sandalwood Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 Any reviews on these please? Taylor Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ron. Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 Top build quality but their price reflects the fact. If the layout suits, the price suits, and the space suits then go for it. Especially their ‘N’ range with the normal caravan type door. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sandalwood Posted September 29, 2018 Author Share Posted September 29, 2018 Tks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don636 Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 We looked these amongst others before we bought our Vantage Neo but decided against them due to the, in our opinion, overly fussy styling and we thought the build quality was not quite up to the level of the Vantage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest pelmetman Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 Don636 - 2018-09-29 5:12 PM We looked these amongst others before we bought our Vantage Neo but decided against them due to the, in our opinion, overly fussy styling and we thought the build quality was not quite up to the level of the Vantage. Overly fussy styling? :-S ......... Having spent a nice evening in a IH on a couple of occasions.......cant say I was unimpressed by the build quality B-) ........ .......and I suspect it'll make a very nice 4 wheel caravan much like your Vantage one day :D ....... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colin Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 pelmetman - 2018-09-29 5:38 PM Don636 - 2018-09-29 5:12 PM We looked these amongst others before we bought our Vantage Neo but decided against them due to the, in our opinion, overly fussy styling and we thought the build quality was not quite up to the level of the Vantage. Overly fussy styling? :-S ......... Having spent a nice evening in a IH on a couple of occasions.......cant say I was unimpressed by the build quality B-) ........ .......and I suspect it'll make a very nice 4 wheel caravan much like your Vantage one day :D ....... Haven't looked in a Vantage since they first came on the market, at that time the salesman tried to tell us about the quality, gf soon showed him where he was wrong, at that time they where not anywhere near the same league as IH, still tell enough people enough times how good you are and some believe you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dicksob Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 Hi Taylor, we are on our 5th IH, so you could say we know quite a bit about them! Currently got an N-630-RL which is excellent. The design and build quality are absolutely first class, though at a price. Delighted to answer any questions. Bill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don636 Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 Anybody any idea what the reference to 4 wheeled caravan means - beats me? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowie Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 £ 74k for a N-630RLS and you still have to make your bed up every evening? Or accept that you have a bed that is made up of several pieces that have to be put somewhere when you want a sofa? And even when it looks as though you could leave the double bed made up on a long trip, you have to climb over your partner to take a leak in the wee small hours! It’s not good enough is it? ( and this applies to most vans and caravans) Nice build quality, a bit old-fashioned maybe, and a bit like a caravan in concept. I’m not sure if I understood “pelmet’s” point, but maybe I get it. Cheers, Snowie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
starvin marvin Posted September 29, 2018 Share Posted September 29, 2018 sandalwood - 2018-09-29 12:54 PM Any reviews on these please? Taylor Bit late isn’t it? Thought you had bought one last week? Change of heart? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest pelmetman Posted September 30, 2018 Share Posted September 30, 2018 Don636 - 2018-09-29 9:45 PM Anybody any idea what the reference to 4 wheeled caravan means - beats me? The van's are well built and will last for years B-) .........But how long will that bit under the bonnet last? ;-) ........ It'll be the MOT rules that will turn them into caravans 8-) ......... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deneb Posted September 30, 2018 Share Posted September 30, 2018 Having cut my finger on the end of a screw protruding into the locker space of an IH van at the NEC - an example which I'm sure they would have taken extra care in assembling as it was destined to be a show exhibit - I'm also not sure on the build quality aspect. added to that, their design seems to me to consist of a lot of superfluous "pretty" bits that serve no function other than to affect usable payload. Bits of wood and fabric fixed to the ceiling for instance, and a need to have their initials plastered over every conceivable surface in case you forget what you've bought I suppose. I'm with Don on finding Vantage's build quality better, although I notice that since the change of ownership they too are finding it difficult to resist the tendency to included added bling creeping into their designs :-( Any van you buy, no matter what make, comes with the possibility/risk that it might eventually turn into a 4-wheel caravan, surely? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest pelmetman Posted September 30, 2018 Share Posted September 30, 2018 Deneb - 2018-09-30 11:37 AM Any van you buy, no matter what make, comes with the possibility/risk that it might eventually turn into a 4-wheel caravan, surely? Not those built last century as they can be repaired with a hammer :D .......... Which is why the supply of vehicles to the Classic cars and van market will cease to increase, as keeping the newer even more complicated euro engines compliant will become cost prohibitive, the only vehicles that will reach 20 years old in future will be super cars :-| ........ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PAJay Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 dicksob - 2018-09-29 6:41 PM Hi Taylor, we are on our 5th IH, so you could say we know quite a bit about them! Currently got an N-630-RL which is excellent. The design and build quality are absolutely first class, though at a price. Delighted to answer any questions. Bill Five vans? If they are so good , why have you changed so often? Do you buy new? I am of an age where if it ain't broke, don't fix , comes to mind! I guess you must be a salesman's dream buyer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will86 Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 pelmetman - 2018-09-30 12:02 PM Not those built last century as they can be repaired with a hammer :D .......... And that is what decided us against another Rapido, they appeared to be moving towards more decorative interiors than practical. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pepe63xnotuse Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 PAJay - 2018-10-01 9:26 AM dicksob - 2018-09-29 6:41 PM Hi Taylor, we are on our 5th IH, so you could say we know quite a bit about them! Currently got an N-630-RL which is excellent. The design and build quality are absolutely first class, though at a price. Delighted to answer any questions. Bill Five vans? If they are so good , why have you changed so often? Do you buy new? I am of an age where if it ain't broke, don't fix , comes to mind! I guess you must be a salesman's dream buyer I would assume that Bill changed their van(s) because he/they wanted to and that he/they could afford to do so. All this- I've had my van for 20-30 years- malarkey fools no one. The reason some folk keep a vehicle that long is because they just couldn't afford to buy a newer one, plain and simple. So if folk are in a position to renew/change their vehicles frequently, be they MHs or cars, then good luck to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stuwsmith Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 pepe63 - 2018-10-01 11:13 AMPAJay - 2018-10-01 9:26 AMdicksob - 2018-09-29 6:41 PMHi Taylor, we are on our 5th IH, so you could say we know quite a bit about them! Currently got an N-630-RL which is excellent. The design and build quality are absolutely first class, though at a price. Delighted to answer any questions.BillFive vans? If they are so good , why have you changed so often? Do you buy new? I am of an age where if it ain't broke, don't fix , comes to mind! I guess you must be a salesman's dream buyerI would assume that Bill changed their van(s) because he/they wanted to and that he/they could afford to do so.All this- I've had my van for 20-30 years- malarkey fools no one. The reason some folk keep a vehicle that long is because they just couldn't afford to buy a newer one, plain and simple.So if folk are in a position to renew/change their vehicles frequently, be they MHs or cars, then good luck to them. My VW LWB Nektar is 17 years old and owned from new. I could afford to buy a new one but havent come across one that we would consider better than what we have. I guess we were lucky in choosing a van that we have been happy with. Reliable, economical and small enough to use as our car.Perhaps its down to my belief in keeping things simple. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don636 Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 We have had our Vantage Neo for 4 years and are very happy with it but we do still have a casual look around now and again to see if anything catches our eye and are in the fortunate position of being able to change if we so chose. To date we have not found another motorhome that matches our layout requirements and that is, in our opinion, as well built and designed so we stay as we are. I maintain the van inside, out and underneath to an obsessive level of detail and consequently it looks virtually as new. The only part of the van that shows any sign of aging are perhaps the carpets and upholstery and even then I am being very critical. It would only require some new carpets and upholstery in a couple of years or so time to have it looking brand new for a relatively small outlay compared to buying a new van so I can't see the point in changing just to have a new van. Unless we decide in the future that we no longer want a rear U-shaped lounge layout I guess we might never change. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pepe63xnotuse Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 Don636 - 2018-10-01 2:22 PM It would only require some new carpets and upholstery in a couple of years or so time to have it looking brand new for a relatively small outlay compared to buying a new van so I can't see the point in changing just to have a new van. Hi Don But doesn't that just make my point?...if someone would be needing "justify" the outlay, then they probably can't really afford a new van anyway.. (and by "afford" I mean being able to spend the silly amounts of money MHs cost, without so much as a second thought..). If instead of MHs, this was about cars, I doubt folk would be saying how they had seriously looked at buying new ones but had instead decided to just fit new seat covers and carpets to their 20 year old Sierras? (lol) (we have several friends who rarely seem to be able to take their cars in for a service, without coming away from the dealer' having part ex'd them for new ones! (lol) ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dicksob Posted October 1, 2018 Share Posted October 1, 2018 PAJay - 2018-10-01 9:26 AM dicksob - 2018-09-29 6:41 PM Hi Taylor, we are on our 5th IH, so you could say we know quite a bit about them! Currently got an N-630-RL which is excellent. The design and build quality are absolutely first class, though at a price. Delighted to answer any questions. Bill Five vans? If they are so good , why have you changed so often? Do you buy new? I am of an age where if it ain't broke, don't fix , comes to mind! I guess you must be a salesman's dream buyer Hi, I’ll ignore the rudeness and sarcasm of your response :'( . For Taylor’s benefit I was offering my experience over a long period ,of my knowledge of the design and build practices of IH. My current van had photos taken at each stage of the build, postings are all on MotorhomeFun for anyone interested. Bill Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ron. Posted October 2, 2018 Share Posted October 2, 2018 snowie - 2018-09-29 10:15 PM £ 74k for a N-630RLS and you still have to make your bed up every evening? Or accept that you have a bed that is made up of several pieces that have to be put somewhere when you want a sofa? And even when it looks as though you could leave the double bed made up on a long trip, you have to climb over your partner to take a leak in the wee small hours! It’s not good enough is it? ( and this applies to most vans and caravans) Cheers, Snowie Any N630RL owner will tell you that making the beds means just sliding the seat bases inward, dropping the seat backs into the spaces provided - and that’s it. There is no need to move anything else, and yes, you can still walk to the toilet. With regard to the “superfluous bits” in another post, this is called ambience and much better to return to on a stinking night than the usual masses of blank plastic looking surroundings which is the norm. One wonders how the likes of Carthage ever get to sell their products, but they do. Ron. Ex IH owner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowie Posted October 2, 2018 Share Posted October 2, 2018 ron. - 2018-10-02 8:09 PM snowie - 2018-09-29 10:15 PM £ 74k for a N-630RLS and you still have to make your bed up every evening? Or accept that you have a bed that is made up of several pieces that have to be put somewhere when you want a sofa? And even when it looks as though you could leave the double bed made up on a long trip, you have to climb over your partner to take a leak in the wee small hours! It’s not good enough is it? ( and this applies to most vans and caravans) Cheers, Snowie Any N630RL owner will tell you that making the beds means just sliding the seat bases inward, dropping the seat backs into the spaces provided - and that’s it. There is no need to move anything else, and yes, you can still walk to the toilet. Ron. Ex IH owner. But a longitudinal bed where you have to climb over your partner? Can’t be right. Unless you can slide down to the end, but it didn’ look like that to me. Cheers, Snowie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ron. Posted October 2, 2018 Share Posted October 2, 2018 snowie - 2018-10-02 8:47 PM ron. - 2018-10-02 8:09 PM snowie - 2018-09-29 10:15 PM £ 74k for a N-630RLS and you still have to make your bed up every evening? Or accept that you have a bed that is made up of several pieces that have to be put somewhere when you want a sofa? And even when it looks as though you could leave the double bed made up on a long trip, you have to climb over your partner to take a leak in the wee small hours! It’s not good enough is it? ( and this applies to most vans and caravans) Cheers, Snowie Any N630RL owner will tell you that making the beds means just sliding the seat bases inward, dropping the seat backs into the spaces provided - and that’s it. There is no need to move anything else, and yes, you can still walk to the toilet. Ron. Ex IH owner. But a longitudinal bed where you have to climb over your partner? Can’t be right. Unless you can slide down to the end, but it didn’ look like that to me. Cheers, Snowie I should have made clear that I was discribing the twin single bed option. However, you can have a longitudinal or a lateral double. The former allowing you to slide off the end without disturbing your partner or the latter meaning you can’t. The choice is yours and it is right. Ron Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don636 Posted October 2, 2018 Share Posted October 2, 2018 I would offer the following further comment on why I preferred the Vantage to IH when buying. As regards build quality I had looked at a lot of vans before purchasing and quite a few were disappointing in that the showroom examples had a number of build issues such as loose or broken parts or build debris evident in lockers for instance. Anything like that puts me off instantly. The Autotrail V-Line was particularly bad in this respect. When looking at the IH RL I could not find anything wrong with the integrity of the build as such and the only aspect of the build that I was unhappy with was the fact that when you looked into the upper lockers there was no back to them and all you could see was the carpet stuck to the walls, joins and all. Looked a bit cheap to me and this contrasted strongly with the over the top styling for me with loud stripy seat coverings, brightly coloured trim on the doors, IH lettering everywhere,old fashioned looking exposed hinges and knock on edging to the panels. I appreciate that this is a matter of personal taste however and I recognise that IH vans are very popular. When we first saw a Vantage van in the flesh we were immediately drawn to the much simpler and, in our opinion, more classy design but that is personal taste. Could not find any problems with the build quality at all and this has been borne out over the last four years. The upper lockers are fully formed units with proper backs by the way. The attention to detail both inside and under the van is very good indeed. There are always opposing views on the merits of rear lounge layouts and the main gripe seems to be with having to make up the beds. It takes us two minutes to make up and three minutes to put away so not exactly a great hardship. All of the bedding goes under a seat and at night any spare backrests or cushions go there as well so nothing left laying around. The advantage is that there is much more living space during the day and a more spacious feel than in a continental style front dinette/fixed bed layout. We are loungers when in the van so this is important to us. I can't get my head round devoting more than half the van over to beds leaving a very cramped kitchen area and a relatively cramped dining area. On some vans I can barely get into the seat round the fixed table leg and no way to get my feet up to watch the TV. The idea is that you use the front seats but, whilst they are OK for driving I do not want to sit in them to relax as they are not comfortable enough and you can't get your feet up. Each to there own I suppose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest pelmetman Posted October 3, 2018 Share Posted October 3, 2018 pepe63 - 2018-10-01 11:13 AM I would assume that Bill changed their van(s) because he/they wanted to and that he/they could afford to do so. All this- I've had my van for 20-30 years- malarkey fools no one. The reason some folk keep a vehicle that long is because they just couldn't afford to buy a newer one, plain and simple. So if folk are in a position to renew/change their vehicles frequently, be they MHs or cars, then good luck to them. When we inherited Horace my parents decided to swap from tugging to campers......he got through 6 in 24 years .......... They were.......................and..............Reason for change/sale....... 2nd hand A/S PVC..............................To fat to fit in it ....... 2nd hand A/S Clubman.......................Unreliable VW chassis....... New Compass Coachbuilt...................Lean't to far over at roundabouts......... New Pilote A Class..............................Leaked like a sieve.......... New Rapido A Class...........................Telly too high.......... New Hymer A Class............................He became a danger to other road users 8-) ........ As you know ;-) ........I semi retired at 46........and retired proper at 58 B-) .......... He had to keep working until he was 70 to fund his Moho habit *-) ........ So who made the most sensible decision? :D .......... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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