There used to be a guy driving a motor home round these parts who had placed the clearly legible message on the back "I WOULD NEVER BUY ANOTHER SWIFT MOTORHOME. ASK DRIVER FOR DETAILS. TELEPHONE 01702 nnnnnn"
Many British manufactures did (and still do) use softwood as part of the construction. They are gradually moving away from it (my good friend is a supplier of composites to the industry and is frustrated that they do) but it lingers on as part of their 1950s construction techniques.
You pays your money..etc. British Motorhomes can be extremely good value and they certainly dominate the British scene.
Anecdote. We knew the (British) motorhome we wanted to buy and went to see a used one. The layout was perfect and we'd spent a long time refining our selection to this model. We looked around the one at the dealer showroom and were distinctly unimpressed with the fit and finish. The layout was great but the cupboards and internals certainly felt built down to a price.
Next to it was a (German) Burstner, same price but about twice the age and higher mileage. The internal furniture felt solid and heavy, like domestic furniture. We remarked about the finish to the dealer, "It's German ", was his reply, "hence the price".
With a slightly different layout we'd have bought the Burstner. We eventually found our perfect layout in a Hymer. Our compromise (there's always at least one) was loads of internal space for sitting, working, slouching (for when we get trapped inside on rainy weeks) at the expense of a garage. It's an A-Class with a double bed that drops down from the cab roof in 10 seconds and frees up the whole inside for day use. It depends on whether you want to sit upright of have the option to slouch.
Here's my less than professional walk-around tour of our Hymer B544 where I say "
loads of storage" too many times (and we've now managed to fill it).
https://youtu.be/huTQKjJ5qNcExternal storage here shows how we deal with the lack of garage -
https://youtu.be/vPfTL-gcH8gIt generally has enough essentials on board (clothes, boots, long-life milk, soup, coffee ..etc) that all we need to do it put some fresh water in the tank via a hosepipe and we're good to go. The solar panels keep the batteries at 100% on the driveway.
Did I mention that many pubs let you stay overnight for free* in their car parks? That has provided some of our best stops (BRITSTOPS is a book that documents hundreds of them but there are Apps that do the same thing all through Europe).
*Caveat. The pubs usually expect you to go in and buy some drinks in return for the favour. I know, it's unfortunate, but we force ourselves to do it, it's the polite thing to do.
