At the outset, let me say that we offer a full range of kitchens both with and without built in cookers but here are a few of my thoughts:

•  If the cooker is built in, you are restricted to cooking directly under your canvas and beside your screen walls. Over time the canvas may become impregnated with fat and cooking smells - many people won't cook in their caravans for this reason

•  You could potentially create a fire hazard by impregnating your screen walls with fat - a strong gust of wind and you could be in trouble

•  You just can't have enough bench space when camping. If you choose to install a built in cooker, make sure you specify a model with a closeable lid if you want to avoid loosing a sizeable amount of your bench space. We can supply the SMEV stainless steel 2 burner cook top with glass lid which is ideal

•  The cost of a stainless steel cooker will ad up to around $900 ($450 for the cook top plus $450 for gas fittings, regulator, hoses, installation and the issue of a Gas Certificate). Note that it is a legal requirement that the cooker is installed by a licensed gas fitter in such a way that the tail gate cannot be closed with the gas hose still connected

•  Many people of course already have their own cook top, BBQ, Webber, etc. or just prefer their trusty camp oven. If this sounds like you, you now need to consider whether you are happy to use your portable device for cooking with fat outside, with the option of bringing it inside to make a cuppa, boil the pasta, vegies, etc. If it's raining, you still have options!

•  If you still like the idea of a built in cook top and it doesn't blow the budget, go for it! Just keep in mind my comments above and there's no reason you can't have the best of both worlds.

We of course offer a full range of kitchens from the basic kitchen box (with optional steel fold out shelf,  lockable aluminium checker plate door, timber drawer inserts, 2 x folding laminex top timber shelves, manual or 12 volt water taps); to the range of Drifta kitchens (both tail gate and slide out); to the stainless steel tail gate kitchen (with or without built in cook top). The choice is yours - have a look at them all and think about how you are likely to use your kitchen and what best suits your needs (and your budget).

Huge! My best advice is to go and feel a Chinese camper tent, then feel genuine Australian Made canvas. Even to the uninitiated, you will immediately notice the difference. The Australian Made will feel like real canvas and the imported will feel very thin by comparison. You can often see daylight right through the imported canvas and on a windy day, you will see it flapping in the breeze like tissue paper! Another easy way to pick Chinese canvas is to look for small 'squares' in the canvas - if you see these, you know it's imported. The story you will hear is that this is 'Rip Stop' canvas. Rip Stop was something we tried in Australia in the early '70's for truck side curtains but it was a real failure as i) it opened up the weave and let the water through (estimated to be 30% less water proof) and ii) it created abrasion points where the elevated thread would wear through anywhere it came into contact with anything. One more thing to look at is the height of the roof - most Australian campers are around 2.7 mtrs at the ridge (highest point) although some are only 2.4 mtrs. The Chinese tents are at best 2.4 mtrs with some being considerably lower still!

Lastly, have a look at the number of poles required to set up a Chinese tent - if you enjoy spending hours setting up tents, go for the import!

Q. OK, so is all Australian made canvas the same?

Not by any means, in Australia we make 8 ounce, 10 ounce, 12 ounce and 15 ounce canvas. Most good Aussie camper manufacturers use 15oz in the roof and at least 12oz in the walls but having said that there are a couple using 12oz in the roof and 10oz walls and even one that I know of that uses 10oz in the roof and 8oz walls - crazy! I believe that the canvas is one of the most important aspects of your camper trailer so why wouldn't you have the very best? Buy the right canvas and you'll have many years of pleasurable camping holidays but buy the wrong canvas and you're in for years of misery, kicking yourself for not buying the right thing in the first place. Customline use top of the range, 15oz Dynaproofed canvas on both roof and walls in every camper tent, regardless of size or model. The reason we insist on 15oz all over is that it's then best blend of canvas, 50/50 polyester and cotton - poly for strength and cotton for breathability. When you come down to the 12oz that most others use, because it's a weaker canvas, the only way to build up the strength is to increase the polyester content - problem is, now it doesn't breathe so well. We all know the difference between a poly shirt and a cotton shirt on a stinking hot day!

A word on 'Dynapfoofing'. When you see the 'Dynaproofed' label, you know the canvas is totally impregnated with the proofing solution - i.e the wax solution for water fastness, the mould and mildew inhibitors, the UV protection and the actual colouring. The cheaper canvas is sometimes only sprayed on one side which is totally useless. Look after your quality Australian made canvas and you can expect well in excess of 20 years life out of it.

Q. I've heard the term 'Seasoning the canvas'. What's this all about?

The concept of seasoning the canvas is all about sealing up the tiny needle holes made while sewing the tent together. All you need to do is set up your new tent in the back yard, zip up all your doors and windows and give the whole tent a good soak with the hose (or you can wait 'til it rains of course). Let the tent dry out thoroughly then repeat - 3 or 4 times is recommended. What happens is that the thread will slowly swell and the canvas itself will tighten up and seal up those tiny holes. No big deal if you can't do this, the canvas will season itself the first few times you go camping in the rain but we like to give you the opportunity to season the canvas before you go so you don't get any drips in your new tent.

There are a number of things to take into account when considering whether or not you need brakes. i) the towing capacity of your vehicle - have a look in your car's Owners Manual and it will give you 2 towing weights - one with brakes on your trailer and one without ii) look at the Tare (empty ) weight of the trailer and consider how much weight you are likely to add to it. Note that the Customline Deluxe On Road weighs 400 kgs and the Deluxe Off Road weighs 520 kgs. You need to think about things like water tank (70 litres = approx 70 kgs), jerry can holders (20 litres = 20 kgs), your own camping gear, food, etc. The 12' tent upsize and full set of annex walls adds about 30 kgs. If you are a family you will no doubt carry a fair bit more weight than a couple. iii) If you have your trailer hot dip galvanised, you need to add approx 40 kgs to the tare weight. iv) As you can imagine, it is not uncommon for the Gross (fully loaded) weight to exceed 800kgs. v) The maximum legal GVM (Gross Vehicle Mass) or fully loaded weight is 750 kgs without brakes so if you are a family, have a water tank installed, etc it's going to be a very good idea to have brakes fitted. From a safety point of view, I always think about the worst case scenario where, for example you are on a wet road and a car pulls out in front of you - you don't want an 800 kg trailer pushing you from behind! Another consideration of course is insurance - if you ever end up in an accident and you legally should have had brakes fitted....

Q. If I can't afford brakes now, how hard is it to fit them later and how much extra does it cost?

No problem fitting electric brakes later and you need to allow about $150 on top of the listed price

Q. What are the best brakes to go for - electric or override?
 
For my money, I would always go for electric brakes - they are a far more effective braking system than override brakes as they operate just like your car's brakes. You can fine tune the amount of braking from a controller under the dashboard of your car - if your camper is empty, you'll want to back them off a bit, if it's full you can increase the braking accordingly. With override brakes there is no such adjustment plus because they operate on inertia, if you put the car in reverse, the trailer brakes apply themselves automatically. It's a real pain to have to get out of the car, flip over a lever, do your reversing, get out of the car again, flip the lever back over, get back in the car and get on your way! So why do they even make override brakes? The only advantage of overrides is that if you use two different vehicles for towing, you don't have to have them both wired up for electric brakes. The cost of a good brake controller is about $129 plus labour but the electric brakes are a bit cheaper to start with so it works out fairly close from a cost point of view if you only have to wire up one vehicle.

Naturally, this depends on your intended usage but for on road and dirt road use, the standard 50mm ball coupling is fine. If you intend taking your trailer through creek crossings, over spoon drains, sand dunes, Cape York - anywhere the trailer is likely to be on a substantial angle to the towing vehicle, you are best to go for a 4WD coupling. But which is the best 4WD coupling? The old Tregg style (poly block) hitch used to be regarded as the best off road coupling as there weren't too many alternatives available. The biggest drawback with poly block couplings is that they are extremely difficult to get on or off your vehicle - you only have about 1mm clearance either side of the poly block to line up with the vehicle, so on level concrete it's difficult but in sand, forget it! You'll end up unbolting the hitch from the vehicle because there's no way you're going to unhook that coupling! By contrast, the Hylander 4WD hitch is an absolute breeze to line up with your vehicle and it goes straight onto a standard 50mm ball hitch. It can be padlocked onto your towing vehicle (great if you have to leave your vehicle unattended while you've stopped to do some shopping) and it has 4 grease nipples to keep it well lubricated. Of course if your vehicle breaks down, everybody has a 50mm ball hitch so no trouble swapping onto another vehicle.

Again, it's all about your intended usage. If your style of camping is mainly caravan parks or National parks then you'll probably go for the standard painted finish. Most people prefer the look of the painted finish and it's easy enough to touch up if you get a scratch every now and then. If however, you live near the beach or intend taking your camper on the beach on a regular basis, hot dip galvanising is the way to go. When the trailer is 'hot dipped' the entire trailer is effectively rust proofed for it's lifetime. You'll pay a few more dollars up front but you will rest easy knowing that your investment is protected for the next 20 years.

There are 2 main reasons to fit a stone guard. i) to prevent stones and rocks from chipping the paint on the leading edges of your trailer and guards and ii) to prevent rocks bouncing off the front of the trailer and into the back window of the towing vehicle. Stone guards need to be angle downwards and back so that they deflect rocks back down to the road and away from the vehicle.

Many campers have had experience putting a 'fly' over the roof of their tent and know the advantages of doing this - substantial heat reduction, more water proof, keeps bird dung off the tent, etc, etc. For all the same reasons it's a great idea to have a 'tropical roof' on your camper but they must be designed correctly. A couple of very well known and extremely expensive camper manufacturers do it badly - the roof actually touches the main tent roof at both ends which not only totally defeats the whole purpose of a tropical roof (which is to give maximum airflow) but also creates potential condensation (and therefore mould and mildew problems) where the two roofs touch. On our tropical roof, there is a huge air gap from end to end and most importantly, the roof can stay on when you pack up. This is a must as you can imagine how difficult it would be to try to throw a fly over our 2.7 meter ceiling!

Spreader bars are great. They keep your canvas nice and tight and you will need less ropes and pegs (we have our display model set up in the showroom with no ropes and pegs at all and it's still nice and solid). If the canvas is tight, you will have less chance of water pooling in extreme conditions. You can also use spreader bars in window flaps to make them into individual awnings for extra shade.

You can easily accommodate 4 kids in the 12' tent with 2 x double bunks to the right of the main door. This leaves plenty of room for mum and dad to access their own Queen size bed without disturbing the kids and there's still plenty of space to set up a collapsible wardrobe, etc to the left of the door. If you still need more space, we can add an additional room to the drawbar side of the camper - this way you don't take up any more space on the camp site as the drawbar is there anyway. What we do is move the existing window down a bit, install an extra door, fit a zip for the extra awning (roof) and attachments for the extra walls and floor. If you're undecided about whether you need the extra room or not, we can do all of these things ('Provision for Extra Room' on the Options list) at minimal cost. The Extra Room itself has 3 large windows (the end one has it's own awning) and a solid PVC floor just like the main tent. We usually don't put an outside door in it so parents can keep track of the kids but this can be done if you wish. Note also that the awning is full length so it covers your drawbar. There are photos of the Extra Room on our Gallery page.