We're here at the BC interior RV Show
with Jason John from Armadillo Trailers and he's gonna give us a quick rundown
on their new, what do you call it? Thirteen and a half-foot armadillo. All right yeah so tell me this looks fantastic, what's it all about? So what we did is we took an old vintage
trailer from the 70s that Ray Olecko did which was called the Bowler. It was a
small 13 foot lightweight fiberglass shell that a small family can get in and
go on quick adventures in and you know it's compact its lightweight
it's easily towable and just bring it into the future on the most part. What we
have done is we've actually taken the shell and insulated it so what they used
to use in the old days is like a headliner material to insulate these.
Well we've actually used a high-density foam insulation and put our structure in
the shell instead of relying on the cabinets to hold up the structure so we
really started off right at the shell and at the frame into trying to
make it a stronger and a better unit. So like a house everything starts at the
foundation we went a little bit stronger, my frame has to support a drawer so it
has to be straightened and true. We try to not penetrate the finish so we have
no extra rivets no extra holes by doing the sandwich construction allows us to
tag all our cabinets to the interior structure of the unit instead. But it's
just fit and finished trying to make everything new, fresh. Everything's LED
inside and out. We try to do things like Rock guard the wheel wells we rock guard at
the front of them, right, to keep them protected from rocks. We named it the
Armadillo because like an armadillo they're small and cute but they're
strong and tough. Try to use things like stainless steel handles you know we use
the Sun view windows, vision doors, Torflex axles from Dexter, anything under
2,000 pounds you don't really need to have electric brakes but we supply them
with electric brakes anyways. If it's a basic package you can start off at 1,600
pounds and then they had I think one of the heaviest ones we did was 1,800
pounds and it left behind a Volkswagen Golf TDI. If you want a dry camp you can
put more batteries and more propane storage on there if you like to. What do we got on the outside, electrical? Yep so this is the furnace yep we have the 110, we have the furnace outlet, we
have stabilizer jacks on here, entry door steps, the eyebrow gutter on the top
there. So what we've done on the inside is a little bit different as well, most
of the cabinets you see you'll find our photo finish
paneling. So what we've done in there is this is all arborite so the same
surface arborite or formica we've used and basically it allows us to finish
this any way you want. So this could be, cedar, it could be oak, it could be bamboo
it could be rock, marble, leather, orange, green, blue, polka dots you know. So
anything you find on a sample of we can change it up and that's what we've been
kind of priding ourselves and doing is being able to do custom work and do
something different for everybody. Yeah. we're trying to be practical in use of
space so if you look at our cabinets they're full 24 inches they're not 20
inches like moles so to give you maximum storage inside your cabinets nice and
deep. Yeah. This particular unit actually has fridge,
stove, furnace hot water converter. Fantastic fan. Like our tables they move
in and out so if you notice it's really tight to get into the space well now it
it becomes a little bit more manageable. This will fold into a bed, the concept of the table for two is that a lot of people like to leave
that in a bed position and not have to put it up into a table-bed in the
morning for breakfast or when they go to bed at night. This still gives a couple
of place where they can sit and just leave that as a bed position that was
the concept of that and just like this table here if you do have company over
and you did want to have more guests you can you know this one moves over as well
so you can have in surround seating around the table. You can use this as a
desk if you want you to work at it. You can push it out of the way and just
relax it's supposed to be a really comfortable relaxing space but we use
day/night shades Yeah. You know really blocks the light
out until you're ready to wake up whereas curtains don't really dangle the
same. All the safety we have smoke detectors and co2 detectors and fire
extinguisher and all the labeling to make sure everyone's safe. I love the porthole, that's a great little feature that looks fantastic. Or the bottle cover on the front Okay. So the idea is to hide the bottles.
So we hold it up to 220-pound tanks with this cover on and the battery goes under
there without the cover you can actually put 230-pound tanks in the front of this. So lots of storage for fuel and power if you want it to. We do the BBQ hookups
on there so nowadays with you know forest fires and stuff like that you
can't have just but these portable fire pits are still usable in most provinces.
So you need that ambience so to ask the place to you know plug in your fire pit
or your BBQ with something that made sense. Of course we have the different
packages for rims and tires and covers and stuff these are the old moon caps
right so they're kind of going with a little bit of vintage. If you look we use
the the round windows to give it a little bit of a nautical theme because
they are kind of built more like a boat than they are an RV and that's the
beauty of it is being a two-piece shell once you're done with the rest you go
with the best and that's really a two piece shell. The great thing about these
awnings ours are lightweight. Yeah. They only way like under 30 pounds of the
alternative to these are box awnings which are a lot heavier you know so in
thinking that once this weight gets out there now it has stress on my fiberglass
and on the shell so these things are a fantastic product they're easy to set up
and you don't have to worry about them nearly as much when it gets windy. One of
the features that's kind of put me on the map that no one's kind of really is
thought about is kind of the storage so in a 13-foot shell like one of the
biggest problems that you have is storage. This gives you a little bit of a
more storage it's kind of more of a basement for your barbecue, for your
extension cord, your hoses, those kind of things. Yeah when you cook on these
barbecues you know they just take up odors and smells you bring that into
your trailer those things fill your trailer so it's just trying to be really
practical and courteous that's what I would want if it was my trailer so we
created that storage. This is this is this is the full length of the frame so
this is actually 90 inches it goes all the way till it hits top front
crossmember. Oh so you can load it up in there too? Yep like tarps and carpets and different things that you need that
you never have enough space when you're camping and enough stuff and once you're
done you can put it in get it right out of the way nobody need
knows it's really even there. There's a place here for your padlock you can lock
it go for a hike or something you know your stuff it's most people don't even
know it's there. We put a receiver on the bumper here so
this can come off and you can put a spare tire, bike rack on there or
they have all kinds of little accessories that go into those tongues,
provided it stays within the ratings. This also has an outside shower on it so inside here it has the outside shell,
we're still trying to develop, I haven't got the keys to open it up, but trying to develop things that go into this receiver that would give you a surround
for a shower. Yeah I want to grow a lot of these attachments and things
that actually go with our trailer. Yep all our manufacturing is in Enderby at the moment we're trying to get larger facilities and we're working
out of a really small space right now and but we've worked on the process got
it up to where we can create for a month just took the labor that I have in-house.
We do everything in-house from the upholstery, to insulating, to painting - you
know, welding and so.. Right because you were saying that these can be customized so
if I wanted to order one I could pick my interior, I can buy cabinet colours.. If you got a 57 Chevy, I'd like to put the stitching inside to be the same
stitching or seats in your car, that kind of level. So give us a bit of a price
range where do the Armadillo start. For base package where they
start it's just getting kind of a really simple it's 24 9 is where we start at.
To get something that has a few of the amenities like fridge, stove and furnace
and that kind of thing, is a comfort package we call it and that's more like
the 29,000 range and then for 33 5 you can get the comfort plus and that's
everything from solar panels, to fridge, stove, furnace, hot water, all the features,
outside shower. We actually use a flat flexible solar panel that conforms to the
body there which is a nice 100 watt. Comes with the team, the craftsman, so you know
the local talent that I have at my disposal and the materials is kind
of what makes the product or as well, really representing British Columbians
best we can and the Okanagan we have so much to offer and a lot of talent here. you
