Hello

My wife and I are considering buying our first motorhome and would welcome some advice please. Intended use is UK holidays, attending car & motorcyle race meetings & (with luck!) the odd trackday.

Our budget won't stretch to buying brand new but we are aiming for one that is less than 5 years old.

Are there any chassis/engine combinations that are especially good..........and any that we should avoid like the plague?

What kind of fuel consumption can we expect in sensible real world mixed driving?

What engine size offers the best compromise in terms of performance and fuel consumption bearing in mind that we will sometimes be towing a 7 type kit car to trackdays etc.

Hopefully chassis rot & corrosion won't be an issue with the age of vehicle we have in mind but are there known weak spots we need to be aware of?

Are there any known/regularly occuring mechanical issues we should be looking out for?

We intend to invest in a damp test meter because everything I have read so far suggests that damp/water penetration is the No.1 motorhome killer..............is damp ingress a regular problem or a rarity these days?

What kind of annual insurance premium might I expect (middle aged old fart, clean licence, rural location)?

Our plan is to start looking around seriously during (what I assume will be) the winter dead zone to get the best deal.

Any other advice or wisdom from people who have trodden the same path would be very, very welcome.

Thank you,
John

I can only offer you one piece of info on this one, after our experience last year hiring one (a sprinter) for a fortnight in Western Australia. We found that the biggest drawback was finding that once we got to the campsite, we needed to get around and having 'set up camp' we couldn't use the camper - Ideally you need to tow a small car.
Having said that, if we had had one it would have been fantastic.

Go for it and happy hunting.


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Originally posted by RACER101
Hello

My wife and I are considering buying our first motorhome and would welcome some advice please. Intended use is UK holidays, attending car & motorcyle race meetings & (with luck!) the odd trackday.

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motorhometrackday

Welcome to the club
http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/viewthread.php?tid=156176&page=1

Still looking myself, having looked at a few, got a feel for what we want it's just waiting for the right one to come up.

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Originally posted by MikeCapon

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Originally posted by RACER101
Hello

My wife and I are considering buying our first motorhome and would welcome some advice please. Intended use is UK holidays, attending car & motorcyle race meetings & (with luck!) the odd trackday.

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Sorry but the above question just made me think.......


[img]
motorhometrackday [/img]

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What sort of budget do you guys have ?

My neighbour is selling his Burstner A747.

Very low mileage, loads of extras. I think he wants around £44K.

£44k

Are you sure its a Burstner and not a Boeing?

We've recently bought a Compass Cruiser 2001 Peugeot 2.4 td , returns 25 - 29 mpg, the insurance was about £250 fully comp 2 drivers.

Takes ages to get anywhere ,we keep stopping for a brew up!!



[img][/img]

[Edited on 6/7/11 by Surrey Dave]

Thanks for the replies so far

The F1/Motorhome piccy certainly made me chuckle. Kinda reminded me of the thing Top Gear did with motorhomes being raced (crashed?) by of some British Touring Car drivers.

In terms of budget £44K is well out of my league I'm afraid. Sub £30K is my maximum with £25K-ish being ideal............the more I spend on the motorhome the less I will have to buy/build a trackday weapon!

I am still very interested in hearing from anyone able to supply facts & figures as per my original post . Thanks.

One thing that has already become clear is how relatively slowly these motorhomes seem to depreciate (at least when compared to luxury car depreciation). Already I have seen dozens of 10 year old+ models for sale at over £20K which seems bonkers to me.

That said, it also strikes me that determining the value of secondhand motorhomes is nowhere near as easy as it is for cars. Motorhomes seem to have far less model standardisation and there doesn't appear to be a Parkers Guide to offer guidance. Consequently asking prices, for at least outwardly similar models, can be wildly different. As a motorhome vigin this definately worries me when it comes to laying out a great deal of hard earned cash...............how the hell do you decide what represents a fair price and how do you choose one that gives you a fair chance of recouping a decent percentage of your original outlay when you subsequently sell it on?

Thanks again,
John

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Originally posted by RACER101Are there any chassis/engine combinations that are especially good..........and any that we should avoid like the plague?

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What kind of fuel consumption can we expect in sensible real world mixed driving?

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quote:

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What engine size offers the best compromise in terms of performance and fuel consumption bearing in mind that we will sometimes be towing a 7 type kit car to trackdays etc.

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quote:

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Hopefully chassis rot & corrosion won't be an issue with the age of vehicle we have in mind but are there known weak spots we need to be aware of?

Are there any known/regularly occuring mechanical issues we should be looking out for?

We intend to invest in a damp test meter because everything I have read so far suggests that damp/water penetration is the No.1 motorhome killer..............is damp ingress a regular problem or a rarity these days?

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quote:

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What kind of annual insurance premium might I expect (middle aged old fart, clean licence, rural location)?

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Any other advice or wisdom from people who have trodden the same path would be very, very welcome.

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Yes they do hold their price very well it seemed to me that the price related more to the age than any particular model,obviously if you buy from a dealer you pay more but have some backup , we bought privately and saved approx 5k over dealer prices ,although we have had a few things to sort out.


There alot of different layouts , and you need to think about how many travelling seats you need with regard to seat belts and the law, no children under 12 can travel in the rear without seat belts, seat belts can't be fitted to sideways facing seats.

I think after a certain year nobody can travel in the rear without seatbelts.

We went for the rear lounge setup.



[Edited on 6/7/11 by Surrey Dave]

Thanks for the additional information that has been posted Much appreciate you taking the time and trouble........you have certainly added a few useful extra items onto my list of things to consider which is helpful.

Fuel consumption at 22mpg is fairly disappointing tbh. Is this a Ford characteristic or simply a reflection of your racing driver right foot BobM? With the race car unhitched does the consumtion improve much? (or perhaps get worse because you peddle even faster without the trailer behind!!)

Squeezing out 29mpg sounds much more attractive and was around the figure I was hoping to hear but I don't want to kid myself................does this require you to drive ultra carefully with total economy always in mind?

The common engine sizes nowadays seem to be 2.0L, 2.3L and 2.8L. Despite what the official consumption figures might say I wonder whether the bigger capacity engine might actually be more economical (or at least no less economical) than the smaller variant because you don't need to thrash it mercilessly to make progress. Plus the added torque and horsepower will make the whole driving experience easier than it would be in a relatively small capacity gutless wonder?

Thanks again,
John