Arrived back home in Safety Bay WA after battling the worst head winds we have encountered for many years, rain and wind, wind & rain .. van is parked up and Chev in the shed, both filthy and will get a wash in the next few days if my OCD can wait that long 🤣
To recap .. we drove to the factory from WA to take delivery of our new Optimum, the drive over with the Chev was great but the weather was terrible, we thought we were youngsters and could tough it out with a roof top tent for a few days but we soon woke up from that fantasy .. 2 nights was enough and we got to our daughters in Adelaide and advertised it and sold it. 😂
Purpose of the trip was to give the new van a bit of a road test and were very happy to say it went extremely well. We have one cold water JG fitting going to the external shower with a slight drip which I can’t get my Mr Gadget arms in far enough to try and fix and the water tanks appear to have their own mind in filling up … seems to be a different amount each time and I’m using a flow meter I know is accurate .. ideally I’d like to get a 3rd non potable tank put underneath to suit our style of coastal camping. I do think the layout of the water pumps and changeover taps could be easier accessible, maybe take a tip of what Bushtracker do and have an easily accessible manifold cupboard for changing tanks over in future models. None of us are getting younger and getting on the floor to turn taps under the fridge could be better, IMO.
The Van road superbly on its Terraglide airbag suspension, can’t say the same for the Chev, it’s definitely getting the bigger Bilstein shocks fitted plus possibly the airbags on the rear. Travelled approximately 13000klms and some of the worst roads QLD & NSW have.
3 fatalities on the road , a huge Roo, an Emu and a small Bird, no damage to the Chev but it well could have smashed lights or grill so we were lucky … so we will be looking at having a Bull bar fitted before our next trip.
Haven’t finalised the fuel cost / economy etc but it’s been a lot better towing a heavier van than our previous 200 series towing the previous Optimum and a Bushtracker prior to that. No way could I sit as long as I did in the Chev as the 200 series, I have some spine issues and the heated seats were awesome.
Huge thanks to Remon Raffaello and Bobi Petruveski and all the MP factory Crew for building us a van we can be very proud of. 👍👍
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