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Carlight has always been the Rolls Royce of caravans. If you look after a caravan and make sure its tested regularly for damp it will last many years. Certainly more than 13.

Bessacar and Buccaneer were both good makes when they were independant manufacturers , Buccaneer is now just a range of one of the big manufacturers. and Bessacar I believe is no more. (I may be wrong)

Quote: Originally posted by craig+sam on 09/3/2009

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Is there a range diference in Caravan manufacturers as there is for cars?

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You might be interested in this - the CC Quality and Reliabiltiy survey from 2005.  AFAIK, it hasn't been done again since.

http://www.caravanclub.co.uk/NR/rdonlyres/6C84E378-4F81-4B65-B85B-D709DF784D2E/0/newsqualityandreliabilitysurveymay05.pdf

The Vanmaster came top, followed by a ruck of german vans. 

Cheers
Andrew

Quote: Originally posted by freeatlast on 09/3/2009

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Caravans have a long way to go to match cars in terms of quality and reliability given the average lifespan of a car in the UK is 13.5 years.

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What is the  lifespan of a caravan? I reckon I see more pre 95 caravans than I see M or N reg cars,

Our first caravan, a Compass was 20 years old when we got it, its still going strong 10 years later.

We've also had a Bailey which was great, and a Sterling (Swift) which has just had a repair for damp at 17 months old, but we still rate as a good caravan.

I think most people know when a caravan is right or wrong for them when they step in it, and that forms the major part of the buying decision.

We were set on a new Bailey after our old one but didn't think the quality was as good, so looked around and bought the Sterling.

Incidently, the quality of  Dealer would also play a big part in our  choice, we had a  hassle free warranty claim with Swift through Frys at Driffield, which judging by some of the posts on here isn't always the case.

Paul

Cars tend to do a lot more milage in a year than caravans and have much more complex mechanicals.  I have seen posts on here about fairly young caravans ( less thyan 5 years old having damp problems ).  It is rare for modern cars to have major problems within a few years.

Brian

Although Buccaneer is now part of the explorer group I do think you can see the quality when you step in, we were at a dealers last weekend and there were 2 identical layouts next to each other, one was a Buccaneer and the other was a Swift and there was no comparison. The Buccaneer has upholstery on the walls & the finishing touches just made it feel of luxury.

 I did comment though what a pain it'd be having  to hoover the dog hair off the walls as well as the floors though!

We also went into a Hobby at the Donington caravan show and it was amazing, I've never seen such an outstanding van, really ugly from the outside however and you'd need a 3.5 tonne vehicle to tow it.

"Although Buccaneer is now part of the explorer group I do think you can see the quality when you step in, we were at a dealers last weekend and there were 2 identical layouts next to each other, one was a Buccaneer and the other was a Swift and there was no comparison. The Buccaneer has upholstery on the walls & the finishing touches just made it feel of luxury."

I agree, when you step into certain 'vans, you can see the different quality in the fittings, but is the body shell built any different from the cheaper range? Luxury fittings do not prevent damp!

Personally I don't like things like upholstery on the walls, prefer a modern, clean  look (but not the ultra basic like some continental models). When we bought our Sterling there was also a Buccanneer for sale (for a couple of thousand more), same layout as ours but we thought it looked very "fussy".

Anne

I think the Hymer vans are outstanding, the quality of them is great! Although worth an extra £10k on top of what you would pay for a brittish van? Not sure?

I have to admit, I love our swift but there are lots of areas where vans including ours could be built a lot better.

If money was not object it would be a Hymer

Interesting that the OP states Mercades as the benchmark for reliability and quality, when their recent repution has been anything but (this is now improving, however). The real masters in terms of customer satisfaction (a good measure of reliability and quality) are Lexus, Toyota ... and Skoda!

Take a look at the JD Power survey - we could do with a similar comprehensive survey of caravan owners, because all that's available at the moment is anecdotal evidence.

Some of the manufacturers mentioned above produce only low volumes of vans, and their added quality is reflected in their price. But building a few luxury, bespoke caravans that are also heavy and expensive is relatively easy.Building (and selling) thousands of vans that are good value and reliable is the difficult bit, and I think Bailey have gone the furthest towards mastering that, via their assembly line set up. They back their products with long-term water ingress warranties, too.

Quote: Originally posted by brianconwy on 10/3/2009

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Cars tend to do a lot more milage in a year than caravans and have much more complex mechanicals.  I have seen posts on here about fairly young caravans ( less thyan 5 years old having damp problems ).  It is rare for modern cars to have major problems within a few years.

Brian

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Puts me right off of changing the van I can tell you!

I didn't include Vanmaster, Van Royce etc because they are not mainstream and out of most people's price range or else no longer in production lol.  Lovely vans though.

Ali

Quality a lot of it is in the eye of the beholder. Does weight = Quality?

Wead  had a Skoda Octavia, probally the most unreliable car we have ever had and we had it from new, you know what we absolutely loved that car.

We now have a Honda Accord almost perfect trouble free motoring for the last 75K you know what much prefered the skoda.

As for caravans after looking at British makes that had faults from new due to build quality, we bought a Hymer certainly haven't regreted that decision and when the pound was strong against the € a few years ago they were a bargain.

Quote: Originally posted by snowy747 on 10/3/2009

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Puts me right off of changing the van I can tell you!  I didn't include Vanmaster, Van Royce etc because they are not mainstream

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If you have another look at the CC statistics, you'll see that the number of respondents for Vanmaster and for the german vans was generally very low - so the stats might be a bit dodgy anyway.

Cheers
Andrew

Sorry Andrew wasn't referring to the CC stats was referring to Freeatlasts comments about his damp vans.

I read the CC article before we bought our van and I agree there are very few replies from people with Vanmasters etc so it is quite difficult to gauge the true facts and figures.

I honestly think it is pot luck these days, if you are unlucky enough to have a van that has a defective panel or poor workmanship then you will have problems on your hands but just as equally the same make could be defect free and last for years.

Ali

Ive always had swifts and found them to be good and reliable so thats where my vote goes