Heritage Becomes the Caravanner's Caravan

The luxury Heritage, released just five months ago by Jayco, has quickly become accepted as the caravanner's caravan in both its caravan and pop-top designs.

The centre-piece of Jayco displays at the country's caravan shows and also exhibited at various major motor shows, the Heritage encompasses virtually every conceivable comfort ever put into a caravan design. It was built as Jayco's replacement for its Westport, which had reigned for five years as the country's No. 1 top-of-the-range production model,

What makes the Heritage so fascinating is that it has had a complete overhaul in its exterior design as well as a thorough interior make-over.

The most startling design element is one-piece moulded fibreglass front and rear ends, giving the Heritage an aerodynamic, automotive styling that is modern, clean and sets it apart from the square aluminum shaping that for decades dominated caravan design.

Using fibreglass gives designers a rigid, lightweight, anticorrosive, stable, heat resistant material capable of taking on an infinite number of shapes. It is also strong enough to be stone and hail resistant. Fibreglass use is not new to caravan design and over the years it has been refined so that American-developed Enydyne unsaturated polyester resin technology used by Jayco has put the company way ahead of its competitors.

Jayco created special moulds to shape the aerodynamic front and incorporate a wind foil at the roofline at the back. A unique design feature is the moulding of handles that are set into the front that maintain the sleek sweep of the overall aerodynamics, helping to eliminate possible wind drag points. The front window guard is also fibreglass.

Isophthalic gelcoat is used to colour the fiberglass to a reflective white that has stood intensive laboratory testing for water resistance and UV stability. Side walls and the roof remain aluminum and are the same reflective white colour and Jayco uses popular automotive burgundy, bronze and teal blue colours for styling.

The spare wheel is hidden inside a sleekly designed reflective bronze cover on the "A" frame draw bar. A locker built into the sloping front stores gas bottles and holiday gear. The bronze-coloured stone guard along the base of the front is more to absorb stones being flicked up so they do not ricochet back to cause stone chipping to the tow vehicle.

At the back, the wind foil is a feature on the caravan, then there are the curved rear indicator, stop and nights lights, third brake light above the rear window and a reflective white powder coated bumper bar add to the overall automotive look.

The Heritage is built on the Jayco-developed galvanised Millennium chassis, which has been shown by engineering tests to be stronger and lighter than the box chassis used by most other manufacturers. The axle is the tried and true leaf spring and electric brakes are also fitted, along with light truck tyres and a spare wheel and bumper bar are standard.

The framing is anti-corrosive 25 mm C section aluminium - 30 per cent wider than other manufacturers' framing.

The aerodynamic styling has allowed caravan's height to be increased by 50mm, without impacting on the caravan's towing characteristics. Pop-top models have an extra 100mm of ceiling height, allowing for larger and more overhead cupboard space.

Another exciting new feature for some caravan models is the availability of Carefree's new "One Touch" electric awning. It simply winds out with the touch of a button.

Inside the Heritage, it's as if Jayco designers started with a clean sheet of paper and set about introducing a new era in living comfort. The extra height creates a roomier feel.

Most caravan models have shower and toilet compartments, and some pop-tops also have these facilities. There are front-end, side and rear kitchen models, ensuring a broad range of layouts available, as well as sleeping arrangements.

Solid timber furniture has a handcrafted look about it because of its curved edging and the curtain, seating and other fabric colours are compliment the wood finishes.

The kitchen has a new four-burner stove and oven with two new design developments. Pizzo ignition has been introduced to fire up burners. If a gas flame goes out an automatic gas cut off is standard. There is an intriguing adaptation to the conventional four-burners, with one changed to an electric hot plate that uses holiday park power.

Caravan models also have as standard Dometic (by Electrolux) RH1440 three-way refrigerators. A microwave and CD player are standard and Wynguard TV antenna is fitted in caravan models.

While two-way air conditioning and roll-out awnings are not standard, they are being packaged in such a way that they are an attractive, well-priced addition to the models.

Pop-tops start at 5.2 metres (17ft) and are single axle models. Dual axle pop-tops go up to 5.8 metres (19ft). Caravan models range from 5.2 metres to 7.3 metres (24ft), though there are also special layouts up to 7.9 metres (26ft).