Off Grid Trailer’s Expedition 2.0

I started my search for an off road trailer back in 2017 when I decided that life was leading me more into the overland style of adventures vs the rock crawling that I had been doing in the past. In those early days I was looking for a rugged off road cargo trailer with a kitchen and a roof top tent (RTT) to sleep in.

The very first overland trip that I did, Three Generations In Death Valley, show the necessity for an offroad trailer for the style of trips I knew I would be doing. With three people and 7+ days of remote travel planed, there was simply just not enough room in my Jeep Wrangler for us and all the gear. There was also the issue of enough space for us all to sleep.

I was lucky enough to find a local off roader that had a trailer that he would rent me for a very reasonable price. It was made out of an old Jeep CJ tub and had a RTT mount. It was nothing fancy, but get got the job done and made our trip much easier.

I ended up using this same trailer on a later trip up through Wyoming and Montana. Those early trips helped me refine what I wanted out of an overlanding trailer. First and foremost was an enclosed cargo area. Dealing with dust and mud every time you setup and tear camp gets old really fast! At this point I was still looking at RTT models like the Turtleback Expedition and Nuthouse Industries’ Peanut trailers.

One of my main issues with that style of trailer was the cost. They are very well made and had everything I wanted in a trailer, but for $20k~$30k I was still going to be sleeping in a tent and would still need to have another tent on top of the Jeep if more people were traveling with us. My wife also was not keen on spending that kind of money to sleep in a tent. It did not help that she kept seeing full blown camper trailers in that price range that came with a real bed, bathroom and even damn fireplaces! It was a tough battle, but in the end I stuck to my motto of “When camping, you are supposed to leave the house at home” and we continued to look for a smaller overlanding trailer that checked all of our boxes. Enter the Off Grid Trailers Expedition 2.0.

Some of the key features of the Exp 2.0 are its all metal construction, suspension, full kitchen and shower with hot water. It also sleeps two inside on the queen sized bed, two or three up top in the RTT. You can even sleep more people if your RTT has an annex room. The frame is made from powder coated engineered 4-inch C-channel frame construction. Everything above the frame is made from aluminum, except for the floor. That is made from a waterproof, mold/mildew resistant ThermoLite SpaceAge Synthetics flooring material. This type of construction leads to a very light trailer as well, just 1800lbs dry. It has a Max GVW of 3500lbs.

The suspension is a Timbren 3500HD axle-less suspension (4 inch lift) with 12-inch Electric Brakes. These have great articulation and ground clearance (21 inches) and can fit 35″ tires. The only drawback to this setup is that you can not get hubs to match the 5×5 bolt pattern of the Jeep wheels. This requires you to get creative if you want to match the wheels and tires between the trailer and your Jeep. I’ll have separate write up on that in the future. The suspension and angled back of the trailer give it a very impressive 50° departure angle!

The full kitchen is broken down into two parts. The first part is a stainless steel fold down two burner stove and the sink. These live just behind the passenger side wheel.

The water lines are connected full time, so after you pull the kitchen down all you have to do is turn them on right there at their controls. The propane line for the stove is also connected full time, but you need to open the valve on the 10lb propane take on the other rear corner of the trailer to get gas to the stove. The sink just drains out the bottom, but there are a few options to manage that. I’ll be covering the method I chose in an upcoming article.

In the above photo you can also see the round Bluetooth stereo controller. They actually moved that in the 2020 models as it bumps up against the weather sealing of the kitchen box and turns on when you close the kitchen up.

The other part of the kitchen is the slide out 60L Dometic fridge freezer (it is not a dual compartment, so you either have a fridge or a freezer). It is in the Front Box, in front of the trailer door.

The whole setup makes for a nice place to cook your meals and since most campsite have the fire ring on the side, having the kitchen located on the side instead of the back keeps you connected with what is going on in camp.

One of the options for this trailer is the 23Zero 270° awning. What is unique about this awning is that not only does it extend around the back, but there is also a section that extends to the front to mostly cover your fridge area. I say mostly because according to 23Zero, that section is not supposed to open up a full 180° so that it stays inline with the main part of the awning. So if you want full coverage over the fridge, you have to sort out a solution your self.

You also end up with a similar gap in coverage on the back side of the trailer, but that is mostly mitigated when the rear storage area (where most of us store or kitchen and dry food items) door is up.

The on demand hot water heater and shower are on the opposite side of the trailer, again behind the wheels. There are a few options for a shower room. If you have a RTT with an annex, you can deploy that off the driver’s side and it could server as your shower/bathroom. That gives you a lot of room, but it does have the draw back of having to deploy the whole RTT. If you were base camping in one spot for an extended time, that would be a great option. The other option is a 23Zero shower room. This mounts right to the side of the trailer roof rack and allows you to deploy a much smaller, but still usable, shower room off the side. Off Grid Trailers makes their own special mounting bracket if you need to have both your RTT and 23Zero shower room deployed at the same time.

The interior of the trailer is one large sleeping area. It comes with a nice queen size mattress that is quite comfortable. The walls are all white, making it nice and bright inside when the LED lights are turned on. The back wall has two gigantic storage compartments, the trailer’s control panel and an optional TV with mount (we did not get this option).

The basic trailer does not come with any shelves in the interior besides the two large built in ones, but the newer 2020 models have several options to add them. I just installed some stick on shelves that have worked great for holding cell phones and wallets. I’ve also got some folding drink holders, but I’ve not installed those yet.

On the other side of the Front Box from the fridge is a storage shelf and the battery box. The trailer comes standard with dual Group 31 deep cycle batteries. These can be charged by plugging into shore power, the 7 pin connector to your tow vehicle, and they are are also solar ready with a built in Zamp solar port. Various other electronic and power devices also occupy this area of the Front Box. The top shelf on this side holds the Dometic 5g portable toilet nicely.

We are really happy with our decision to purchase the Expedition 2.0 by Off Grid trailers and we can foresee many great trips in our future using this trailer. If you have any questions about it, please leave them in the comment section down below and I’ll be sure to answer them. If you think you might want to purchase one of these great trailers, shoot me a note and I can save you $500 on it.