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On-line brochureThank you for your interest in the Bushtracker range of caravans. Recognised Australia wide for over 16 years as the leader in off-road caravans. What we are really about is correcting all of the features that have caused people problems traveling with caravans over the past 40 years. We have engineered designs and equipment to correct the faults and weaknesses that have caused failures in caravans traveling in the outback. You really need to see what we are doing and understand why we do it for your own benefit. Our success is your success as you happily travel around.
We design custom layouts to suit the individual, and you will be pleasantly surprised at all of the variations and unique ideas you can see at the factory. At the factory you can also see gear and equipment not available anywhere else. We are Australia's number one off-road caravan, you owe it to yourself to come and see why.
Standard inclusions
Our aim has been to build not only the first truly heavy duty caravan in Australia, but also the finest quality caravan. We start with the best and strongest four-wheel independent suspension, that is load sharing as well. Then for maximum strength and longevity we incorporate an off-road trailer in and under the engineering and design.
We even add a watertight door to close over the caravan door for crossing rivers and floods. The Bushtracker is water tight to 1.2 metres! That can really save you and it is a big help in the bull dust as well!
We offer the best quality materials and equipment available. From solid Tasmanian Oak doors and drawers with dovetailing; to aircraft style welded and double riveted aluminium structural box section exterior wall frames in 25x25 and 50x25mm, 2 and 3mm wall thickness. Why? Because it is the best! Exterior aircraft frames are not built of glued and stapled timber and neither is Bushtracker! We build custom layouts to suit your needs.
All of our normal inclusions listed in the below link give you the best basic package of any caravan on the market, as well as your selection of vinyl, panelling, curtains, bench tops, and upholstery.
Click here for the standard inclusions list.
Layouts
Layouts do not affect the price, and you can have anything you like. Each caravan is custom designed to suit your individual needs.
We literally have hundreds of layouts to choose from, and usually have something pretty close to what you would like in our collection. After talking with you about gear and style of travel, can get a group of layouts for you to work with. When we know what hobbies interest you, a computer workstation with a satellite uplink for managing your business and e-mail in the bush, or a freezer hold for Barramundi, or maybe a workbench and charging system for Minelab gold detecting equipment. These things and mode of travel and sleeping accommodations and tow vehicle choice etc, will affect layout choices of samples that we can send away with you.
We allow considerable time to coach you through the process, as your success in achieving your planned lifestyle is our success and will sell us more vans as you happily travel around.
Click here to link to our sample layouts.
Wall frames
We would suggest to you that there is a real advantage to coming up to the factory for a visit. We guarantee you will be impressed. No one builds frames like we do. Most are still building glued and stapled timber frames on the exterior walls.
Of the very few who build in aluminium, most are building in 1mm "C" channel with single pop rivets. We are building in 2mm and 3mm square box section 25mm x 25mm and 50mm x 25mm with full laps on 3mm angle, double rivets diagonal in aircraft style and welded as well. Then all the corners are welded and through bolted. Nothing compares with that in strength and longevity, and it is immune to the normal caravan destroyers, like dry rot, borers, wood swelling, fungus, water damage, etc. Boeing does not build their exterior walls of aircraft in glued and stapled timber, and neither does Bushtracker.
In the tropics wire staples only last a few years. All cladding is in 250mm strips and they even staple on the cladding in the overlaps where wind at 100km per hour can blow moisture up to attack both the wood frames and also the staples.
They also have to continually battle dry rot and fungus in wooden exterior walls, and some have even resorted to using treated wood to try and slow down the dry rot effect. This has only made more problems in wood framed caravans because the material used to treat the wood is copper based and the copper could chemically react with the aluminium exterior cladding eating it away in time. Even normal condensation and humidity in the tropics will attack the thin staples in the exterior walls and start these problems. On our cladding, we use hidden structural rivets every 250mm on each wall stud. It is many times stronger and more durable. There is just no comparison.
We also use three inches of cooler board insulation in the roofs and one inch in the walls not batts or fibreglass to settle out on the corrugation. Why? Because it's the best.
Because of the nature of the construction of our caravans, our vans are lighter and stronger than a wooden exterior frame van from the trailer up. A wood exterior frame means some fairly substantial timbers to span the roof. Ours are not only more durable, but also lighter and stronger from the body armour up, while heavier from the armour down in chassis and suspension, where it really counts - which means we have a lower centre of gravity than other caravans.
Suspension
The Bushtracker suspension is a fully tandem independent and load-sharing suspension. The fact that the load-sharing characteristic reduces the shock of rough tracks to the payload is why the Defense Department likes it so much.
The load-sharing characteristics are so important, because when the leading arm of the suspension hits an obstacle it shifts half of the load onto the rear arm of the suspension, and when the rear arm of the suspension hits the obstacle it shifts half of the load onto the front arm of the suspension. The net effect is that the suspension articulates rather than delivering the shock of the road to the van twice in the tandem form. It is the suspension that moves in the ruts, shifting the load front to back and then back to front, rather than jarring the van by delivering the entire shock to the van with each wheel. It is simply the best. It has been around for about 20 years, but is not widely used as it is more expensive than normal caravan suspensions.
You must have a fully independent suspension for several reasons. Here's a couple: One, the independent leaves a tunnel through the centre of the van for higher ground clearance, an axle suspension drags the axle when the wheels fall into the rut, and the axle acts like a boat anchor to bog the tow vehicle. Two, and most importantly, the independent breaks up what is called in engineering language "harmonic motion" which basically means that when there is just the right speed and timing on the ruts, the bounce builds on itself to create a destructive force. When you see it you will like it and most importantly it is load sharing in a tandem mode.
We have also done the engineering to incorporate the option of 12" two piece hub drum commercial brakes into our suspension and that is a major improvement over the standard 10" or 12" caravan brakes. Besides better brakes, our larger hubs allow for bigger bearings as well. Our suspension can be fully aligned, as each A-frame is adjustable. It is simply the best, and stands head and shoulders above the rest.
What we are about is building the best and strongest, not just "the look". As it turns out, when you compare apples and apples (as close as you can get since we offer things not available anywhere else), if you were to price up their vans with what we offer, we are also very comparable in price.
Built to last
Before you choose a caravan manufacturer, you need to see how they are actually built. You owe it to yourself to come to the factory for a visit and see the difference. Call us for an appointment and we will be happy to show you through the factory. We welcome a fair comparison with the rest.
If you are too far away to come for a visit, we can do it all by fax and mail. Even your vinyl, curtains, upholstery, etc. can be done that way, and in fact some of our customers come to the factory for the very first time when they pick up their new Bushtracker caravan. However, we would suggest that a round trip airfare is a small price to pay to get the highest quality caravan on the road today. And it is something you may have for the rest of your life, so a trip the factory is well worth the confidence it will build in our product. Here you can see all of the stages of construction that are hidden once the caravan is completed. You can make the decision with the confidence and security of knowing that you are getting the best.
Call us for an appointment so we have more time to attend to your individual needs, and we will be happy to show you through the factory. We will not make comments about other specific manufacturers, as the energy should be spent showing you how our vans are better. We will say however, that our competitors seem to be content to copy the style of off-road rather than do the hard yards to correct weaknesses that normal caravans have in travelling the Outback. This only fools the people that don’t know what they are looking at. We operate from a different perspective and have engineered the entire van to suit the Outback, and if you come here to see the bones for yourself in the factory you will know for yourself that we really have no competitors.
As to second hand Bushtracker caravans; The problem is that some people will pay more than new value not to have to wait for one to be built. To wait for one second hand that has a layout that you like, and the equipment list that you want, could be a very long wait indeed, it is just impractical. We build “land yachts” to last a lifetime. Just about everyone that sold second hand in the last few years has turned a profit. Not only do they tell us about it, but many, many people have sold their vans to get a larger one built. In the last two years alone they almost all turned a profit.
Optional equipment
Most of our customers just want a high quality touring van that will hold together on some of our rough bitumen roads. After owning a Bushtracker they end up having the confidence to get off the main tracks and do a bit of exploring on their own. Most of our clients have said, that they did not think they were going to remote 4x4 access places, more just general touring and dirt roads. But after finding out just how crowded the main tourist destinations really were, within six months or so they found themselves in a lot more remote regions that they thought! They discovered that the “Best of Australia” is not on the maps.
You need to understand that we offer a range of gear and equipment that no one else in Australia even offers. The rest are about building the look or the style of “Off-Road”, while we are about building the real bones of off road travel in the Outback. What level of gear you need is up to how self-sufficient and independent you really want to be.
We offer general touring self sufficient equipment up to a level of expedition grade equipment, that no one else in Australia even offers. As to the gear selections, we can give some advice on how much of it you need when we talk more about what level of self-sufficiency and independence that you want to achieve. We can give you a fair evaluation.
We would suggest that you get away from the normal light duty, road running caravan gear; and get into some proper expedition grade equipment. (In addition to the extensive package of Standard Equipment we include per our brochure or on this site, which is already the best-equipped caravan in Australia).
For a full options list with pricing, please contact us.
Cost
Call or e-mail us for prices. We include thousands of dollars of what most others would call extras in our Standard Inclusions that they will charge you for.
So that you are not fooled by what the others build, you need to have a closer look at Bushtracker and you will find that; YES, we have the best engineering, YES, we have the best equipment. And YES, we have the nicest interior finishes of any caravan in Australia. You price it up with the Optional Equipment to suit your own level of self-sufficiency and independence, for the lifestyle you want…
Bushtracker really has no competitors in Australia. Our basic aim is to make you self-sufficient and securely “at home” in the bush. For a full options list with pricing, please contact us.
Bottom line
The point is that we excel from our suspension to our aircraft style wall frames, our equipment, engineering, and interior finishes. We build altogether the best caravan in Australia.
We have an enormous range of gear and equipment that no one else even offers and you will have to see it for yourself with a trip to the factory. What we are really talking about is a level of gear and equipment matched to the level of personal freedom and independence that you require. We really have no competitors in Australia.
You owe it to yourself to see what we are doing in person at the factory before you make the mistake of buying something else; so we would like to invite you to come to the factory for a visit. A trip here is a small expense on a “Land Yacht” you are likely to keep for the rest of your life. Here we can give you the real confidence in our vans and show you the real bones of the quality in the construction, as well as a vast number of layout possibilities in books and on computer. Here you can walk through a dozen vans, and get a better feel of confidence for the things that make us number one.
We would like to suggest that you schedule a visit to the factory as soon as possible. You will be impressed with what you see. Be aware that it takes time to build a custom van to the highest quality. You may need to think about booking your own delivery slot as soon as possible if scheduling is important.
That is the only penalty for being number one, they tend to keep us booked up a bit, but the best is worth waiting for. Many of our clients who could not wait and were fooled by what the competition has on to offer, have come back later and said: “Right, well we can wait now.” No one builds a van like we do; we really have no competitors in Australia.
Our basic aim is to make you self-sufficient and securely “at home” in the bush.
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