Unfortunately, we did not pick up the caravan. We travelled to Sydney on the 20th and were very pleased with what we saw, the repair to the fibreglass was very well done and almost undetectable. We had a serious problem with the caravan so went silent and deep until we had tried to resolve it with the dealer. We had ordered the Caravan with only two non standard options that would effect the weight, an extra battery (about 30Kg) in front of axels and a washing machine (about 40Kg) at the rear. These options should have balanced each other out with tow ball mass and only added 70Kg to the ATM.
The show stopper was the Empty Ball Mass of 263Kg on the trailer compliance plate; this was way in excess of the 175Kg we were advised in July. We own a Pajero and the caravan could not be legally towed in NSW. The dealer was really good they tried relocating the two batteries to under a seat (over the axels) and reweighed the Caravan on the Monday. It then gave an Empty Ball Mass of 243Kg which is still too high as the ATM (about 120Kg higher than in spec) of the caravan was well over 2.5t (the Pajero needs an Empty ball mass of 180Kg over 2.5t). We also visited a local engineering firm about getting the Pajero towing weights upgraded, but this is expensive and still 240Kg is a lot of weight on the tows rear axel.
Since then we have had to do a lot of thinking as the Caravan was really nice and what we wanted, but the heavy weight on the tow ball worried us. We checked with a few Jayco dealers and found that a typical Empty Tow Ball mass for the Outback version was around 230Kg to 257Kg nowhere near 175Kg. It looks like the Outback version has a serious design flaw.
We also got some good help from
@ACTraveller who has the touring version of the same van built around the same time. Their Empty Ball Mass was 166Kg which is much more realistic. It appears the weights of the touring version are fine and the Outback version has the problem. This Outback problem may be due to the extra 300mm length and heavier chassis plus the JTEC suspension shifting the Caravan centre of gravity further back than the touring suspension.
We are very pleased with the dealers efforts to resolve the problem and they are giving us a full refund of our deposit. So we have no complaint about dealer service, but we have an issue with the engineers in the Jayco factory who got the weight distribution so wrong. We are now starting with a clean slate. Most likely we buy off the lot to ensure the empty tow ball mass and ATM is reasonable.
Our options are:
1. wait and see if the 2015 Outback version resolves the problem (it is getting a layout redesign)
2. Buy a Pop top 17.88 (need to do more research)
3. Buy the 16ft single axel version (note its Ball weight 187kg and we prefer dual axel)
4. Buy another brand of van (least desirable)
Also we now have a nice new garage completed on Monday in which to store our non existent caravan.
Always look on the bright side.
