When getting your vehicle set up for camping trips away you need to consider building your own set of Rear drawers.

To begin building your rear drawers you need to start by measuring the available space in the rear of your vehicle. Taking into account the most narrow width between your wheel arches, as well as any fastening points on the floor of your vehicle, such as tie down points or child restraint anchors and even bolt holes for the rearmost seats.

With all of these measurements taken, it is time to draw up your plans, by penciling out your idea you will be able to iron out a lot of the difficulties you may encounter when you start building. The best way to build your drawers is to begin by heading to the local hardware store and grabbing yourself some plywood panels to fit the  space along with heavy duty brackets, enough extra plywood to build the actual drawer units and a set of heavy duty soft close drawer runners, latches, metal tie down points, and marine carpet to line the inside of the drawers and to coat the top of the drawers to make them neat and tidy.

With all of your bits and bobs together you can begin building the “chassis” of your drawer system, this will consist of a top a bottom and a central support piece and when complete should resemble 2 pidgeon hole boxes next to one another, as these are the central support of your whole drawer system, you must ensure they are stable and sturdy, we recommend affixing plenty of right angle metal supports to ensure the setup is rigid! 

When these boxes have been constructed you can begin to build your internal drawers. Factoring in the width of the drawer sliders into the design it is also important to consider the location of your latching mechanisms and extra clearance you may require to allow the drawers to slide in and out smoothly, as well as the size of any handles (to prevent damaging your vehicles rear door trim.

The Drawer frame is built and now needs to be fastened to the floor of your vehicle, we recommend that you use the threaded fastener holes you took note of before and fasten the whole drawer system to the bottom of your vehicle, this will prevent it bouncing, and also counterbalancing as you open the drawers later.

With your drawers built and drawer frame fastened to your vehicle, you can begin to install the sliders. It’s important to make sure the sliders are square and level, and affixed to the frame using sturdy fasteners, we’ve found that due to the heavy duty nature of 4WD accessories these must have an extremely high to be able to carry the weight of not only the drawers and their components, but withstand the rigors of dirt road corrugations and rough tracks without failing or jamming shut.

Your drawers are almost looking like a bought set now, with the latches and carpet the only thing left to complete. The latches must be able to hold the fully loaded drawers shut, and this has led to many people using a range of different systems to secure the drawers into place for transit.

Finally you are left to cover the whole thing in marine carpet, this can be messy but is worth the hassle as it will deaden any loud echoes created by having a large flat surface in the back of your vehicle. We recommend cutting your marine carpet a bit large and using a strong spray adhesive to affix the carpet firmly to your drawers. With the carpet stuck down, you can take a sharp knife and cut off all the excess around the edges. And voila, with just about a weekend worth of work your rear drawers are complete with sliders and all.

Alternatively….

You can head into any Adventure Kings store or approved dealer and pick yourself up a set of Titan Rear Drawers– they are purpose built, boasting a strong galvinised steel chassis, roller bearings all around, already covered with marine carpet, and can be installed with just a few simple hand tools in an hour or two, with a wing infill kit available for most wagons and even a “universal kit” for ute trays, to store away all of your 4wd and camping accessories when you hit the tracks, best of all the include metal locking latches, heavy duty tie downs, and all double drawers include a latching fridge slide straight out of the box to make sure you can always access your favorite refreshing beverages!

Instead of spending all your time and effort building your own heavy and clunky wooden rear drawers, grab yourself a set of Titan Rear Drawers for proven quality and easy installation for organization on the tracks!