Dangerous Elddis
Yesterday I took the cover off our new Elddis Affinity and was shocked to find the wooden surround over the main roof light had fallen off. Obviously we were not in the van at the time, but could you imagine what would have happened if the sharp edge of this wooden surround had landed on one of our heads during the night, or fell off during mealtime knocking hot drinks over everybody?
We have had a torrid time with this caravan so far, less than 6 months old, and been out once and travelled a total of less than 150 miles from delivery. The dealer was simply dreadful in every way imaginable on delivery, and I'm still sorting out problems that should have been completed on the PDI.
Next we have this, a day before we go away, and a week before we take it abroad. The reason it fell down is two-fold;
1. The supports holding it to the roof are just glued with hot melt glue. - A notorious glue for lacking strength unless applied to both surfaces at exactly the right temperature.
2. The supports were 3mm too short so that it was forced up against the rooflight frame, causing extra stress on an already suspect joint.
I would suggest anyone with an Elddis takes a long hard look at this surround. I gather mine is not the first to fall off.
I managed to get an emergency repair, though the whole thing needs replacing.
Guess what? They discovered the wall cupboards are parting company with the roof and it will need to go back for a factory repair.
I suppose it makes a change from the damp issues we've had with both new Baileys and a new Swift.
Comments
-
Don't have a lot of luck with new vans, do you Andrew.
0 -
Well that's another make to knock off the list of caravans to look at when renewing, along with Lunar, Coachman etc.
0 -
Yet people still persist in buying/changing vans. The moral is that if you have a good'un, don't under any circumstances change it.
4 -
Until someone takes the manufacturer to court and wins handsome settlements then l am afraid they won't bother about customer care. We have had four new vans none have come without faults. This last van l have had was not new just 2 1/2 years old did my home work and had it checked out found three faults all done by the dealer under warranty. At present well pleased, don't think l would ever by a new one again, why give the Government 20% Vat plus having problems with sub standard workman ship. Don't tell me to buy German heard loads of horror stories their too
1 -
Heethers,what always surprises me with caravans,is the way we always blame the manufacturers.This must be the only industry where people have faults and "try" and go straight to the manufacturers.
You do not buy from a manufacturer,but a dealer.This reguarly is an issue on facebook,where people think I'm going straight to the company,yet when his Volvo had issues he went to his dealer,not Sweden.
Say you purchased a £33k Kia Sorento or any foreign made vehicle,and has a serious fault,would you take the manufacturer to court,Kia are far too big to sue,you would take the dealer who supplied it to court.
Where I believe manufacturers can assist, via dealers, is in a chain of repair centres trained and authorised to repair vans,not these 7 week wait until it can get back into the factory,then repairs can start, meaning nearly the whole of the summer without use of the van.This is due to no fault of the owner.
When I had a badly dented front wing caused by a motorbike hitting the side of my vehicle,insurance company contacted,claims put in, and an insurance appointed agent rang me up saying the vehicle can come in for repair,this was within the week,not as it is now for us caravanners.
I am not sure currently what the answer is,shortterm,but something needs to change.
I'll get my tin hat now.
0 -
Fozzie
The point is that it’s the manufacturer who builds the thing in the first place, and are the ones sending shoddy vans to the dealers to pass on to their customers. It may legally be that the dealers are liable, but that doesn’t alter the fact that it’s the idiots who build it in the first place who are often useless, combined with poor quality checks during build. Furthermore the manufacturers are plainly aware of the issues, yet don’t appear to be getting a grip on the problems. Instead it’s the dealer who gets the grief.
0 -
But, if the dealers did a PDI as they are supposed to, we, the customer wouldn't have to find all these faults (on behalf of the dealers), which are as a result of shoddy manufacturing and then have to wait for weeks for the faults to be repaired. It would be the dealer with unusable and unsellable caravans in his yard not us the customer after shelling out many thousands of £s. Somehow I doubt that the dealers would like this but if they did they may, hopefully, put a lot of pressure on the manufacturers to get things right. As it is the dealers have no real financial loss.
Having said that, and partially in defense of the caravan manufacturers, it is frequently the bought in equipment that there is a problem with, (cookers, fridges, water heaters, microwaves, toilets etc etc) so perhaps all the blame should not be laid at the caravan manufacturers door.
1 -
yes, there are many bought in components in a whole caravan or MH, that have to be fitted into the overall floorplan...
however, these are installation guidelines with these devices and often, they are plainly not being adhered to, with the overall 'design' and often aesthetics taking preference over install insteuctions...
this, sometimes, leads to devices not working properly.....certainly fridges and heaters with insufficient ventilation are a common cause of usage issues..
the manufacturer is responsible for delivering a decent quality product, and a dealer PDI that actually involves firing up all the appliances and testing them properly in situ would be a great help...
the thing is, the dealer has your money, and will get more back from the manufacturer for carrying out 'warrenty work' so what have they to lose...?
yes, you cs kick and scream and shout the house down but the 'blame' will pass firmly back to the manufacturer, against whom you have no redress...
all a bit cosy isn't it?...
this 'caravan' section (and just about every other forum) is littered with issues ranging from the annoying (rooflight falls on head, microwave held in place by tin tacks) to the rather more serious (water pipes and drainage hose not secured properly resulting in bathroom and kitchen flooding) to the 'absolutely shouldn't happen' (water ingress resulting in new roof/side/floor panels.......)....
yes, I know there are many UK caravans sold here to CC members who post their woes on CT.....but where are the Knaus tirades, the Hymer outpourings, the Fendt fiascos....nowhere...
reading CT would anyone buy a new Coachman, Elddis, Swift or Bailey?......
i dont 'do' caravans but I certainly wouldn't....
a sorry state of affairs, glad I'm not part of it.....
0 -
yes, DD, I fear you're right....
SwiftTalk and the ASOC don't make very good reading, despite a few 'loyal stalwarts' trying to keep the issues 'away from the brand'...
one of the most oft trotted out lines I see is.....'oh well, you have a problem, go and see Mark at the factory....he's brilliant and they always sort it out...'
...why isn't Mark managing the QA process and ensuring his 'warranty team' have little or no work?....
anyone in after sales (good old customer service teams) would probably love to get their hands on the team that constantly sign off the junk going out of the factory gates.....they just see it again a few days after the customer tried to use it.....
I had a wonderful mentor who got me into the service delivery management side of IT world, and he was 'service' through and through.
he told me that, once you learnt what it really took to 'do it right, first time', dealing with the UK retail world would 'drive you nuts'....
i managed to get out before it got to me that badly, but I do know what he meant......
rockets, posteriors comes to mind
0 -
If it came from the honourable league of Wardens it’ll be not for public consumption BB🤫🤭
0 -
..then help out, rather than stick to your always unhelpful 'asides'...
not everyone reads every post and can't possibly 'keep up' in the way you do....
so, if you don't want to retell the story, how about a pointer or even a link to the thread?
now that would be nice.....and constructive, can you manage that?
0 -
Away for the weekend at the moment and horrified that the microwave cabinet had dropped some more. Rather concerned about even sleeping in the van tonight. If the microwave cabinet falls off then the side cabinets will fall too and we have to sleep under them. We certainly will have the head end at the opposite side!
As for PDI, ours was so dreadful I formally complained to Elddis alongside making a real fuss at the dealership. I'm still finding minor faults which should have been done at PDI like connecting up the alarm battery or calibrating the pump. The handover was a joke. The dealer pointed to the Aldi expansion tank and said there is your water heater. When I tried to correct her she insisted she was right.
However, the two dangerous faults on our van are due to poor or faulty construction methods.
0 -
Anyone ever read this interesting research by Bath University?
It goes some way to explain why modern caravans struggle to stay intact on current UK roads. Basically, the suspension is rubbish and is insufficiently compliant to withstand the punishment the chassis goes through in normal use. While the likes of Elddis may go to some lengths to tell the consumer they test their products to near destruction, they don’t tell us what damage they found during such tests, holding their cards very close to their chests.
http://opus.bath.ac.uk/36474/1/UnivBath_MPhil_2013_J_Lewis.pdf
0 -
I fear Elddis hasn’t changed. Our 2003 Crusader suffered from moving furniture, cracked bulkheads and a fridge that jumped out of its housing.
Wheel balancing and fitting shock absorbers helped but, well, what can you say really when words fail?
0 -
It would be interesting to know if one chassis is better than the other ? My current Elddis has a BPW chassis. although Elddis have now gone back to using Al-Ko.
I personally like the BPW coupling and think its much easier to use than the Al-Ko one.
0 -
ALKO parent co purchased the BPW light chassis division last year, so it’s no surprise Elddis are now constructed on ALKO, unlikely to ever see another caravan built on BPW again, certainly not in the UK
0
In yer dreams 
