Sterling Europa 470STERLING QUALITY
When you are sitting in the very warm setting sun on a peaceful site somewhere in the Dordogne, sipping a chilled wine, the last thing on your mind is making a bed up in your caravan.
It is for this very reason that you may well consider buying a fixed bed caravan, no bed to make up, just pop in and pop on.
There are a plethora of fixed bed models now on the market, and virtually every manufacturer sports at least one.
We have, on your behalf naturally, been trying one such model and find that our feelings are totally mixed.
Manufactured by the Swift Group, now one of the major players in the world of touring caravans, motor caravans and holiday caravans, this brand new Sterling Europa 470 that is the subject of our test, is like the curate’s egg, good in parts. Read on for our findings.
EXTERIOR SPECIFICATION
The 470 is a new model for the 2005 season and it benefits from the new 7 feet 4 inch width, new wheel spat design makes the appearance a little more streamlined and this is complemented by the new, rather pretty alloy wheels.
The rear panel is new with modern light clusters and high level brake light. An Al-Ko AKS 3004 stabiliser is fitted as standard and a new Al-Ko Euro overrrun device with assisted handbrake gives sure braking.
The colour scheme is in Glacier white with blue coachlines and the whole looks clean and modern.
On the offside the fridge vents are forward of the axle and the Truma water heater flue, Truma water inlet, the battery box and mains inlet are all one after each other aft of the axle.
On the nearside at the front is a wet locker, then the entrance door. Aft of the door is a new flush fitting awning light and right at the rear on the nearside is the Thetford Swivel toilet access door and rinse water filler over.
The spare wheel is chassis mounted on an Al-Ko spare wheel carrier.
There is nothing startling about the Europa but the caravan as a whole looks right.
WASHROOM
With modest sized fixed bed caravans something has to be sacrificed and in almost all cases it appears to be the washroom.
The 470 is no exception.
There is, however, an attempt to improve the shower area in that there is a bi-fold door that separates the toilet from the shower, so no clingy curtain to contend with.
For people who always use their caravan’s own facilities, careful thought would have to be given to the advantages and disadvantages of this layout.
Showering is easy but once finished there is no room to dry oneself and obviously the floor now has to be dried before the toilet can be used. Storage in the shower room is meagre, just an open cupboard over the toilet and nowhere to put bottles or soap.
SLEEPING
If this part of the Europa let it down there wouldn’t be any reason to buy it, but don’t worry the double bed which is 1.9 metres long and 1.4 metres wide is very comfortable and, thankfully, devoid of any creaks or groans as the whole flexes.
Possibly the only slight snag here, and this applies to virtually all the caravans, is that the occupant on the inside has to crawl over the other body if a night time loo visit is required.
We found the bed extremely comfortable, and slept like two little babes (who are we kidding?).
The twin settees at the front are too short to be used as two single beds (except perhaps for small children) but make up to a fair sized double of 2.0 metres x 1.34 metres wide.
The dreaded knee rolls are present so the cushions have to be turned over.
The beauty of the Europa is the ease with which the conversion from daytime use to night time use can be achieved with no danger to fingers.
COOKING AND STORAGE
We will have to separate these two headings, cooking first.
A smart looking Stoves cooker sits in the kitchen, three gas burners with an electric hotplate, the gas with self ignition, is good looking and good at its job.
A round stainless steel sink with mixer tap is let into the work surface with no fixed draining board. The draining board is a separate plastic one that sits by the sink resulting in very little work surface.
This would make cooking anything but the most simple things a little too fraught, we feel.
There is a Thetford fridge at the front end of the kitchen with a narrow cupboard between it and the cooker.
Storage is our bone of contention with this 470. We took enough items to serve us for four days and had difficulty in finding somewhere to put them all.
Let us start over the fixed bed.
Yes, there are four high level cupboards, difficult to get at especially for the shorter lady. When lying in bed there is nowhere to put a book or cup of tea at all, nothing in fact.
The shower room we have covered.
The wardrobe is just a box, no shelves to put underwear on, there are no drawers in the entire caravan so where clothes for the full complement of four bodies for a fortnight’s holiday would go we have no idea.
There is a vast area under the fixed bed accessed by self supporting slats but anything placed here would have to be in boxes and great care would be needed not to overload the caravan.
The storage, or lack of it, would we feel be a source of acrimony between the crew as with so little space it is much more difficult to keep things tidy, and being tidy in a confined space makes for harmony.
LIGHTING
This is another area where the Europa is let down a little. No mains lights are fitted, so the primary source of illumination is from seven spot lights. This is fine as far as it goes but there are no lights over the washbasin so one has to work in the shadows thrown by the ceiling light.
We felt that there are probably enough lights but some of the positioning needs re-think.
Should you be on a site without electric hook-up, care would have to be taken not to use all these lights at once, as the battery would not last very long.
CAMPING IN FRANCE CONCLUSION
The Europa 470 is a new model in the now rather extensive fixed bed line up that faces consumers. Coming from the Swift stable, Europa is a name that goes back to the early days of caravans when they were churned out in Newmarket.
Whatever faults we have had a mutter about, the build quality was certainly not one of them. We could find no fault with that at all.
The equipment levels are reasonable for a caravan at this price (£11,495) but there are signs that a few corners have been cut.
The removable carpets are a boon especially on muddy fields or a nice sandy beach, although we prefer the latter we hasten to add, and the wood block effect floor looks just the ticket.
The Europa is a smart looking caravan that will not look out of place in any company and if you can put up with the lack of storage space this could be the one for you.
Camping in France would like to thank the Caravan Club for allowing us to use their Moreton-in-Marsh site, Swift for the loan of the Europa 470 and to Peugeot for the loan of a 307 SW to transport us.
THE NUMBERS
STERLING EUROPA 470
Berths Four
Internal length 4.74 metres
Overall width 2.23 metres
Overall height 2.70 metres
Max headroom 1.90 metres
Awning size 895 cm
MRO 1080 kg
MTPLM 1291 kg
Price £11,495
Can be towed by: Citroen C8 2.2 HDiSX, Ford Mondeo 2.0 TDCi LX 5 door, Hyundai Sonata 2.7 V6 auto, Kia Sedona 2.9 CRDiL, Land Rover Freelander TD4S 5 door.
This is not an exhaustive list. Many more cars would fit the bill and tow the Sterling well.
PANEL
Are fixed bed layouts all they are cracked up to be?
All caravans are compromises in some way or another, as the very lack of overall space makes sure that what you gain in one area you have to lose in another.
This is shown up more in fixed bed layouts than virtually any others.
Take our test Europa 470, the double bed is supremely comfortable and the layout is quite conventional, but it is not an easy caravan to live in.
We feel that the designer ought to be made to spend at least a month in this ‘van and then go away and re-design it. It is the lack of drawers and accessible storage space, the complete absence of hooks to hang towels and the few darks spots even with the lights on.
In mitigation we have to say that the build quality is superb and could not be faulted.
Memo to Swift – make sure all your designers actually use the caravans.
QUICK REVIEW
This Europa is a medium-sized, four berth caravan for four adults, or two adults and two children. We feel, however, that if four bodies were to use the Europa, everyone’s patience would be stretched to breaking point.
The caravan is quite comprehensively equipped and the kitchen only lacks a little work space.
The Truma water heater and space heater worked very well, our test was carried out in rather cold weather but we were like ‘bugs in a rug’.
We really missed the chest of drawers in between the twin settees at the front.
Apart from no storage it meant that the table had to be constantly in use, and in the way.
The wardrobe is of a reasonable size but lacks any other space, except hanging space, and there is nowhere for the ‘smalls’.
The front bed lockers are easily accessed and provide enough space for the bedding required for the front double.
The removable carpets were put away so that the caravanning dog could not put a muddy paw on them. An excellent idea, the removable carpets we mean!
The cooker hob glass lid had to raised to its limit or the gas is shut off, ever been had?
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Sterling Europa 470 - Adrian's Arena