Bought a 1999 Sterling Europa 520 NT

[dave1966]

Hi All.

We had to sell our 2013 Sterling Eccles SE Solitaire caravan due to having more damp than I knew.
We now own a 1999 Sterling Europa 520 NT, with no damp and we replaced the Ford Mondeo with a 2003 Mitsubishi Shogun Elegance 3.2 LWB.
Here is a photo of both of them together. Will get more photos of the caravan real soon.

 

[otherclive]

A really nice looking outfit.

 

[Beachball]

A Stunning setup enjoy

 

[Raywood]

Good luck with the new combination. It does look good.

 

[dave1966]

Thank you all for your kind replies.

 

[WayneS]

Hi - really nice outfit, I've got exactly the same tow vehicle, it quite likes fuel stations but reliable, lovely and comfy and a great tugger!

 

[Ferrodo]

I also tow with a Shogun. In fact it’s the second one I’ve owned and love them. 👍

 

[Dustydog]

Both are gleaming, very well polished👏May ask what the letters are on the bonnet front? 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

 

[dave1966]

I also tow with a Shogun. In fact it’s the second one I’ve owned and love them. 👍

This is my first Shogun but it's my 3rd 4x4.

 

[dave1966]

Both are gleaming, very well polished👏May ask what the letters are on the bonnet front? 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

The letters on the front are the name of a car club that I am a member of. Believe it or not I haven't put any polish on either of them yet.

 

[Buckman]

This is my first Shogun but it's my 3rd 4x4.

We bought an almost immaculate low mileage 2013 Shogun in 2018 and found it to be very heavy on fuel when towing and we were lucky to get 17mpg. Solo was about 28mpg. Also every time we hitched up you had to increase the tyre pressure and then deflate it again when not towing.

A common issue as the air con packing up and needing a pipe replacing. The problem was that the pipe was unobtainable in the UK and wait time was 3 months. No joke in the summer in the south of France!

We had it for about 3 months and took a loss and traded it in for 2012 Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland Summit.

 

[Ferrodo]

Never need to play around with tyre pressures towing or not. A pipe is a pipe and aircon or not they can be made up by any reasonable garage in an hour or two. Yes they are thirsty but lotsa fun……that’s why I call mine Oliver…..Oliver Reed

 

[Buckman]

Never need to play around with tyre pressures towing or not. A pipe is a pipe and aircon or not they can be made up by any reasonable garage in an hour or two. Yes they are thirsty but lotsa fun……that’s why I call mine Oliver…..Oliver Reed

It was the Mitsubishi garage that could not supply the pipe.

 

[Ferrodo]

Ah well my friend….. first law of car ownership never ever go anywhere near a dealership. 🤭🤭

 

[Buckman]

Ah well my friend….. first law of car ownership never ever go anywhere near a dealership. 🤭🤭

No choice as it was bought second hand and came with a warranty. However you are quite correct.

 

[otherclive]

Ah well my friend….. first law of car ownership never ever go anywhere near a dealership. 🤭🤭

You’ve never had a Saab or Subaru then ?

 

[Ferrodo]

You’ve never had a Saab or Subaru then ?

No why?

 

[RogerL]

You’ve never had a Saab or Subaru then ?

My experience of Subaru was that routine dealer servicing was frequent and expensive but nothing ever broke so no repairs needed and the overall running costs were similar to a Vauxhall.

 

[Ferrodo]

Yes reliably being the key word. Regular servicing being paramount. I have always found servicing to be at an acceptable cost considering that the beastly is a 2.2 ton 4x4. No it will never be fuel efficient but that’s not why I own one. It’s not used for the Tesco run….. that’s down to Mazda. As a tow truck they are hard to beat. Solid tow. The door mounted spare wheel gives a long tow bar which is not ideal. But that old 3.2 straight four do turn out some sort of low down torque. Ya pays ya money ya takes ya choice

 

[otherclive]

No why?

Their dealers were/are good. Mainly small family owned businesses.

 

[Ferrodo]

And there’s the rub….. “family owned “ 👍

 

[otherclive]

And there’s the rub….. “family owned “ 👍

Not all dealerships are poor and I really don't know why there's the need to tar them all with the same brush. I've had good service from quite a number encompassing different makes.I also use independents too, especially on cars out oof warranty. But one dealership that wasn't good, and which matched the cars poor quality was a Land Rover dealership that looked after my Disco 2. They even gave me a call one day to say would I like to change the car? That prompted me as I was getting into a taxi for a long stint in Oz to say to my wife "get rid of that b****y thing" which she did. On return from Oz I bought generation 1 Sorento....absolutely ace.

 

[Hutch]

The servicing garage is only as good as it Mechanics and Engineers( very few nowadays). The service is a look around and spray white lubricant on items, change some air and oil filters. Maybe a dealership might plug in an OBS reader and look at previous faults and charge extra to clear them.
Unfortunately for those folks that do not know or understand how things work they can get ripped off. .
I know I am off thread but this happens with caravan servicing as well.
That why , I have started to only get my van AWS serviced every two years. My caravan insurance does NOT require a yearly inspection.

 

[Buckman]

And there’s the rub….. “family owned “ 👍

Yep learnt the hard way to avoid anything "family owned". Not even sure why they need to put in that phrase in many instances?

 

[ProfJohnL]

Unless you research every business's shareholder lists and company history you almost certainly do business with several such family owned concerns. There are a plethora of familiar high street names, whose premises are run as franchises, and the people you see face to face are actually employed by a private and often family owned business.

However I do agree with the notion that being "family owned" is not a guarantee of better service or value, but it's rather like a common description used for butchers and bakers where their shop sign includes the words "High class"

It harks back to earlier time's when family run businesses needed to build a good reputation in their community or face being shunned.