with special hardware including gussets, mounting brackets, pulley brackets, pullies, and hardware. The goal is that RTT owners can source their own steel tubes from local hardware stores and cut them to specific lengths detailed in the kit step-by-step instructions. With the hard parts supplied by Vanultra, the hoist can be constructed at home by the average overlander with entry-level mechanical skills. The kit is targeted to be a bolt together product once the raw materials for the frame have been sourced and cut to length.

The team is currently redesigning the system so common raw materials can be used. Additionally, after receiving feedback from nearly 100 interested Overlanders, the team is aiming to make the system collapsible for storage when not in use. We plan to continue working back on this soon.

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