Best vehicle for camper conversion around Aus?

Beware of loading up any dual cab with a heavy weight and bouncing it up and down continuously over rough country. You will break the chassis. A single cab ute would be better suited as the load is better balanced on the rear axle. Is $15k enough to buy a reliable vehicle for remote travel?

Howdy...

I'm sure there are various vehicle alternatives that "might" work and you've named a couple.

I've owned three Defenders and currently have a 79 Series dual cab. The Defender 130 and 79 Series had/have canopies built on the back, although not as living quarters.

A critical thing for you to do before purchasing the vehicle is to work out what you want to put on the back of it; this way you can assess the weight the vehicle will be required to carry and whether it can be done safely and legally.

Choosing a vehicle without that information will be a difficult task and may result in a wrong choice of vehicle.

It might also pay to consult an engineer who has knowledge of GVM upgrades for some guidance regarding weight and its distribution.

To build something like the one you have pictured will almost certainly require you to upgrade the GVM of the vehicle and even then you may still be close to maximum (if not over) depending on construction and what you "fill it with".

That is something you may want to factor into your price consideration as it could add anywhere from $2,500>$4,000 minimum.

A canopy/camper unit like the one pictured will also limit your choice of vehicle to some extent on a "fit for purpose" basis, especially if you intend to do off-the-beaten track travel.

Noting, the one pictured is a European based vehicle (Netherlands).

And for guidance, the canopy on the back of my vehicle, which is of high quality, set me back in the region of $10K, only has shelves inside and is not designed to live in, but rather to live out of. A set-up like the one you pictured could run to multiples of that cost if produced to a standard suitable for outback travel.

Good luck with the project and your travels.

Cheers, Baz - The Landy

I suggest that almost all the vehicles like you mention are overloaded when equipped with a body like your pic and full of fuel and water. That overload condition impacts seriously on reliability, running cost, safety and the law.
You may have some chance with a Mercedes G class Commercial with a GVM of 4.5T, but that will be a tad outside your budget.
Bite the bullet and start with something like a Canter 4WD and expect it to be closer to 6 tons on the road.

EDIT: I would seriously suspect that the vehicle in your pic is not legal in Australia. The maximum rear overhang behind the rear axle is 60% of the wheel base and I would guess that that has been exceeded.

Cheers,
Peter
OKA196 motorhome

Welcome the the forum, and have fun planning your adventures here.

So how long is you trip for ?
That is a lot of cost and preparation building such a combination, so I imagine it must be for a year at least.

Yes, it's not so much the camper (tray back) weight itself, though this certainly is a big factor . . . more the weight distribution and design of the whole thing on a vehicle.

If a camper back setup is your wish, then consider the cost of suitable vehicle will be high, not sure you would find something fairly good for $15k that is suitable for the camper back.
The cost of setting the back camper up will be high too.

You could buy a re-existing setup more economically, but you don't know what the previous owner used it for really (on road mostly, gentle outback) and you might take it places that will cause issues with structural failure.

$15k for base vehicle ?
What budget for the camper ?
That would likely run a similar amount at least.

Have you considered a good towing 3.0lt TD single/ extra cab / dual cab, and towing a small camper trailer ?
This would give you a wide range of options, just need to buy a good brand off road camper and drive to conditions.
This setup can be left if base camping for a few days, a week etc, and let you go out exploring more easily.

Or fitting a good size roof top tent ?
MANY backpackers (and Aussies) use these, a great option as you can keep weights and load even better, and not have to tow.

Camping / swagging could be possible too, but seems you want a bit more of a 'home' for your trip.

Maybe think about it some more and consider all options for living on the road here.

My wife and I have been doing exactly what you have in mind for the last twenty years with two different single cabs and three different home made campers. We have driven everywhere from Victorian High Country tracks to remote desert tracks where we have not seen another car for up to three days. One ute was a Mitsubishi while the current one is a Hilux. Our trips have taken us to all States and Territories. We have a HF radio and always carry an emergency locating beacon but are determined to avoid situations where we may have to use it.

As the others have said, weight is critical. The Outback is littered with broken cars. About 99% of them are owned by tourists who have installed things like upgraded suspensions plus every other conceivable accessory. They are usually loaded to the max or beyond. In just about all cases, their after market suspension still looks brand new. It is just the rest of the car that broke because the rest of it is still standard and was working beyond its design limits.

Our current car has standard suspension and tyres and has never been higher than 200 kg under GVM. None have had bull bars, tow bars or anything heavy down the back behind the rear axle.

One of our campers was a slide on but it only weighed 180 kg empty. The current one weighs 220 kg empty and bolts directly to the chassis. All were plywood with a thin outer layer of 225 fibreglass mat. None have ever broken.
We only carry one spare wheel in its original location under the chassis. We have used split rims for years but now have one piece wheels. We carry some new tubes on remote trips and enough puncture repair equipment to fix anything from a nail hole in the tread up to big holes in the side walls. Read through all of the links on this page and ring Mick and see if you can get to one of his day long tyre repair demonstrations . TYRES

We carry very little recovery gear because when you are on your own, you make sure you don't get stuck. Always get local advice before going anywhere. If anything looks dodgy then don't just drive in hoping for the best, get out and have a look first. Enrolling in a good 4wd training course like this one can save you a hell of a lot of trouble in the bush.TRAINING

This link covers the bent chassis problem that has already been mentioned.
BENT UTES
This comes from having too much heavy material too far back behind the rear axle. The far end of the chassis has to constantly lift it suddenly or bring it to a sudden stop when the chassis falls. You can not fix the problem with heavier springs or air bags.

Imagine an empty ute for example with twenty bags of cement on the rear end of the tray. That will be 400 kgs which is well under the car's carrying capacity. The rear of the car will most likely be sagging. Lift it up with springs or air bags until the chassis is level and look down the back again. The cement will still be there. All you have done is make the car look better from side on. The rear end of the chassis it is still under excessive stress

If you really must take half your house with you then tow a small trailer. There are some little ones on the market today that are just a tubular steel skeleton with mud guards. They contain mounting points for jerry cars and things like the big aluminium tool boxes that you see in places like Metaland. You will then have the car well under its maximum carrying capacity and a very long way under its towing capacity. That adds up to maximum reliability.

Fuel consumption depends a lot on the driver, the load the car is carrying and the speed it is travelling at. Our Hilux will use a little over 10 lites per 100 ks at around 100 kph on freeways. Around town at slow speeds it will be around 9.3. At anything from near stopped to a maximum of around 60 kph on good unsealed roads like the Oodnadatta Track, it will also be about 9.3. The best ever was just under 8 at low speeds along the Tanami and Gary Junction Road between Alice Springs and Kintore near Sandy Blight Junction. The highest has been 16 during day after day crawling around Victorian High Country tracks.

Most 4wds have the aerodynamics of a brick so keep the load and the speed down if you want to get the best possible fuel consumption.

Any of the popular utes will do what you want to do in standard form without breaking. It is the drivers, not the roads, that break them.

One vehicle that would suit is a Perentie 6x6 (ex army) but you will need more than your $15k. You will need to put some sound deadening in and put in some creature comforts but this will be minimal compared to the cost of the camper.

Wow, thanks for the responses, great to hear from people with real experience out there. Also some very helpful resources to read through. Lots of things for me to consider, but the main thing I'm hearing is that weight distribution is key. Sounds like a dual-cab is probably not feasible. It also seems that most of you don't like the camper back design, so I'll have a re-think about that too.

In terms of heavy things that need to be taken along, would the following be a reasonable estimate?
Tools+spares 100kg, water 120kg, diesel 100kg, second battery 60kg, gas bottle 30kg, spare tyres 50kg. That's a total of approx 500kg, so plus the weight of the camper and other items I can see that being dangerous in terms of weight on a 79series with a payload of 1 tonne or so.

However on a single cab defender, there's a payload of 1600kg. So assuming all the heavy liquids are behind the cab, and with sensible overhang, that should be doable? It's worth noting that I won't be taking more than necessary, and I won't have a shower or toilet in there. I'm not disregarding the advice given here, just trying to figure out what is reasonable.

If the camper-back idea is completely daft on a standard ute, then I would rather go for the rooftop tent or trailer setup than consider bigger vehicles. The main reason I like the idea of having a camper back is that I will also be using the vehicle for shorter trips in more populated areas too. The eventual goal is to spend a year around Aus, but in the meantime I would mainly be using it for weekends and week long trips.

In light of your comments, I will reconsider more conventional touring setups.

Have you considered a troopy?

If you are after a dedicated vehicle it may be a good option. You"ll find a few high tops that a ready have the conversion done, although they generally have high km's.
If I could justify a dedicated vehicle I would have one in a heart beat.

This is our camper that we bought about 5 years ago. Has a double bed on drivers side, and a slide out kitchen on near side. A small front compartment stores 2 batteries, and 1 or 2 fridges about 40L size.

It has plenty of storage space, in fact too much as it's easy to overload it. Haven't confirmed exactly how heavy it is, but would suggest it's a lot heavier than the 400kg "guesstimate" I was given when we picked it up. I put 500kg constant leaf springs in the rear and it rode the best of any Landcruiser ute I've driven since 1965.

Since sold that ute and bought a new one with 3900kg GVM upgrade.

Something like this, with lighter interior materials would be ideal, and would help to address weight issues



Bob

i wouldnt like to be negative however you will be very challenged to find a 79 single or dual cab that will not be flogged to the craphouse for 15 k and a finding a dual cab under 45k is a proverbial crapshoot.

good luck with ya search mate hope it goes well.

cheers jed

As stupid as this may sound running along lines of a Land rover and slightly out of square

ADF are currently auctioning off their 20 year plus fleet of Land rovers

Majority of them are standard 2 door well body some FFR (Fitted For Radio) just e,mans has a storage cabinet on passneger side allowing 1 or 2 auxillary batteries and 24 v operating system.

But they also have a few dual cab 6x6 and also 6x6 ambulance variants - these going for around the 35K mark you also need a higher LR possibly HR truck licence to drive the 6x6 on road due to weight involved most of them have around a 2000 kg payload rating

WA states for multiple axles ie more than 2 requires a HR whilst rest of country go by the weight involved, yet to get a proper determination on this aspect

the DOWNSIDE they are wider in body and axle width to standard as such you don't want to bent a axle or body work spare not that common !