Caravans, they are far too little checked. And when they are checked, one in three turns out not to be safe. This is evident from figures from the car sector organization BOVAG. At Caravan Center Peelo they recognize this problem. “It is very important to have regular maintenance carried out. The advice is to have it carried out every two years. But not everyone does that. And if people do come at some point, it may be that the needs to be done,” says Aletta van der Meulen, owner of Caravan Centrum Peelo.
Johan van der Veen from Bafloo is standing with his wife at the Zomerzicht campsite in Assen. They are already on the road for the second time with the caravan. They’ve had it one year out of seven now. “If we make a really long trip, I’ll have it checked,” says Van der Veen. When was that last? “Wow, that was a year or so ago.” Five years, says the BOVAG sticker stuck to the back of his caravan.
Bearings, tires, the gas installation. Anything can go wrong with the caravan. But the braking system in particular causes problems, according to the study. “You can do that on the flat road, but when you go into the mountains it becomes very important. You shouldn’t want that yourself, but you shouldn’t want that for your fellow road users either. Because that naturally leads to dangerous situations.”
People are not quick to bring their caravan for an inspection, because this is not mandatory. “There is an MOT for cars, for example. But we don’t have that yet for caravans. That is quite a process; it goes all the way through Europe. That still needs time. Work is being done on that in the meantime, but it is still not so far. And that is why it is now the responsibility of the camper to handle it safely and responsibly.”
In addition to a biennial inspection, the camper can do this by checking the tires and gas hoses themselves every season. Van der Veen usually does that sort of thing, he says. “Yes, I check the gas hoses and I flush the water pipes well when it comes out of the storage. But not much else really.” Does he feel it’s all safe? “Yes, because otherwise I wouldn’t have gone out with it.”
Nevertheless, BOVAG’s figures have given him a wake-up call. “There is also a BOVAG company in our village. I’ll have it checked again sometime.”