An eagle is among the largest birds of prey in the world. Ironically, Soaring Eagle Campers aims to manufacture the smallest, lightest truck campers possible. The company debuted basic hard-side and pop-up truck campers for half-ton truck drivers last September at the Elkhart Extravaganza . The company is developing a new truck camper line for lighter trucks.
Soaring Eagle’s new offerings are the Adlar 6.5 truck camper, the Adlar 6.5XL truck camper and the OV-X Truck Camper pop-up camper. An “Adlar” is another term for an eaglet.
Brisk Interest
According to co-founder Scott Tuttle, RV dealers that do not usually carry truck campers are ordering Soaring Eagle campers to fill a fast-growing light truck camper market.
Tuttle was a Heartland RV and Livin Lite Recreational Vehicle founder and is an owner of Gen-Y Hitch.
Years after selling Livin Lite to Thor, he said that RV dealers continued to inquire about Livin Lite’s aluminum-constructed truck campers. After confirming inTech RV, Tuttle’s other RV manufacturing interest, had no plans to build truck campers, Tuttle received permission from his business partners to build them on his own. He partnered with Troy Andrews (former Livin Lite owner) and Scott Bradshaw to start Soaring Eagle Campers.
Manufacturers have been making larger and larger truck campers and leaving “behind folks looking for something basic,” Tuttle said, adding that most simple truck campers being constructed were made from wood.
Construction Elements
The Soaring Eagle Adlar 65 and Adlar 6.5XL flooring, sidewalls and roof are all made from tubular aluminum. The studs are 16 inches or less apart. The Adlar walls have smooth fiberglass on the outside and Azdel
composite wall board on the inside. The entire line is built to enable consumers to close a truck’s tailgate.
“This is a great advantage and allows the owners to utilize not only the backup cameras and sensors built into the tailgates of their trucks,” Tuttle said, “but also the steps that are built into many of today’s truck tailgates.”
The truck campers are fitted with composite dinettes with composite lids. The cabinets are residential-quality laminate.
The Adlar campers were made without plumbing or gas systems to answer consumers’ calls for a simpler camping option, Tuttle said.
The Adlar 6.5XL contains a 30-amp converter and room for batteries under the dinette. The electricity is optional on the 6.5. A microwave is standard.
Consumers can incorporate 160 to 400 watts of solar power, depending on the camper model. They can order the Soaring Eagle Adlar 6.5 and 6.5XL with an optional air conditioner.
Also optional for the Adlar 6.5 are a SereneLife portable toilet (included in the XL), portable Blackstone griddle and a Dometic CFF35 powered cooler.
The Soaring Eagle Adlar 6.5 XL weighs 1,200 pounds. The cabover contains an East-West bed or an optional North-South queen pull-out.
The Adlar 6.5 weighs 800 pounds and the dinette turns into a two-person bed.
Truck Topper
The Soaring Eagle OV-X pop-up boasts an aluminum frame that sits on top of truck rails like a cap rather than in the truck bed. The current model fits 5.5-foot-long truck beds and weighs 750 pounds. The company is planning to engineer models for trucks with 6.5-foot and 8-foot beds.
“(The OV-X) has gotten so much attention from people,” Tuttle said. “It blows your mind.”
According to Tuttle, truck owners can drive around town during the week with the OV-X installed and not lose any cargo room in the truck bed. Outdoors people, hunters and fishermen are very excited about the model’s potential, he said, because they have a comfortable place to sleep, room for equipment and can still pull a boat.
The OV-X comes standard with a water-resistant tent integrated with screened windows, a 74-inch by 78-inch cabover bed and an under-bed storage area with lift-strut storage for gear.
Consumers can include an optional powered cooler, a griddle, a solar system and a fan.
A Lighter Future
While most of the industry continues to provide for heavier trucks, Tuttle and the Soaring Eagle team are prototyping new models for lighter trucks such as the Toyota Tacoma, Ford Ranger, Nissan Frontier and the Jeep Gladiator truck.
“In the North American camping report, like 94 million people identified themselves as campers,” Tuttle said. “And out of those 94 million, some 60 million of them are tent campers. I have got to tell you that is perfect for us.”
Tuttle said many of those consumers already own half-ton or lighter trucks. For them, switching to a truck camper is easy “to take their family and do what they are already doing which is, again, kayaking and camping and having fun,” he said.
The new truck campers might stick with their truck camper or trade up to an RV in the future, he said, and that gives the company the opportunity to “pull new blood” into dealerships.
According to Tuttle, Soaring Eagle is mindful of slowly ramping up the company’s growth. He said the company expects to make its next shipments to already-enrolled dealers by June.
For more information about Soaring Eagle, click here.
