Ranger Mods

Okay, so we took delivery of our Signature Off-Road Camper Trailer on the 6th June and headed off on our odyssey to WA and other places two days later and this is a summary of our experience with it should anyone else be considering buying one of these trailers in the near future.

Model:- Signature "Elite X" Standard equipment included
Independent suspension with twin Dobinson gas filled shock absorbers per swing arm,
Cooper 16" tyres 265/75R16 and two rear mounted spares all on alloy rims.
Internal lighting and radio.
Collapsible inside table.
Seating for six and an option to convert the seats into a second double bed.
Slide out cook-top with four burners and sink with hot and cold water faucet.
Canvas annex, C/W water-proof floor, screen walls and an en-suite
Two water tanks, 80 and 120 litres.
Gas fired hot water unit.
10" electric drum brakes.
Hot and cold water piping with pumps fitted to each tank
2 x 9 kg LPG bottle holders and 2 x 20 litre Gerry Can holders.
Full width stone guard.
Several slide out drawers on both sides of the trailer.
Mc. Hitch coupling.
Swing over boat frame.
125 mm thick Dunlop Queen sized mattress
Slide out fridge / freezer frame to hold up to an 85 litre unit.
2 off 110 a/h Glass filled batteries
An electrical cabinet showing water tank levels and manual resets for all the supplies
LED rear lights.
Front and Rear boat winches to enable tent assembly and packing.

All up by comparison to other similar equipped makes, Australian, South African and Chinese made, it presented good value for money at $25,500.

Prior to collecting the Trailer I installed a rear mounted Anderson connection with a 100 amp rated supply cable ( active and neutral supplied from a Redarc VSR with a 100 amp fuse on its supply and a 50 amp feed to the Anderson connection.

Okay the first thing we carried out was to remove the swing-over boat frame, I was of the opinion that where we were planning to go it was going to get hammered with branches, as it was the only breakage we had during the entire trip was a passenger side mirror and I bought a pair for $100 on our return. If anyone want the boat frame, let me know.
We left and very quickly found that the electric brakes were only working intermittently, I traced this to a crushed and almost severed supply cable inside the draw bar frame and this was repaired when we camped overnight on the second night. It pays to carry a gas soldering iron and some cable connectors.
The batteries were not charging and the wiring from the Anderson plug was getting bloody hot, a phone call to Signature revealed that the supply wiring in the trailer was designed for a 20 amp supply only !!!
On arrival in Darwin I replaced all of this cabling including the 40 amp manual reset circuit breaker ( which by then had died ) with 80 amp rated cables and a 50 amp fuse, the batteries now charged fully to 13.8 volts while the Ranger's engine was running and supplying 14.2 amps. This charge dropped down to 12.8 once all four batteries were fully charged ( my Wildtrak has a 120 a/h Lithium auxiliary battery with a Redarc BCDC1225D charger ).
We were chuffed to notice that the track of the trailer wheels was identical to the Ranger, this proved to be a bonus on soft sand later on in the trip. We also encountered creek crossings up to 600 mm deep and it handled them with ease with no water getting into the trailer.
There are in all 7 doors all fitted with automotive type rubber door seals and pneumatic openers. The second set of doors would not seal against dust. I finally realized that the plasma cut panels had not been cut correctly and that these two doors had insufficient flat surface for the seals to press up against. Later, on our return home in September I cut out two 22 gauge sheets and using Sikaflex adhered them into the compartment to give a full surface, the problem is fixed and Signature have made note of this and requested the Chinese manufacturer to make the necessary alterations to their plasma cutting software.
On the track from the Gibb River road north to Honeymoon Bay the two 10.8 grade Cam bolts on the outer side pivots of the two swing arms shattered. I believe that they are simply too hard and brittle given that they are tightened up to 165 Nm of torque.
On arrival to Derby I replaced them with 8.8 grade bolts with just plain thick flat washers. I wasn't able to carry out a wheel alignment but these bolts lasted the remainder of the trip.
Question; Just how do you check the alignment of independent trailer swing arm suspensions ? I am told that the only way is with a 2 metre long straight edge held against the tyre/rim horizontally with a steel ruler to measure to ensue that the tyre/wheel is parallel to the chassis/body and a 1 metre long spirit level to ensure that they are also true vertically with no camber. If there are other ways of doing an alignment, please let me know.
In short we did 15,830 kilometres on bitumen and dirt tracks, some were well graded, some were horrendously corrugated. When we were camped up at Coward Springs we were hit by a mini cyclone and at 2.30 am in the morning and in pitch darkness we had to take down the annex and even then the sheer force of the gale broke the nylon eyelet ends off two of the annex poles.
Since our return I have replaced the press studs that hold the canvas door open with toggles, press studs just don't like dust !
The jury on the Mc.Hitch is still out, its a great coupling and very easy to align up with when reversing but again, if its filled with bull dust its a real problem as the release pin doesn't release too easily, I'm a Trigg urethane mono-bloc coupling fan so we will see after our next trip scheduled for this December.
We plan to go over to WA via the Great Australian Bight and again up to Broome before crossing to the NT and Qld. The other thing I have done as previously mentioned is I installed a diesel space heater under the floor of the trailer for winter heating, it can get bloody cold inside a canvas tent and today I installed a swing arm plate for the Weber Baby Q barbecue. An additional LPG bayonet fitting has been installed for it along with a "T" piece before the pressure governor so that both 9 kg LPG gas bottles are connected for convenient switch over when one becomes empty.
The hot water unit is great, however if you have a shower using the front 80 litre tank it's very wasteful of water, a shower will quickly use up the 80 litre front water tank so I purchased a collapsible "Evershower" tent this unit has a 30 litre tank that you stand in and the pump recirculates the water through the gas heater, we found that 15 litres was more than enough water per shower and all I did initially was to siphon the water into the tank out of one of the two Jerry cans. The alternative is a sponge bath !

In short, yes, it's a very good and capable strong off-road Camper Trailer and it does give very good value for the purchase price but like all things mobile it has some issues but as we found them they were quickly and easily resolved. I heartily recommend them to any prospective buyer.

Signature have promised that they have taken "on board" all of the issues we found and will rectify them, as William their sales manager said - Julie and I are just one couple of the 2% who actually take them seriously off road, the rest just stick mainly to the black-top. What a shame and a waste!