A caravan or RV spends most of its life parked, and that is what wears it out. The damage is not from kilometres. It is UV working on the roof sealant and the exterior, salt air on anything metal, tyres ageing while the van sits still, and moisture finding a seal nobody checked. Almost all of it is preventable and most of the prevention costs very little.
These are grouped by what they protect against rather than ranked, because there is no honest way to rank a tyre blowout against a chalky roof. Four of the ten are things we do and we have said which. The other six are yours, cost almost nothing, and matter just as much.
Water getting in is the most expensive thing that can happen to a van, and it almost always starts at a seal rather than a hole. Roof sealant, hatch surrounds, window frames, awning rail and anything screwed through the skin all move as the van flexes and all degrade under UV. By the time you see a stain inside, the damage in the wall is usually well established and the repair is measured in thousands.
Get up there twice a year and look at every joint for cracking, lifting or gaps, before the wet season rather than after. If anything feels soft or spongy on an interior wall or around a window, get it assessed straight away, because water spreads sideways through a wall long before it shows itself.
If you tow anywhere near the coast, salt is landing on your van and settling into every seam, hinge and bracket. Rinsing with fresh water after a coastal trip does more for the life of a van than any product you can buy, and the timing matters more than the technique, because salt does its damage once it dries and concentrates.
Pay attention to the underside, the A frame, the jockey wheel, the corner steadies and anything galvanised or plated. That is where corrosion starts, and it is exactly what a normal wash never reaches.
This one sits upstream of nearly everything else on the list. Undercover storage slows the UV damage to your seals, your exterior, your tyres and your interior all at once, which makes it the highest leverage thing most owners can change. Where that is not possible, a properly fitted breathable cover beats a tarp, which traps moisture against the surface and chafes the finish every time the wind moves it.
Where the van has to live outside, a ceramic coating is the other lever. It takes the UV load off the panels and decals so the surface stops chalking, and it makes the wash down after a trip considerably less work because road film and salt release instead of bonding on. We fit the same three coatings we use on cars, XPEL Fusion Plus V2, Kovalent Borophene and Kraken Graphene Titanium, with warranties from eight to ten years. Caravans and motorhomes are quoted on size and condition rather than off a price list.
While it is stored, keep the batteries maintained rather than letting them sit flat, leave vents open enough for the van to breathe, and open it up every few weeks. A van that is aired regularly does not develop the smell, the mould or the seized fittings that a sealed one does.
Fibreglass and gelcoat panels do not scratch and swirl the way car paint does, they go chalky, oxidising from the surface down under UV until the finish feels like powder and holds every stain. Queensland Health advises the state records a UV index of 3 or above all year round, so a van parked outside takes that every day of the year, not just over summer.
Catching it early is the whole game, because light oxidation polishes out and deep oxidation means cutting back a finite layer. This is one of ours. A ceramic coating takes the UV and salt load instead of the surface and makes washing far easier, which counts for a lot on something with this much surface area. The mechanism is explained in what a coating does for gelcoat and in how ceramic coating works. Vans are quoted per vehicle once we have seen the condition.
A van parked in the sun becomes an oven, and the heat coming through the glass is also what fades and cracks everything inside it. Most of the heat you feel is infrared rather than visible light, which is why a film can remove a lot of it without making the windows noticeably darker.
Another of ours. How heat rejection is actually measured, and why darker does not mean cooler, is covered in does darker tint mean better heat rejection, and the film options sit on our window tinting page.
Interior damage is harder to reverse than exterior damage and it happens quietly. UV through the windows fades and dries upholstery and trim, humidity gives mould a chance on fabric during the months a van sits closed up, and spills in a space this small are inevitable.
Ours as well. Treating fabric, vinyl and leather early is far cheaper than replacing it and makes the inevitable spills recoverable rather than permanent, which is the case we make on our interior protection page. Airing the van out instead of leaving it sealed for months does most of the rest for free.
Van tyres almost always age out before they wear out, because the van sits still for months at a time. Rubber degrades with UV and time whether or not it is turning, so a tyre with plenty of tread can still be old enough to fail on a hot day at highway speed with a heavy load behind you.
Every tyre carries a four digit date code on the sidewall giving the week and year it was made. Find it, work out the age, and get advice on replacement based on that rather than on how the tread looks. Check the spare while you are down there, since it is the one everybody forgets and the one you need most.
A lot of vans on the road are overloaded and most owners have no idea, because they have never had theirs weighed. Your ATM, your tow ball mass and your tow vehicle’s limits are not suggestions, and being over them affects handling, braking, tyre load and where you stand if something goes wrong.
Load the van the way you actually travel, with water in the tanks and gear in the lockers, and take it over a public weighbridge. It costs very little and it is the only way to know rather than assume. If you are over, the fix is usually deciding what stays home.
Bearings and brakes on a trailer do not get the attention a car’s do, and they fail in ways that end trips badly. Long periods sitting still, coastal humidity and the occasional boat ramp all work against them.
Have them inspected and repacked at the interval your manufacturer specifies, and always before a long trip. If one hub is running noticeably hotter than the others when you stop for fuel, do not keep driving on it and hope.
Towing changes your exposure. You are longer, slower to stop, harder to overtake and more likely to end up in something that becomes an argument about fault. A hardwired dash cam settles that with footage rather than recollection, and it keeps watching in parking mode while the rig sits at a site or a servo.
The last of ours. Front and rear is the sensible configuration when towing, since the rear camera covers whoever is behind you on a long descent or in a queue. Options and what is included are on our dash cam installation page.
| What | How often | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Rinse after coastal trips | Every trip | Salt does its damage once it dries |
| Open up and air out | Every few weeks in storage | Prevents mould, smell and seized fittings |
| Seal inspection | Twice a year | Water ingress is the most expensive failure |
| Tyre age and spare check | Twice a year | Van tyres age out before they wear out |
| Bearings and brakes | To schedule, and before long trips | Failures here end trips badly |
| Weighbridge check | After any change to how you load | Handling, braking and where you stand legally |
If the exterior, glass, interior or camera side of that list is something you would rather hand over, get in touch and we will look at the van and tell you what it actually needs. The other six are yours to do and cost almost nothing.
Check your seals. Water getting into a wall is the failure that turns into a repair bill rather than a job, and it gives you the least warning. Storing the van undercover comes a close second, because it slows almost everything else on this list at the same time.
Usually yes, and the improvement is often dramatic, because most of the change comes from cutting the oxidation back rather than from anything applied afterwards. The limit is how much sound material is left underneath, since every cut removes some and it does not grow back.
It is quoted per vehicle rather than off a price list, because surface area and condition vary enormously and a pop top is not the same job as a twenty two foot van. Condition matters more than size, since a neglected exterior needs cutting back before anything goes on it.
The strict visible light transmission limits that apply to a car’s front side windows exist because of driver visibility, which is not a consideration for living space glass. Tell us the vehicle and how it is used and we will confirm what applies before anything is fitted.
A properly fitted breathable cover helps. A tarp usually hurts, because it traps moisture against the surface and moves in the wind, which abrades the finish underneath. If a cover flaps, it is slowly sanding your van.
There is no need to wait. A new van is the cheapest one to protect because there is almost no correction to pay for, and every summer it spends unprotected is a summer of UV working on the surface.
