On a roadtrip where you don’t have a planned itinerary, and can’t say for sure where you’ll end up every night (or any night), it’s important to have options. Mostly, options on sleeping arrangements. You can’t always find a place to throw down a tent, and you can’t always find a campground. Knowing this, Tracy and I hatched a plan to build a sleeping platform for the car. Sleeping platforms are very common in trucks and vans with the vandwelling and permanently nomadic, but much less common in SUV’s. We borrowed ideas from a lot of different research and put together a plan. The first step was to visualize the thing. After some measurements, I set out to build and model the structure in 3D to make sure we knew what fittings we’d need.
Right. After that, sourcing the fittings was the tough part. We ended up getting most of them online, and having them shipped up. On Friday a couple weeks ago, I picked up the PVC we needed and we set to work to bring the thing to life. Saturday morning we rented a mitre saw for the day, and set about making our (very carefully measured) cuts, and assembling for a dry-fit as we went. It actually came together remarkably quickly given all the planning we did, which I’m quite grateful for.
Time for a test-fit! Everything came together great and it fit perfectly in the back of the car. We were thrilled with the storage capacity we’d have under the platform, and it looked sturdy enough to hold us without issue.
That’s the supports done- on to the platform to support us. The plan was to make two side-by-side plywood platforms that would have swing-out extensions to match each of our heights. This was necessary because the platform couldn’t be long enough to accommodate full sleeping-height when the seats are in a good driving position. When we’re in sleep-mode we can move the seats forward, fold out the extensions, and have enough room to stretch out without issue. The platforms were cut, covered in fleece to protect the car and our thermarests, given their hinges, and loaded in.
Now that we had everything assembled, it was time to properly test the whole thing out in both sleeping mode, and in travel mode. First check was for storage fitment, and then a check to make sure everything works in travel-mode. 
Looks like we’re set! We were both thrilled at how well this all came together, and we’re excited about how it’ll serve us on the road.
Best of all, disassembly and storage, if needed, is super easy, and the thing packs up to nothing- We’ll be relying on this on the first leg west, because we’ll have Avery’s kennel with us.
Until next time!