Gday All, we are upgrading our caravan. I thought I had narrowed it down to couple of brands but today I looked ay a Galaxy Rover. It looked pretty good on the surface and was in the right length/ weight area for me. The salesman said Galaxy are now made by Retreat vans and share the same building standards as Retreat. I know Galaxy did go into liquidation a few years back, and apparantly one of the owners of Retreat used to work for Galaxy, so he was keen on buying that brand when it was in trouble.
Has anyone had any experience with Galaxy vans in more recent times?
All I know is that lots of caravans come out of factories in Somerton (Vic) and that many brands come out of the same factory. It's a sort of good news industry for the area as the van industry took on a lot of ex-Ford workers who all lived nearby.
I have just posted in Techies Corner re my recent suspension upgrade of a Galaxy Grand Tourer, this was due to the fact that I was virtually unable to pack in much gear after water and food. So I upgraded and had the van recertified.
All I know is that lots of caravans come out of factories in Somerton (Vic) and that many brands come out of the same factory. It's a sort of good news industry for the area as the van industry took on a lot of ex-Ford workers who all lived nearby.
I got lost in the back streets there last year and was amazed at the number of workshops that were dedicated to caravans. None had manufacturers names or brand names, just workshops making caravans. It may be worth future buyers to take a cruise out that way. At the time I thought it was close to sweat shop labour!
A caravan manufacturer(branded and well known) told me last year that there are 114 manufacturers, branded and non branded, in the area of Craigieburn and Campbellfield alone. I see Somerton is slap bang in the middle of the two suburbs, so that gives you a bit of an idea of the numbers. A drive around that area probably confirms those numbers, as we did last year.
regards
Ian
Yep, that's definitely caravan central! Many are small, custom builders making to order. Other firms in the area just make components and not full vans, then there are a swag of service centres and dealers. A lot of parts interchanging goes on so, being in close proximity to each other make sense logistically.
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Cheers,
Tony
"Opinion is the medium between ignorance and knowledge" - Plato
