Who manufactures the best new vans?

101279 said:
Vantage, who make panel van conversions are a top end company but their vans are worth the money. This is our 3rd moho, 2 coachbuilts and then the NEO. It took us 3 vehicles to get it right.
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I’ve seen some at shows and they certainly look very well made.
 
101279 said:
Vantage, who make panel van conversions are a top end company but their vans are worth the money. This is our 3rd moho, 2 coachbuilts and then the NEO. It took us 3 vehicles to get it right.
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I know Scott personally as he used to be a customer of mine in his previous occupation.
He and his lovely wife Jane gave us all the info we needed when we were looking to buy our first MH. A conversion was not suitable for our needs, how many companies would tell you that their vans are not for you ! And yes Vantage are a quality company. Scott and Jane actually take there vans into Europe and test them themselves and any tweeks needed to models are initiated on their return.
 
DJMotorhomer said:
I know Scott personally as he used to be a customer of mine in his previous occupation.
He and his lovely wife Jane gave us all the info we needed when we were looking to buy our first MH. A conversion was not suitable for our needs, how many companies would tell you that their vans are not for you ! And yes Vantage are a quality company. Scott and Jane actually take there vans into Europe and test them themselves and any tweeks needed to models are initiated on their return.
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Excellent staff all round in the company, we are very pleased with the van and them too
 
Today I saw a Wingamm as described in my first post. Only a fleeting glimpse as it was travelling in the opposite direction, but it did make me think, very few buyers will pay a big premium for a top quality finish.
 
Still very happy with my Wildax. Have owned hymer S820 in the past and this has equal build quality, the only failure is the italian made step which,surprisingly they are replacing foc when we get back to UK under 3 year warranty.
 
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We had a new Autosleeper which we loved, apart from the French bed with the silly cut off end, it was perfect, but we sold it to free up some cash for our house renovation and bought a wide bodied Winnebago Brave. Absolutely brilliant van. The finish in everything was great and no expense was spared in the fittings.
I hated driving it though, it was too wide and handled like a ....well, it just didn’t ever go straight, so we sold it and bought British again, a 20 year old Swift. This van is brilliant. Great layout and still looks good.
What we don’t like is the combined shower/ bathroom, with a shower curtain that stays wet for hours after using it.
And now, it’s getting a little to small for us, so, we are currently looking for a new van.
Maybe brand new or ( so that all the new van faults have been fixed) one a couple of years old
So, I will be watching this thread with interest.
We don’t want a traditional wood framed build, so that rules out most British vans, and we also don’t want the traditional sitting round the kitchen table style that many Euro vans seem to offer.
Any recommendations for something 4 berth over 3500kg with big payload ( our Swift has 750kg payload) and around 7.5 metres in length?
 
I hesitate to say Vantage in Leeds, I can't knock their build quality, but choice of design is a bit odd, and the owner is adamant there will be no substitutes, so I built my own.
 
Cheerful Charlie said:
We have literally pulled apart, poked prodded and climbed on roofs slammed doors pushed on drawer bases and pulled at doors etc on just about everything available on the market.
The honest answer is that sadly all are now built to a price not a standard and the appliances are all expensive crap .
Best are probably German but our HYMER is rubbish compared to older vans and it actually has more faults than any other van we’ve had from new .
The industry will continue to churn out crap as too many owners are satisfied with mediocre and wouldn’t know craftsmanship if it hit them in the face.
We have looked at top end German like Morelo and Concorde and to be honest it’s still factory built crap that’s never seen a craftsman.
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I can see how you got your forum name now......
But you are right. We’ve seen so much rubbish both new and nearly new, and are leaning towards something 4 or 5 years old to keep for a couple of years or so.
 
Definitely not Bailey! Very poor build quality! I would never buy a brand new mh again. At least secondhand all the faults have been fixed. I would recommend American it does what it says! There systems are easy to operate and repair.
 
I have a converted Mercedes Sprinter and it has been superb. Handles like a car and can go, due to its size, where other larger campers fear to tread! Great reliable engine and a fantastic size for two people. 35+ to the gallon and cheaper fuel abroad! What more do you want?
 
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I have had a few campers, but without doubt the Citroen/Fiat/Peugeot ranges were the worst as they are let down by the quality of the base vehicles which are commercial vans built to a price to be competative in the fleet market for works vans. Anything VW based especially Westfalia and Bilbo are very high quality. I have not tried a Mercedes van but I would expect them to be as good as the VWs. Hymer are great converters, but it is a shame that they have started to use cheaper base vehicles than the traditional Mercs.
 
Cheerful Charlie said:
Interesting you say Bailey as we actually looked in one while waiting for our salesman when we collected the HYMER pig , he said that they had cut their Bailey order right down as they were the worst vans for problems at the moment.
Someone mentioned Moto Trek earlier we looked at them too as there was one Karen liked , what a nasty badly built pile of junk , more commercial build but poor quality finishing and terrible paintwork.
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We looked at a new Bailey Autograph yesterday.
Not for us!
First thing we noticed, ( only minor, but annoying) the carpets don’t fit properly. The curved sliding bathroom door wouldn’t latch closed and rubbed on the frame when it closed and opened
The offside body side panel where it joined the roof at the front over the cab looked pinched, as if the top edge had been bent to fit on the roof and all the panels looked rippled on both sides of the vehicle ( and all the others they had on display.
Definitely a make ( for us) to avoid
We are being drawn towards a couple of Burstner models at the moment.
We will be back in France at the weekend so will have a look at all the French dealers stock to see if the have what we want.
 
We are really limited by availability of dealers. I don’t want to travel hundreds of miles to buy one, only to find I have to keep taking it back to them if anything goes wrong. Our first new van was purchased locally and they had it back a couple of times to rectify faults and do a free hab check.
There certainly seems to be many more dealers in the North, but as we are mainly in the South, we want to buy there, which limits our choice of makes, but luckily we have a couple of layouts that we really like and they are available not too far away.
 
technispark said:
I have had a few campers, but without doubt the Citroen/Fiat/Peugeot ranges were the worst as they are let down by the quality of the base vehicles which are commercial vans built to a price to be competative in the fleet market for works vans. Anything VW based especially Westfalia and Bilbo are very high quality. I have not tried a Mercedes van but I would expect them to be as good as the VWs. Hymer are great converters, but it is a shame that they have started to use cheaper base vehicles than the traditional Mercs.
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VW and Merc based vehicles are also built on commercial van chassis, maybe better quality, but they still rely on high volume trade sales the same as Sevel built vans.
I do like the Mercedes chassis though, but, the only van I saw broken down, was a brand new Merc based PVC at an aire in France.
To be fair though, they called Mercedes and even on a Sunday morning, they were there and had it fixed within a couple of hours.
 
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