There are two tricks to camping more often: comfort and speed. Knowing that听you can cook and hang out in a protected area听lets you enjoy camping in less certain conditions. Being able to assemble a protected area quickly鈥攅ven in the dark鈥攎eans you can arrive at camp late听or set up a pop-up base camp during a pit stop. Enter the 270 awning. Add one of these to your car or truck, and I guarantee your next camping trip will be a lot easier.
Vehicle-mounted awnings have a couple key advantages over their freestanding counterparts. They鈥檙e faster to set up, have more stability听and resistance听to high winds, and don鈥檛 take up room inside your vehicle.
Unfortunately, vehicle-mounted awnings also come with some downsides. They tend to be expensive听and heavy, adding weight to the worst spot on your truck. If you don鈥檛 have a fancy roof rack, they can be challenging to mount. They can add noise听from both the wind听and rattles and squeaks. And听they鈥檙e exposed to the weather, so if your awning isn鈥檛 made well, it鈥檒l wear out awfully fast.
In other words,听it鈥檚 really important to find the right one. When I set out to build a Ford Ranger for our wedding trip to southern Baja and back last year, a听dream awning was high on my list of must-haves. It took me a while to find one that鈥檚 nearly perfect, and I learned a lot along the way.
Compared to a straight awning, which simply unfolds to form a rectangle covering one side听or the rear of your vehicle, a 270 awning听wraps around听the side and rear of your vehicle, providing听continuous coverage. Two hundred and seventy degrees may not sound听like a huge step up from 180, but having such a large area of unified coverage from sun and rain gives you way more space to unpack, cook, and hang out.听Think of it as your very own portable camping cabana.
Creating such a structure that also folds flat enough to carry it on the side of your vehicle gets complicated really fast. There are听multiple arms and hinges, a ton of fabric, poles, guylines, a storage bag, and a zipper. In other words: there are听multiple points of potential failure.
And that was the problem I ran into with the first 270 awning I tried, a ($688). One reason听that product is more affordable is its nonfreestanding design鈥攖he awning听requires vertical poles to support each horizontal arm. The poles adjust in length through an internal twist-to-tighten cam; screw them clockwise to loosen, slide the outer pole over the inner pole to find the right height, and twist counterclockwise to tighten. But听the very first time I set up the Rhino-Rack in the driveway, that mechanism broke. I had to remove the entire pole assembly from the awning, disassemble it, refit the cam, and remount the pole. The whole process took 20 minutes听and a fair amount of swearing. With practice, I got that time down to ten minutes. Better, but still pretty听annoying given that the thing broke every time I set up the awning.
On my first camping trip with the Rhino-Rack, I discovered another problem. If my tires splashed any mud into the awning鈥檚 zipper, it would jam shut, requiring a blast with a hose to clean it before the zipper would听work again. I鈥檝e never been happier about the ten-gallon water tank and听extra-long听hose I carry in my truck than I was on that first night, after dark, in the pouring rain. I may have soaked myself to the bone in the process, then had to dismantle, repair, and refit a support pole听and听stake down guylines, but half an hour later, I did have a nice,听dry spot to hang out.
Thirty minutes isn鈥檛 quick. And pulling out tools in the dark isn鈥檛 convenient. So, for my next attempt at fitting an awning to my truck, I created a list of wants: something that wouldn鈥檛 fall apart, was fast and easy to set up and put away, and didn鈥檛 require support legs, at least in very mild conditions.
A recommendation from a friend led me to the . At $1,300, it鈥檚 considerably more expensive than the Rhino-Rack, but it also comes from a South African brand that鈥檚 synonymous with high-quality overland gear. It ticked all my boxes听and came with a bonus: at just 46 pounds, it鈥檚 the lightest 270 awning out there.
Instead of cheap steel tubes, the Bat 270听uses boxed aluminum for its arms and legs, which weigh a lot less. And听while the awning is capable of standing on its own in mild weather, poles hide inside the arms that allow you to support the awning when听needed. The poles include external knobs for length adjustment, and they hold the awning down听rather than听up,听since enormous fabric structures act like sails in the wind. Where other awnings rely on guylines, the Bat 270 requires you to simply pound stakes through holes in the pole feet. Once staked, the Bat 270 will remain stable in any wind conditions you want to be outside in. Using legs instead of guylines, as on the Rhino-Rack,听cuts time, adds strength,听and reduces flapping in high wind.
Fitting the Bat 270 to my GoFastCampers Platform was easy, thanks to bolt channels that run the full length of the awning鈥檚 backing plate. After a couple practice runs, I got my setup time down to under a minute. Packing it up probably takes half as long听and is so simple and intuitive that I quickly learned to do it in the dark听without the aid of a headlamp.
And that鈥檚 all it takes to get a three-quarter circle of coverage听that extends six feet ten inches听from my truck in every direction听it covers. It鈥檚 hard to articulate听just how nice a space that is; now I dread the idea of going car camping without my truck.
But Eezi-Awn鈥檚 awning isn鈥檛 perfect. In heavy rain, water pools in each waterproof fabric panel until it reaches a tipping point and comes tumbling out in one big splash. You can avoid this by pushing up on the fabric every few minutes, but that just nets you smaller splashes听and more of them. Other 270 awnings, like the ($1,500), avoid this by using clever fabric spreaders that dome the fabric to prevent pooling.
Mounting a 270 awning can be complicated听if you don鈥檛 happen to already have the world’s听lightest, most modular truck camper. Heavier designs may require supporting the hinges at the awning鈥檚 rear, which means you鈥檒l need听an aftermarket roof rack like those made by Frontrunner, ARB, and others. Lightweight awnings like听the Bat 270 are听much simpler in that they require only two vertical mounting surfaces on the side of your roof. If you have stock roof rails, you can drill holes into your cross rails and bolt听on an . If you have generic load bars, such as those made by Yakima or Thule, you may be able to fit awning mounts sold by those brands. Whichever awning you choose, make sure to identify its mounting requirements ahead of time and that your vehicle is capable of meeting them.
You鈥檒l also want to consider which side of the vehicle to mount the awning听and order the appropriate configuration for that side. Since we drive on the right side of the road in the United States, a passenger-side awning will open away from traffic听if you鈥檙e pulled over on the side of the road. It will also transmit less wind noise to the driver. I went with a driver-side awning for the simple reason that my rear swingout鈥攁nd the cute little camp table a friend and I made for it鈥攐pens to the passenger side.
Looking for a way to quickly detach and reattach your awning听so you don鈥檛 have to deal with the noise during daily driving? The听 ($149) sits between the awning and vehicle mount, allowing you to easily lift your awning on and off.