The Main Build
Beginning The Process
As with all things, doing something right requires a lot of study. Ours began south of Tucson, Arizona at the 2011 Overland Expo. It was at that event where we first saw the expedition vehicle concept. Several trucks that were on display were ones that had been shipped over from Europe by their owners so they could explore North and South America. What we learned from talking with those owners was that the expedition vehicle concept was essentially a European format invented 40 years ago by a company in Austria. Today, the leading builders of these sturdy off-road/off-grid trucks are located in Austria and Germany, with other Euro builders located in countries such as Switzerland, the Netherlands and even Ukraine.
An expedition truck at OX2011 belonging to a lovely young German couple. Read about their journey, and the tragic end to their travel.
In 2013, on a return trip from Africa, we took the opportunity of a plane change in Amsterdam to lay over, and rent a car so we could drive down to Germany and Austria to visit these builders in person. Both Action Mobil (Austria), and Unicat (Germany), make an outstanding product, and we'd have liked one of them to build us a truck. But there were several obstacles that prevented it.
First was that we couldn't use a new Euro-truck for the build because they aren't eligible for import into North America. Only ones that are a minimum of 15 years old can be imported into Canada (25 years for the U.S.). New, state of the art models with all the latest safety and environmental technology are not allowed. (You really have to wonder about the morons who think up these stupid rules.)
The other issue was logistics. The cost of shipping a North American truck to Europe was considerable, and we'd also have to ship it right back home after the build. We wouldn't be able to take delivery there, and then stay in Europe to explore that region of the world first. The reason for this is the EU value added tax (VAT). If the truck wasn't shipped out of the EU immediately upon completion, then we would have to pay the 20% sales tax. So that pretty much put the last nail in the coffin for us getting a build done in Europe.