Welcome Elmore's to MySwag.
Been watching this and thought I would chime in.
We bought the kakadu 16'XT 12 months ago. We did the figures and by the time we optioned up an Uluru we were better off to just go the Kakadu.
Three main thoughts that come into mind:
Drawbar:90% of where we camp is very remote and difficult to get into. For this reason we opted not to get the extended drawbar or the boat rack option (weight). Even with the short drawbar I have damaged the jockey wheel on high erosion mounds and exiting high creek banks etc. Keep in mind that’s with 285x75x17 KM2's on it as well. Having said that, the jockey wheel is the only thing that’s touched so far.
Weight:Finners is right. Any serious stuff and weight really is your enemy. There would have been 2 times I can think of straight away, were it not for front and rear lockers the result of that day would have been a little different in its outcome. We opted for only one water tank as our camping systems revolve mainly around flowing creek water for washing up, showers etc. This also helps with the amount of weight we tow up and down steep stuff. This would be a limiting factor for outback camping, but we can get two weeks of more from the one 90lt tank when used mainly for drinking water etc. (provided the fridge is stocked well with cold, aerated, refreshment alternatives)
Tent:Tent size is a hard one; on one hand we don’t want to limit ourselves to one type of camping only; but then again we want more kids and don’t want to end up crammed into too small a tent area. What do people think about getting more than x2 camp stretchers into the 13ft tent? After looking at the 13 & 16 tents, we were thinking while you could squeeze say bunks and a stretcher in, is it really feasable? Anyone out there with 3 or more kids got a view on the issue?
We have 3 kids, one of which needs a pota-cot to sleep in, hence our decision to go with the 16' tent. There are no bones about it in our opinion, the 16' tent is a limiting factor in the areas we can set up. Not impossible, just requires some more thinking. We have 2 kids lying on the floor on Therma-rest mattresses and 1 in the Porta-cot. There is enough room to:
a. Walk in between the 2 sleeping kids to attend to the child in the cot
b. Walk from the door to the steps and not have to step over sleeping kids
c. change and not tred on kids sleeping
d. lay out clothes/dress kids and not have to stand on the beds
e. line up 3 bags of kids clothes plus a bag of dirty clothes on the floor and still have room to walk around.
One point that is often forgotten is the size of the tent also dictates the size of the awning
. Trying fitting the kitchen, 5 chairs, 3 kids, 2 adults and a table under a small awning when its bucketing down or blowing rain into one edge of your only cover! Been there/done that, not a happy place to be.
The 16' tent really needs 2 people to pack it up, even more so if you want to dry the bottom of the tent before packing up for the last time before the next trip. Having said that, I've done it by myself, not impossible just hard.
If we did not have 3 kids or they were a little older, we would have gone with the 13' tent, alas that is our situation.
Hope this is of some help and I haven’t rabbited on.