Best Roof-Top Tent?

I have traveled extensively with a friends who have an Autohome roof top tent and if I was in the market for a roof top tent this is what I would be buying.

http://www.autohomeaustralia.com.au/

I have a arb rooftop tent with awning side and rear add on rooms I use it for where the caravan will not go Ie. Cape York and we have found it performs very well no problems the mattress is a little hard so we fitted a latex mattress topper and it is now very comfortable Watch the rooftops on the road some brands seem to balloon up with air arb and others seem not to if air can get in so can dust We did 3000kms on dirt in the cape with ours and not one drop of dust got in apart from what came in on our feet ha! ha!
Steve

I can also recommend the Autohome hard shell rooftops. Used a Columbus model for a number of years in all weather. Set up in less than a minute and pack down in a couple. Great for a couple but no good for a family of 4.

Hope this helps to find a suitable roof topper.
Cheers

Used to have a Hannibal. Used to supplement the caravan on a 6 month trip through NT & WA Great quality tent I purchased mine second hand for $1700 & got $1600 for it 18 months later. Good quality second hand the way to go to save money
Cheers dazz

If you search for thread number 100249 you will get some info on the James Baroud range. I have the eSpace model and can't speak highly enough of it.

Hi, we have been happy with our Gordigear RTT, they have a good 80mm thick mattress in them. Very Comfortable. Cheers, Kanga.

Hi Holly,

We bought an Aussie Traveller 2nd hand over eight years ago. We have both "rooms", as pictured - the standard and family. Ours is mounted on our 6x4 camper trailer, the wall height was suited to a Hilux and so it is too short to sit on the roof of our Cruiser.
Depending on the type of trip and how long we will be in one place, will depend on whether we use the "small walls, or the large walls. The only other modification was to the mattress, an Orthopeadic inner sprung mattress keeps us comfortable when we are away :-)
It does get some looks while we are away and people are being nosey, all good too.
For what we do, and it has been along the GCR twice, we love it.

FWIW, ANY camping equipment is a large investment,
what ever it is, from a tiny tent to a big as 5th wheeler, you need to use it!!

Enjoy your trip.

Cheers,
Wayne & Sally.

Hi Holly

Whilst not in the brief of the question you have asked, but have you considered a good quality centre-pole tent?

Usually they will set you back around $800 or thereabouts. Much less than a roof-top tent.

For the most part, a roof-top tend is only a sleeping space, a tent gives you a room. And whilst many roof-top tents have rooms that can be added, it will be just as time consuming to set up as a tent and with a tent you won’t have the weight penalty on top of the vehicle. Of course, there are times that roof-top tents may provide a better alternative.

Hopefully some food for thought if you haven’t already considered.

Cheers, Baz – The Landy

Holly - had both an OpenSky Canvas RTT and currently a Maggiolina (basically an Autohome). Was more than happy with both.

I travel with a 4wd club-mate who has a James Baroud and he loves his.

Avoid the cheaper imported (Chinese) copies of the hard shells - heard a few stories about poor finish quality - if you go for the had-shell either Autohome or JB are good - probably the JB wins on price point.

Camped a few times in my OpenSky in very strong winds and rainy weather - never has any issues with seal and stability. Gave it to my nephew.

Hi Holly,

I have a Galaxy roof top tent on my 110 Defender. I went for the Galaxy as it is an all in one set up. This being the tent folds out to the sleeping area up on top and a room down below. No zipping up walls or fussing about with a floor as they as all attached to your tent.
My last trip was to Cape York via GCR and as much gravel as possible. I did not have issues with dust or moisture even though the cape turned on rain for most of the time I was there. Many a morning the tent was packed away wet and the next night the bedding was dry.
I purchased it in 2011 and it has kept me warm and dry over a lot of this wonderful country of ours.
Down side is when it is up, your vehicle is locked in place. The same goes for other RTT I suppose. Yes it did bellow after I replaced the cover but a strap or two sorted that out.
It cost $1964 and sits on my car all year.
They have a good web site, worth a look.

http://www.galaxyoutdoorcampers.com/index_pass_child.htm?http://www.galaxyoutdoorcampers.com/custom_tents.htm

There are some compromises and which one you get might depend on your intended use. I had a Howling Moon which was one of the first available in Australia - it was very similar to the larger ARB tents, though it had a heavier/thicker canvas which blocked most of the light (which could be good or bad depending whether you like to wake up with the sun). It had a foam mattress which the previous owners had made a fleece covering for and was very comfortable - I slept better in the tent than at home. If you're moving every day or so, then they're great, but if you like to set up a base camp for a few days and do short trips from there it's a bit of a nuisance because you have to pack up your whole campsite to drive anywhere.

At one stage on the Gibb River Rd/Mitchell Plateau, we ended up travelling with a couple who had a Maggiolina tent on their car. The Maggiolina was quicker to set up and pack up (they just unclipped the top (hard) cover, inserted a handle and wound the roof up - a bit like a Jayco camper) whereas the Howling Moon (and ARB) tents have a cover that you need to unzip, then pull off (sliding the edge out of the sail-track) and then find somewhere to put it (noting that it could be quite dusty or wet, or even muddy - I usually rolled it loosely, dirty side in and put it in the front passenger footwell), unfold the tent, undo the elastic shock cords from inside and set up the frame to hold the awning over the ladder. Once the Howling Moon was set up, we could open large windows which had huge awnings over them so you could have the windows open in any weather - even rain coming it at 30 degrees from horizontal! The Maggionlina has a couple of tiny windows in the sides, but they had no weather protection, so if you're going to spend time in the steamy rainy tropics, it might be better to get something more like the Howling Moon.

Both of them you could leave your bedding in - the Maggiolina was wound back down using the handle, then the sides had to be tucked in so they weren't pinched in the "lid" and then the lid was clipped shut. The Howling Moon was again a little more complicated - clip the shock-cords back in (these pulled the sides of the tent in as the tent was folded shut), remove and store the frame for the awning over the ladder extension, then fold the tent shut. Then came the fun part of putting the cover back on - slide it in the sail-track, throw it over the tent and zip it all around, which could be a quick task, or a mongrel, depending how flat you could get the tent to fold down (which depended on how much bedding you left inside, where it was stored, and most importantly: how that awning over the ladder ended up!). You can get them without the awning over the ladder, but I think the benefits of the awning over ladder outweigh the added difficulty in packing the tent away.