New Great West van owner

[Rick]

Hi Everyone,

We just bought a 2004 GWV Classic Supreme in October. Since buying the van i found your forum and read alot of interesting information. I notice that most writers seem to either have a Pleasureways Van or mostly Roadtreks. Does anyone have a GWV. I am interested to know if they like it or what others know about them.

We down sized from a 17' hybrid trailer. I have not had a camper van sice the early 80's. I like the idea of not having to worry about a trailer, and having everything there. I am worried about the size and having to pack-up just to go to the store for milk.

Any tips or advise both on the van and camping in a B class would be helpful. The van has a V 10. Have not driven enough to know if it will be good on gas or not.

I will post my thoughts on what I think of the van based on the little time I have had it in the area on the site for that.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas and have a Happy New Year.

Rick

[markopolo]

Welcome Rick!

I think Great West Van makes high quality and very innovative Class B's. I came very close to buying one but someone made a higher offer for it and I didn't want to go any higher.

I think you'll get used to the size quickly.

Sportsmobile posted some MPG data on their site:

http://www.sportsmobile.com/5_capacities.html



You'll have lots of power with the V10 and should expect around 12 mpg.

Re: having to pack-up to go to the store etc. - you'll probably find it doesn't take much time at all.

Does anyone have any tips for Rick re: camping in a Class B?

I've got one we take powdered milk! (I know, some don't like that )

[Rick]

Thanks for the information and the welcome. I look forward to getting to know the poeple on site and share information. I am sure I will get use to the space quickly as well. I can't wait for spring to start travelling. We have a dining tent that goes up quickly that we will take to just have somthing on the site when we go out with the van.

Any idea on how long the furncae will run on 2 house batteries? I don't mean for winter camping but for the May 24th week-end. It can get close to fresszing sometimes. Do you think they will last a week-end?

[markopolo]

I am just waiting for Spring.....

With our Roadtrek, we'd put up a screen room on the camp site often. Like you noted, it stops new arrivals from taking your site. We ate most of our meals outside.

Re: your batteries - having two is great. I think you'll get through a weekend with no problem. (I'm assuming your fridge will be on propane)

We had two in our RT and really never had to worry. It did have a small (20 watt) solar panel on the roof and we used led lighting inside though.

I had put together this list for my Roadtrek:

Item_____________________________Amps

Lighting (1156 Single bulb)___________1.3
Lighting (Led 1156 Replacement)______0.1
Lighting (Fluorescent)_______________1.4
Furnace__________________________2.8
Fantastic Fan Low__________________1.86
Fantastic Fan Medium_______________2.29
Fantastic Fan High__________________3
Stove Hood Fan____________________2.2
Microwave on inverter_______________90
CO Detector_______________________0.06
LP Detector________________________0.086
Water Pump_______________________3.8
Water Heater______________________0.75
TV_______________________________4
DVD_____________________________2

Subsequently, I googled 1156 lamp amps and the first two sites I checked show that a 1156 lamp draws 2.1 amps!

With two house batteries you'll probably have between 95 and 120 usable amp hrs.

(2 x 95ah /50% = 95ah) if you have two 95ah batteries
(2 x 120ah /50% = 120ah) if you have two 120ah batteries

Generally, you don't want to discharge you battery bank more than 50%.

We'd have to drive after 3 days to empty the tanks etc. anyway and that would put a charge in the batteries.

[Rick]

Thanks for the info, I will have to check what type my batteries are. The led's do they just replace the rgualr bulb or is it a whole new light fixture? I have a solar panel I used for my trailer. I just hooked it up to the battery but now that i have 2 I will have to research how I should connect it.

[markopolo]

LED lights aren't to everyones liking.

They have a very bright but very focused beam. Quite different than your normal RV incandescent bulbs.

You can make your own; see here:

http://classbforum.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=37

Or buy them on places like ebay:







They're made to fit in your current light fixture.

The double light fixtures work great because you can put both types in; one LED and one incandescent as shown here:

http://classbforum.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=580

[Ferzyx]

We have a very low milage 1995 GVW. According to the original owner, it was only driven by a little old lady, once a week to go to Church At any rate we love it, very good quality and great fun. It has a V8, Dodge, engine that on a 6000 Km trip this past September averaged 17.3 Mpg (Imperial gallons). This quite accurate as I keep careful records. The van had one deep cycle house battery and we found that it was not capable of powering our furnace for all night in the chilly weather that we encountered. As a result I installed two 6 volt golf cart batteries and set up a solar panel charging system. Although the batteries do power the furnace all night in our cold winter excursions, due to North coast B C weather, and the angle of the sun in winter, I cannot honestly say the solar panel charging works too well. I expect much better results in the summer. I think that the real answer may be in obtaining a small generator. I am certain that you will enjoy your GWV. We certainly do.

[Rick]

That little old lady really gets a round!!! She owned mine too! Actually they said it was a little old man. I think we are going to enjoy the van as well. I have heard that two 6 volt batteries do work better, does not make sense to me how that works. So far we have not done any winter camping. I found with our 17 ft trailer during the summer I could get 5 to 7 days on the battery with the solar panel just running the lights and pump. I carried a spare with me and switched it out when the battery would get to low. I think with van having air we may get spoiled and be wanting to get hydro all the time now, but it is nice to have the flexability to go without hydro.

Markopolo, I am going to the Toronto RV show next weekend, I think I will check LEDs out there.

Thanks to both of you for the posts.

Rick