thanks every one for you're helpfull comments, i am looking at a second hand campomatic camper, no decisions made yet just doing a bit of home work. can anyone tell me when or what year they started shipping from china.
thanks again every one for you're time. kindest regards pickles.
Camp-o-matic was a family owned and run company in Queensland for over 30 years, and was sold and moved to SA. During its time based in SA, a move was made to have the campers manufactured overseas, and qulity control slipped, and what was a brilliantly designed and manufactured camper, soon was dogged by quality issues, and poorly finished off products. From what I can gather these quality issues and overseas manufacture commenced around 2004/2005, and continued until the company was eventually purchased and moved to Sydney in 2007/2008.
Now based in Sydney, the company moved from overseas manufacture, to overseas manufacture of the rolling chassis and reverted back to local assembly, to include a few more local products, including all of the canvas being Wax Converters canvas manufactured in the Hunter Valley in NSW, all of the 240 electrical parts are either clipsal or HPM, the stove and sink is from Spinflow manufactured in the UK, all of the gas components are from local suppliers in Sydney, the LED lights and reading lights are from Hella Australia while all of the external lights are from Narva Australia, the fride is from Waeco in Queensland and the window mesh is supplied by Stratco but imported from Japan.
A fully optioned Camp/o/matic Ranger XTC including boat loader and full canvas walls will now set you back the best part of $42,000-$44,000, however there are a few later modelled Ranger XTC seconhand units being sold for prices ranging from $21,000 to $30,000.
If considering a secondhand unit in the 2004 to 2005 era, which is the time quality started to slip, if you look at the canvas awning around the stove area, you will find that some have an extended piece over the kitchen area, whereas some will have no extention and the adjacent pole will be closer to the end of the extended kitchen. The extended awning is a sign that the camper could be an overseas manufactured model.
I have spoken to owners of Camp/o/matic campers which have been purchased from SA, and yes they have had quite a few issues including leaking or poor quality canvas and cracked draw bars, however they were quick to defend the Sydney based operation, and actually praised them for their attempts to rectify problems surfacing in their SA purchased campers.
So to sum up, if you are purchasing a secondhand unit from 2004 or prior, you could be pretty safe in the thoughts that it was one of the quality Australian built units. If purchasing a model around the 2007/2008 era, be aware that it could either be a complete oversease built unit, or one of the overseas chassis assembled in Australia using Australian canvas and other bibs and bobs. I have a friend who is about to take delivery of a 2009 model, and I will be interested to compare it to my 2002 model in close quarters. I was down at Camp/o/matic HQ in Sydney last week and did have a little time to go over a current display model, and whilst I noticed some areas which appeared to be lighter in construction, I'll reserve my judgement until I can get a closer look at my mates newish camper.
Overseas manufacture does not automatically indicate poor quality, but in the Camp/o/matic campers it does indicate that perhaps a closer inspection is required. Reallistically most off-road campers will never get used to their full potential, and what will fail on one could either be the result of hard use, or it could be the result of inferior manufacture.
Good luck with your decision.
