I have been under our Jayco Journey outback which now completed 80km to St Mary's Return. It has not been out of the garage till this week. So that we can prepair the van with all the extra's we want to install and rectifying the issues we need to fix. I covered the brake leed wires to protect them yesterday. I got to the grey water tank to cover the wires just now that also needed to be protected, that I imagined ran through and around the cover plate around the tank itself.
To my Horror the grey tank has been installed crushing the two seprate sets of wires.The protective plate that protects this tank has cut into the plastic sheath around the gas line that runs to the gas stove and has started to do the same to the + & - wires next to this.
To protect my wife and myself We are forwarding the email we send to you to backup our phone call this afternoon to your service staff member Anneke, on to our insurance company NRMA.
It sends shivers up my spine as to what could have happened if we used the gas stove. Im attaching photos.
Jim the quality of this work certainly leaves a lot to be desired I read a post recently where we were asked to stop bagging out on Junco vans I for one think we should do the opposite and not just Jayco there are other members of the Forum with other brands of vans who are having similar problems.
We need to put pressure on for the Federal Government to bring in Lemon laws that contain severe penalties for companies that dont comply, I think that there is an election in the air so now is the time to have a discussion with your local politician.
I have been doing some research and comparing the $86,000 Jayco with a van built in the USA that has very similar specs and costs $42,000au landed in Australia and then another $10,000 for full compliance and fit out with 240 volt appliances. That gives a full price of $52,00 not $86,000 and its built by a company operating under very strict lemon laws.
Worth considering
__________________
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Hey Jim, I understand the frustration you are going through. In 2010 we purchased a brand new Jayco Eagle Wind-up camper, we carried out the instructions of as per DVD. Water entered the unit through stitching and the door, beds wet and large pool of water under the table and the floor covering and cupboards damaged from water. Of course, the Jayco dealer had not heard of this before. The Factory video stated that all units are water tested before they leave the factory. This would have to be untrue. Could not get much satisfaction from the local dealer in FNQ and return communication was always late coming. We sold this unit and bought a used used Pop-Top, as I was prepared to do some modifications and repairs myself and not worry about warranty issues. We have since sold this van and have ordered a New Age Manta Ray van. I have also read about some problems they have, but fingers crossed.
Another Jayco owner here in Cairns is having trouble with there fibreglass bubbling, and he also had difficulties with the dealer. Yes Jayco do have high sales, but for many years Holden and Ford put out a lot of vehicles, with not as many defects. A lot of the issues appear to be poor tradesmanship and taking shortcuts while the quality control is not as good as it should be. Perhaps they use too many 457 visa staff. Sometimes when companies expand and take market leadership, they are unable to keep the standard that had got them to Number 1 and start to slip back down the ladder.
On a lighter note, the best holidays I had was in the 15' canvas tent, canvas stretchers, ice box and kerosene lamps on the esplanade of Hervey Bay. We thought we had it all. No class distinction, kids were happy and played together, never had to worry about TV, mobile or internet reception. Just enjoyed the simple things in life.
From my own personal experience with my manufacturing / retail company, my best and most efficient workers were 457 visa holders. High quality with high ethics which includes attendance. Wish I could get more but unfortunately that gate is just about closed.
That is MY experience and others may have different experiences.
Bryan, like so many things today, just not the consistency in many aspects of life. My experiences with 457 visas have been varied, orders received and the goods sent not matching up with the orders. Causing a lot of frustration when you have to send the merchandise back and wait for the correct merchandise to arrive. This results in loss of productivity, wages and income. Yet some of the farmers up here are so keen to have them as a lot of Aussies won't do the jobs that they will.
I am just learning to go with the flow
Darmc
Five weeks late with delivery so to avoid further delays we drove from Perth to Adelaide to pick the van up as we had sold our house and had nowhere to go. We had mentioned this fact to the sales manager and we were told wait and see how things pan out before he would try to do anything for us. He done stuff all basically, we done it by driving to Adelaide which cost us in the end not XXXXXXXX
We arrived at XXXXXXXX the day before our scheduled pickup and the guys were good enough to let us unload all of our stuff from the rented trailer and store it there so we could return the the trailer avoiding paying another $140.
The next day we turn up at our allocated time slot for the pre-delivery and handover but the van was not ready,they were still fitting things to it so the handover was very ordinary to say the least with the workers in and out all of the time,having to fit and then replace a non-working water heater which is an absolute piece of rubbish and will only ignite now and again.Then there was a very noisy battery charger which was replaced.
Once we had the van we decided to stay nearby for a couple of days just in case anything else went wrong. Next was the shower fan which was not installed properly or tested otherwise the adjustments made to it would not have been needed, another battery charger was fitted at the caravan park where we were staying as this one was getting very hot. It rained that afternoon and we developed a leak through the vents behind the fridge so the van had to go back to the workshop for some alterations. It is not a good thing when staff are telling you things like most people change the chargers over after a couple of months anyway as they arent much good, or the tv antennae is only good if you are staying close by. The best quote being we are so much under the pump that we are doing more fix ups than new van fitouts.
Thinking that all had been fixed we took off for Victoria staying at a friends place in Yarragon and one night got out of bed to a noisy battery charger again and found the door of the cupboard where the charger was fitted was so hot you could not touch it . I contacted Jason at XXXXXXXX and he agreed to reimburse me any monies that I spent rectifying this charger problem. Problem was fixed and I was paid.
Couple of weeks on staying in a caravan park and water line under the van splits along the line upon investigation I find that everything under the is so tight and rigid that things cant help but fracture ,I purchase tubing and fix this first leak and keep extra tube and fittings in case of another failure which was not far away. I have also had to redo some plumbing inside the van and also screw the water pump in place to stop everything vibrating on the walls, and mind you the van is still only about 4/5 weeks old at this stage.
Also ran into another XXXXXXXX purchaser at this park and he is screaming about how loud and unreliable his super duper continuous hot water service is he has also had troubles with the under van plumbing.
Have now noticed the flooring is lifting probably caused the earlier leak that we had , mind you we live in our van and are traveling Oz so it is a big drama to have it off the road for any length of time so we decided to just purchase a quality rubber mat which XXXXXXX paid for.
Not happy with the brakes so had them checked and found that only two wheels had been adjusted properly and one on the other side was half of where it should have been and the other wheel had not been touched.
The fridge, it seems to run all of the time and is also quite noisy, of a night time it is hard to get a good night sleep as it is on and off all night even though nobody is opening and closing the door and it runs for at least half hour then off for a little bit and back on again.
The van itself is very easy to work with it looks great and tows beautifully. I am not all that convinced with the quality of the insulation and will be getting that looked at asap.
At the end of the day we would have been happy to pay a bit more and had the van fitted with quality products in the first place and also avoided all of the problems that we have had. As for the delivery date it would have been good to have been kept in the loop as to where things were at but instead we were getting conflicting reports from head office and from the sales department and this made things very difficult for us and put us well behind in our schedule and cost us money.
Sometimes I feel like getting a sandwich board made up with all of the above on it and just display it everywhere we go.
Jason from XXXXXXX has been very helpful in making things right but seriously none of these problems should have happened and from my experience as a National Operations Manager your sales department need to be more responsible for the promises it makes. If any of my sales rep had have made undeliverable promises to clients for the sake of commissions they would not have a job for long.
Peter from A1 Caravans in Midland WA was a great help to us and put up with us going into the yard every week or two and going through every van on the lot to see if we could pick up on any ideas and pick his brain about this and that.
This van attracts a lot of attention everywhere we go (currently Tasmania ) because of its looks and the construction methods employed by XXXXXXXX but for your sake get it right as you are doing yourselves some damage out on the road.
Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to all
It has been 9 months since my original post on Goldstar RV and I must say they have resolved absolutely nothing despite us engaging a solicitor and contacting Caravan and Camping association of SA who endorse this mob. We have repaired or caused to be repaired most of our problems ourselves at our cost and time. They have not followed up on everything that they told us they would do for us . We have learnt a valueble lesson from all of this and will not be caught out again. Hope reading my posts has moved budding buyers of this product to rethink buying from them.
Cheers.
Hi Jim, I found the same problems when I rearranged my water and grey water tanks. The saying still stands, if you want the job done properly, do it yourself. I have so far redone most of the plumbing, half of the electrics, haven't started on the furniture yet, and praying like hell the body and chassis hold up. I won't tell you about the low strength PVC glue they've used on the pipes, I don't want to upset you further!
I should finish installing a pipe tank system that does away with the 40mm drain hose they've used on the washing machine tomorrow. I am also going to modify the kitchen sink drain hose, that loops down and around the chassis, to exiting the kitchen on the inside of the chassis. I think the big loop is causing draining problems.
Get your overalls out and start fixing.
Happy new year, Ian.
