TC in South America / Design choices
My wife and I just returned from a 21 month trip, 12 months of which were spent touring South America in a TC. Yesterday I had posted a link to our route, you can find that posting here in the RV'i...
Forum Discussion
Hi,
Looks like a fascinating journey - wow - thanks for posting the links.
Those twisting single-lane roads can really sap your time. I recall doing a similar one in the rain (slippery clay) down a gorge in New Zealand once in a DRW class C - I thought it was just going to be a bit of a scenic detour, but it added hours to the journey crawling around the blind corners watching out for the locals who tended to drive at speed WHILST drinking.
Your observations about vehicle size match our experiences - not in South America as we haven't had a chance to go there yet, but certainly in other parts of the world, including squeezing our camper through medieval cities, roads where we are brushing the trees on each side and arches on the entrance to properties.
You mentioned dust. I was expecting to have problems with it in the Sahara. We had certainly had plenty of that fine dust penetrating the camper we used in Namibia. However, the interesting thing was our truck camper never suffered from dust ingress, despite being old with poor seals everywhere, and I couldn't be bothered to get the duct tape out to seal it up. In fact I think the poor sealing helped. We left the over-cab windows slightly open all day. Being over the cab they were too high to be affected by the dust thrown up by the front tyres, and I think they caused the whole camper to be positively pressurised slightly. That pressure then blew out around the rear door keeping the dust out.
Interestingly the washboard corrugations we tackled in Morocco were similar to those experienced in the Namib / Naukluft, but our truck camper handled them better than the converted pickup truck we used in the latter; possibly due to the camper's extra all-up weight, careful tire pressure choice and softer suspension.
All the best,
Steve.
Looks like a fascinating journey - wow - thanks for posting the links.
Those twisting single-lane roads can really sap your time. I recall doing a similar one in the rain (slippery clay) down a gorge in New Zealand once in a DRW class C - I thought it was just going to be a bit of a scenic detour, but it added hours to the journey crawling around the blind corners watching out for the locals who tended to drive at speed WHILST drinking.
Your observations about vehicle size match our experiences - not in South America as we haven't had a chance to go there yet, but certainly in other parts of the world, including squeezing our camper through medieval cities, roads where we are brushing the trees on each side and arches on the entrance to properties.
You mentioned dust. I was expecting to have problems with it in the Sahara. We had certainly had plenty of that fine dust penetrating the camper we used in Namibia. However, the interesting thing was our truck camper never suffered from dust ingress, despite being old with poor seals everywhere, and I couldn't be bothered to get the duct tape out to seal it up. In fact I think the poor sealing helped. We left the over-cab windows slightly open all day. Being over the cab they were too high to be affected by the dust thrown up by the front tyres, and I think they caused the whole camper to be positively pressurised slightly. That pressure then blew out around the rear door keeping the dust out.
Interestingly the washboard corrugations we tackled in Morocco were similar to those experienced in the Namib / Naukluft, but our truck camper handled them better than the converted pickup truck we used in the latter; possibly due to the camper's extra all-up weight, careful tire pressure choice and softer suspension.
All the best,
Steve.
