As the title says we have put a deposit on a new to us van and picking it up at the weekend.
It's our first caravan after many years of camping and trailer tents and folding campers.
It is a 2002 swift challenger
It's in great condition with a lot of extras including motor mover and 2 awnings.it has been owned by the previous owner for the last 7 years and he has decided to pack up due to not using.
Getting slightly excited and already planning our first weekend in November.
As well is two words!
How does a sage know everything about everything? or does he? or does he just think he does?
Remember, if you buy something you bought it, not brought it.
Fetching it Saturday morning and going to have a play with it over the weekend on the drive.
It's in storage at the moment and we can keep it there until December if we want as it is paid up until then.
I will take some photos and post them it's in great condition and looks like it's been well looked after.
The list of accessories is long and I don't think we will need to buy anything else which is one of the reasons we went for it.
It's a little older than we had planned but looks in better condition than most newer models we saw at dealers.
One thing that was winding me up when looking for a van was to many want to be dealers pretending to be private sellers.
Luckily we dropped onto this one and the family have owned it for 7 years and selling as they had not used it much this year through work commitments.
It had 2 new tyres this year and a new leisure battery also has alloy wheels which I like and a motor mover which I need where I live.
Ours was also on a storage site and fortunately I got the service engineer that used to do the services on our FC to check it over before we towed it anywhere.
He found 2 faults that had to be done before we towed it anywhere.
The first was that it had a gubbed Damper and he replaced that.
The second fault was more of a surprise. The brand new car that I had, although fitted with a 13 pin plug, had no 12s wiring in it and I had to get the car dealer to sort that.
Our van is somewhat older than yours and it has taken me a year to bring it up to scratch and for me to work out what works what but we have had a great year in it so far and nothing would tempt me to change it for a newer model.
hi i hope you enjoy your van and have some great hols in it by the way have you checked for damp with a meter just to be sure but if okay enjoy life cheers .tom
Without belittling damp in any way as I have, in the past, had repair some horrendous damp issues, metered damp in a caravan does not necessary mean that there is anything wrong with the van.
Our 1997 Bailey Ranger has damp issues but I have investigated these, cut holes through the insulation, checked that there is no structural problems and then put 50mm vents in the walls of the damp areas.
The one really bad area was the floor from the main door to the toilet area and I have repaired that.
Now, on the return from each trip, I lay out all the bedding in the van and put on a dehumidifier which dries everything out. I then vacuum pack the bedding and store it in its locker so that it is ready for the next trip.
The damp areas I just keep an eye on and none of them are getting any worse while most have dried out quite a bit.
As long as the damp is not affecting the structural integrity of the van and you know it is there, then damp need not be the death knell of an otherwise good van.
Good luck Pencamper and enjoy your extended season!
AS said do check for damp before handing over cash though if you haven't already
Whilst Lobey is right, damp doesn't have to be a non no for a caravan, if left untreated it certainly kill off the structure of a van and lead to large expense if you can't do it yourself
Checked round it when viewed with a damp meter.
It was only a cheap one but seamed to work.
I checked around the windows all the walls and under seating areas also in the rear bathroom.
All seamed ok
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Topic: Picking up our new caravan ...
