Selection of Awning manual Vs automatic

Personal preference, what someone has doesn't mean it's the best or suited to yourself. Check out both and weigh up the pro's & cons & cost difference.

My opinion is keep things simple, we have a manual Aussie Traveller sunburst after originally having a Aussie Traveller Coolabah fitted, the auto awning wasn't available back then but we are very happy with the roll out, it takes very little time to roll out or roll back in and i would make the same choice again.

We have friends with the motorised awning who are equally as happy.

Hi Womblees, we have the Dometic electric one. I believe is fitted to about 70-75% now going out of the factory. It doesn't mean it is the best choice for you of course. It has been good so far, but always believe there may be an awkward time, but you get to understand their geometry in time

Hi Wombles
Have to agree that it is all up to personal preference. We have been very happy with our manual awning, have replaced once and had the choice of an electric but decided to stick with the manual version. I would suggest that if you go for the electric make sure there is a manual override, in case of failure at least you can manually roll the awning up.

Thanks
I could not see any clear leader myself. I think that it comes down to how oftern you would put down the awning for short stops. We were woundering if there were any major issues we needed to be aware.
Thanks for your advice.
Regards

Once again personel thing, we have an electric awning and would have manual next time. the electrics lack the bracing of the manuals so you hve to be carefull when the wind comes up, They flop about badly in almost any decent wind and need to be tied down.

Andrew & Christine

We have advised BT we will take the manual awning.

My Brother had the same problems you mention with the A & E electric model. The response was that we were making the wrong decision. After BT saying that it was a personal decision and we should make our own enquires. Any how the decision has been made.

Thanks for your help and advice. All sorted and we await an August delivery. Ours will be the one with the red strip.

Also spoke to Toyota about the 2012 LC 200 we have on order and we have a revised deliver date for the end of April. So we get one of the first tricked up versions to hit Oz.

Regards

Hi Wombles

We have an Aussie traveller coolabah which is the best in high winds but if we are only stopping for an hour or so or overnight we never use it.

What Mick has done with the Aussie Traveller sunburst is the best option still much stronger that either of the electric models yet still easy to open for a short stop on a river bank for nice cup of what ever.

Great Travels

Scott

Hi guys.

We have an AT Coolabah on our current van.

Philip at BT is talking up an electric awning for our new van under design. He said that if the AT is say 4-5 times better at handling wind than the standard manual Dometic awning, then the electric one is about 2-3 times better than the manual one, because it has a scissor design with gas struts to absorb the wind load. Ie. Much better than the manual one but not as good as the AT.

We find the AT sufficiently fiddly that we tend not to put it up for overnight stops, and would never put it up for a lunch stop.

I assume it must be possible to add guy ropes to the electric awning, if there is wind? Also I gather you can add a side wall or privacy mesh screen to a sail track in he roller, which presumably helps with wind?

Good post Wombles, we'll follow it with interest!

Matt

Morning all

I had examined the AT site on the web looking for some sort of performance comparison between their and competitor products and found nothing. This absence of technical information concerns me as an awning (when extended) is wing attached to the side of a caravan and being subject to all the forces of weather and transferring these to the side of your van.

We are going for walls to complete the unit. We have only word of mouth on which to make a choice.

We are also fitting a sun screen to the off side of the van for additional shade. But we are left to finish them off ourselves. We note AT do not supply a skirt for the face of the van, without which and in the right wind conditions, can make the annex one large wind sox and also lets in a cool breeze .

I just thought there more important things in selecting an awning than colour.

Regards

Hi Wombles,
Another consideration if going for the manual awning is to ask for the one with an aluminium cover at the top, this helps a little with tree branches tearing holes in the vinyl. We went for the A and E 8500 and have had no trouble. If stopping overnight and we use it we roll it up before bed, if in high wind area and staying a few days we use guy ropes and depending on the wind the anti-flap kit comes out.
With your walls, have you considered mesh walls instead of canvas? We live in the NT but travel to Adelaide annually and even in the winter have had very little trouble with the mesh walls, a little water will run down the inside if it is windy but we prefer as much air as possible and would go mesh again plus you can use the long wall on its own as a shade. We had a zip down the centre of the long wall so we can roll it up and just have privacy or shade at the door end.
Hope this doesn't confuse the issue?

Its raining here at the moment, the first insdie extends the awning while the other waits. For out right convience the electric windout has everything beat hands down. We pull up for a couple hours or the night, its push a button, time to get on the road or go to bed, its push a button......just so easy.

If its a bit to windy we have a tent peg, springer and rope, and hammer handy, just loop the rope over the awning drum and anchor. minute max.

Point of interest manual or electric, if you find one edge rolls up quicker and secures against the van and the other end hasn't. In the sail track each end of the vinyl awning is a little self tapper screw that goes through the sail track and awning to hold it from moving towards either end. undo both screws and extend the awning fully and retract, it may take a few times but the awning will re-align once done refit the screws.