If you're going to be driving to remote locations, you ideally need a RWD vehicle, which limits you to the Sprinter and the Transit. Front wheel drive motorhomes are useless on anything worse than level wet grass.
I owned a Sprinter for a year (3I0 LWB hi-roof) and can vouch for it being a superb van; held 75 easily on motorways, returned 29 mopg overall, and nice to drive. I must admit that drivers of later Sprinters with whom I've spoken rate the older models better.
Watch out for rusty doors, though; some parts can be pricey too but they've got a very good reputation for being virtually unburstable. Avoid the 4-cylinder engine (gutless) and go for the mid-range five-pot, best combination of power and economy.
|
|
Most late model Transits are FWD although Ford offer RWD on some models.
|
|
Since they don't do Commers any more I would suggest for your kind of use a VW transporter would offer a good compromise between driveability and accommodation. You need to decide what size you need especially if you are in more out of the way places with narrower roads, bigger can also be more difficult to find parking for.
|
|
Mercedes Sprinters are common on The Gower used by surfers. They build a raised square wooden frame to fit into the back on top of which they put a mattress to sleep, underneath the frame goes all their gear, camping stoves, even boards. Not ideal but it works. Of course, no good when it is cold.
|
|
Ford do a lovely Transit campervan now but it is very pricely at mid 30Kish. Bongo type vans are just too small IMPO and I have concluded that what you need is a motorhome and a small Yaris type car for everyday use.
|
|
|
|
If you're going to be driving to remote locations you ideally need a RWD vehicle which limits you to the Sprinter and the Transit. Front wheel drive motorhomes are useless on anything worse than level wet grass.
Why? If it comes down to it you can always reverse, but I'll bet the times when that is necessary are pretty rare.
|
|
|
|
Tent.
What is the carbon footprint for that?
|
Thanks for all the suggestions. Sorry for not responding sooner, but after reading the earlier replies I set off to do more research and then forgot to report back.
Someone suggested a tent, which is a good idea. I tried one his year and loved it, even in bad weather, but it has two big disadvantages: washing and a site. Without access to a shower somewhere, tent camping isn't the best for personal hygiene, and for the purposes I have in mind I need to be reasonably presentable. Getting a shower requires an organised campsite, which aren't in great supply where I'll be going, and in any case using a tent off a campsite is difficult (requires a co-operative farmer who has a field clear of livestock). So regrettably, I've had to consign the tent to holiday use only.
I toyed with idea of a caravan, and looked at Eribas. Very neat design, probably affordable if I imported an old one, but using the data from the very useful www.whattowcar.com it seems that even the tiniest Eribas (with no washroom let alone a shower) are too heavy to tow behind my Almera automatic. Petrol automatics seem a particularly bad choice as towcars, but the Almera is such a handy car for other uses that I'd be very reluctant to go to the expense and hassle of changing it. In any case, I have gone off the idea of a caravan, because I've never conquered the art of reversing a trailer, and I'd get into a big mess with a caravan.
So that leaves a van as the only option. My thinking has been to keep the Almera for ordinary use, but have a cheap camper for my travels (a van is too big to use around town, both inconvenient and antisocial). Bearing in mind the comments about reliability, I have been looking at the possibility of importing a Toyota Hiace camper, but Hiace campers with showers are as rare as hen's teeth and also have layouts optimised more for carrying lots of people than for living in: they are more like weekend campers. Good vans, though, with a handy automatic gearbox and simple pre-common-rail diesel, and there are squillions of Hiaces in Africa going on forever. I haven't ruled out that option if I can find the right one.
For my purposes, the best van I have seen so far is the Romahome Dimension (www.romahome.com/dimension.html ), but that's based on the troublesome Citroen/Peugeot/Fiat van, which I'm not inclined to touch. There is also Transit-based Cavarno (see www.horizons-unlimited.co.uk/cavarno4/index.html ), but like other panel van conversions it's scarily expensive new (over £40k) and has a common rail diesel (potential trouble). Older examples of UK panel van conversions cost far too much for their age -- £15K buys a tired mid- or late-90s van, and I don't trust them to have enough life left to justify the price. Germany is full of secondhand motorhomes at good prices, but their s/h prices for panel van conversions seem too high.
If I don't get a van, the alternative will be to stay outside the areas I need to be in, and drive a long distance each way every day. That's inconvenient, expensive on fuel and on accommodation, and unnecessarily polluting, so I think that if I can find a useable camper at an affordable price, it'll be the best option all round.
|
HI there, you are probably sorted out by now, I have had most campers new and old,I still do a lot of wild camping, I also built my own camper on a extended chassis 2.5 smiley Transit, There are still plenty of these vans about, they were made up to year 2000, some of these vans were called HI Cubes, and Quite a few had twin wheels,I also noticed in Ireland that the ESB , electric board, had Quite a number of 4 wheel drive smileys that they used to service their pileons out in the wild bogs, BT. have still got a lot of twin wheel transits, and better still great fibre glass bodys,+most are fitted with Diesel Heaters, I am at present driving a 2007 Ford Transit 2.4 she is twin wheeled and 6 Speed Box, It is the best driving vehicle I have ever owned, the turbo packed in at 4000 mls, and she was called in 3 times for minor adjustments, but she has a 60,000 mls warranty,140 bhp, 30 mpg, Go for Ford you can get bits anywhere on the planet,Another great engine is Fiats 2.3 it is fitted to thousants of campers world wide,I had two of them through my hands with no problems, I also had a 2005 Fiat 2.8 camper and again no trouble,I am looking for a used VW T5 elevating roof type but there are a lot of gossip about the 2.5 PD Engine, has me worried as I was told a set of injectors for this engine is at least £1200, good luck, dieseldes
Major case of snip quote. No need to include all of NowWheels last post, Rob
Edited by rtj70 on 25/12/2008 at 23:39
|
It is perhaps a bit late, but I have found the Forum at:
www.outandaboutlive.co.uk/magazines/default.asp?ma...4
to be helpful.
Members of that forum report that all the X250 based vehicles (the current Fiat, Peugeot, Citroen) suffer from the same problems, but that the attitude of the different manufacturers does differ. Fiat seems the worst offender as well as having the most cases of the main problems, namely water ingress over the engine and especially, severe judder when reversing up a steep slope.
Edited by Spospe on 26/12/2008 at 11:37
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
