First Pilbara built as caravan

Trakmaster’s Pilbara off-roader with its extreme rear cutaway and smooth sandwich panel walls turned heads when it was first shown in pop-top prototype form at Melbourne’s Leisurefest last October, but it may prove more popular as a full-height caravan.

The first production Pilbara was recently delivered as a 19ft x 7ft 6in hardtop caravan to retired engine driver Peter Green and his soon-to-be wife Wendy, who will tie the knot during the three-month Outback trip they have embarked on to celebrate their new purchase.

The Pilbara is only Green’s second caravan, with its predecessor being an old Viscount, 25 years ago.

He and Wendy initially planned to buy a 16ft aluminium clad Nullarbor caravan, based on recommendations from South Australian travelling friends, but when they visited Trakmaster’s Bayswater, Melbourne factory, they fell in love with the smooth-sided Pilbara and asked if they could have it as a caravan instead of a pop-top.

Trakmaster agreed and has since made the Pilbara available as either a pop-top or full height caravan in internal body lengths from 3.8 metres (12ft 6in) to 6.1 metres (20ft) and with single and or tandem axle underpinnings, depending on chosen size.

This results in 27 different ‘standard’ floorplans, potentially making the Pilbara the most popular of the nine-vehicle Trakmaster range. However as a custom builder, the company encourages customers to come up with their own formats.

Pilbara pricing kicks off around the $80,000 mark. However, the Greens paid a lot more for theirs, after ticking a lot of the option boxes and ordering their Pilbara with three 100-litre water tanks, three 140 Watt solar panels and three 120 Ah deep cycle batteries, a Webasto diesel heater and a large Dometic 12v compressor fridge/freezer for extended remote area independence.

They also had it built with axles and hubs to accept the same steel wheels and 285/70-17 inch tyres fitted to their new Land Cruiser 200 Series tow car, which they had fitted with a GVM upgrade by 4WD specialists ARB prior to taking delivery.

Ready to explore, their Pilbara has a tare weight of 2710kg, plus a load carrying capacity of 750kg.

According to Peter Green, they plan to keep their Trakmaster for the next 10 to 15 years and have since joined the Trakmaster Club, whose owners account for nearly 30 per cent of all Trakmasters built since 1995.

“We live in a tiny town at the entrance to Lake Alexandrina in South Australia and we will be the third Trakmaster owners in our own small 200 metre-long street,” he told caravancampingsales. “Our friends say our new van will probably outlast us in the Outback!”

The next two Pilbaras down the line are also being built as a caravans – another 19ft x 7ft 6in model and a smaller 15ft 6in x 7ft.