AL-KO ESC gaining traction

The fitment of AL-KO’s new electronic stability control (ESC) system to new caravans is on the rise, as buyers become aware of the relatively low-cost safety benefits of the first anti-sway system for electric-braked caravans.

AL-KO’s State Manager, Southern Region, Gerard L’Huillier, said adoption of the Australian-designed and built ESC system launched four months ago, “is starting to gain a lot of momentum” with an increasing number of manufacturers offering the system on selected new models.

“We have more and more manufacturers coming on board, but they’re not fitting it to every model,” he said.

One reason for this is that the  AL-KO ESC, which corrects excessive sideways movement of the caravan by automatically applying the van's electric brakes, can currently only be fitted to new caravans fitted with AL-KO electric brakes.

“They’re not sitting on all their models at the moment, because part of the requirement is that it’s fitted to our axles and our brakes, so Cruisemaster and Simplicity suspensions aren’t able to be fitted up as yet,” L’Huillier said. “The problem is that we haven’t done any testing on the brakes that they use.”

“The eventual objective is to be able to have it retro-fitted to older vans and on other people’s suspensions but with our brakes fitted,” he said.

He said AL-KO ESC should be available for retro-fit to older caravans by the “first half of 2013”.

One of many manufacturers at the recent Melbourne Leisurefest show advertising models available with AL-KO ESC was Melbourne-based Retreat Caravans, which had an off-road equipped, 22ft 6in Retreat Brampton Outbacker model on display fitted with the accident-prevention device.

Retreat Caravans’ Matthew Simpson said while all Retreat Caravans' models are now fitted as 'standard' with ESC, the safety technology does add approximately $1000-1500 to the overall price.

Priced at $86,490, the well-equipped Brampton Outbacker model on display, rode on G&S Chassis' Control Rider off-road suspension fitted with AL-KO brakes.

“(The ESC) did quite well for us at the show. I think it helped our sales definitely. It’s standard on all of our vans,” Simpson said.

He said another attraction for buyers was that CIL Insurance was also offering a 10 percent discount to owners of ESC-equipped caravans

“It’s a fantastic concept. It’s been around in Europe for a few years now on the old override system,” he said. “I think in a year or two pretty much everyone will have it on all their vans.”