jayco finch how good are they ?

Hi,

I do not have one personnally, but I have long conversations with people who have.

They have said to me that they are amazingly comfortable, and easy to use.

They said the good points compared to camper trailer is:

- Easy to setup, a bit faster than trailer
- Nicer kitchen
- great to use at powered campsite & water supply site

The bad points (compared to camper)

- feels too squashy inside with 3 young kids
- there annex on jayco not as big as camper
- weight is heavier than their camper

They are still very happy with jayco, but just their thoughts

Hope this helps

Thanks

TonyG

We have a jayco camper, along with good freinds of ours who we travel with regularly, and we love it. Stopping at roadside for a cuppa is easy peasy, and storage on the floor is very handy.

The finch is one of the smaller Jayco models and it might pay to measure the width of the main bed for you and the missus. Our freinds have the hawk and the beds are a bit bigger, ours is a penguin (no slide out beds) and I find the main bed is a bit narrow, which really comes to light in hot weather.

Setting up for one night stops is simple, and having cupboards, a sink and fridge inside ready to go is worth the extra weight in my opinion. Plus all the newer Jayco's are setup ready for battery power if you want to go down that path.

Cheers,

Muzz

We have the '04 Dove outback which has the upgraded suspension, as yours does. It's been on some rough tracks and nothings fallen off. We also have installed solar power, gas hot water (truma), external shower etc. See if you can get the dealer to throw in inner spring mattresses, ours did. They also threw in end flies, 12 volt battery system and on road costs.

The Finch has 2 double beds wheras the Dove has a queen bed at one end and a double the other. It tows well behind our diesel Rodeo. Like the others say, it's easy setting up camp and we have it down to about 10 minutes with the Coolibah awning extended.

Good luck

Pat

I have a 15' Viscount, bunks for the kids and huge annexe. These Finches sound nice little jobs but as others have said before, like my van, you can take these vans along corrugations and even worse, but...... it's only a matter of time. The wear and tear is accumulative. Ours has been great to take the family around and will carry on giving us good service for a couple of years or so, yet. But eventually we're going for a good off-road camper. Sounds like you're going the opposite way. Our main concern regarding campers has been ease of putting up for an o/night and storage space.

I tow my Jayco Penguin with a 3.0 auto patrol no worries. It scoots along in 3rd gear (it's not good to tow in overdrive...manual or auto) at about 95 to 100 without breaking a sweat and eats hills no worries. As for fuel, on our big trip up to Broome we used between 6 and 9 lts less at each fill up than our freind with a 4.2 80 series towing their hawk.

You won't have any drama's with your new patrol, just don't flog it to death.

Cheers,

Muzz

Hi,
I'm going through the same process as you. Almost purchased the a Jayco, but then had a look at the Goldstream. No comparision.
The Goldstream is more expensive and the quality reflects that. Picking mine up in September.

Regards

Kim

Hi Kim
We also looked at the Goldstream/ which is lovely but out of our budget, champagne taste ! on a beer budget! they didnt have hot dipped gal chassis but had everything else as far as Mrs Pump is concerned ! Pity we can win Lotto ! Heard a few negative reports but get that with Jayco too! where do you plan on travelling ? Do you mind telling me how much you paid and what extras? did you buy it in Qld ?