Importing an Eriba Caravan.

Eriba caravans are in short supply in the UK for some reason and finding the particular model that a prospective buyer wants at a price they are willing to pay can be difficult and I have heard of some people waiting for months for the right van to come along.
One way around this problem is to import one from continental Europe where they are more readily available and therefore cheaper and easier to find.

This is the situation that I found myself in when looking for a second hand Triton 430.
Searching dealers and retailers websites with the help of google translate I was able to find what I was looking for at a dealership in Holland and with the help of an eBay dealer in the UK the van was purchased and imported.

In this topic I will attempt to show the modification process needed to make a continental Eriba usable in the UK.

First a list of things that will need doing then I will attempt to deal with them one at a time in more detail

1 Modification of the road lights to comply with UK law.
2 Modification of the mains internal electrics.
3 Modification of the gas system.
4 Modification of the 12 volt electrics.

This may seem to be a somewhat daunting list but most of the work is minimal and some if not all can be done by a competent diy person.

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1 Modification of the road lights to comply with UK law.

The object of this section is to swap the position of the fog and reversing lights as UK law on the position of the fog light is different because we drive on the other side of the road.

Step one Follow your 13 pin cable back underneath the van to locate the under van junction box Do not plug your 13 pin cable in at this point
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mine is located under the wash-room area towards the front (on other models may be elsewhere)

Step two Make sure the van handbrake is on then use the jockey wheel to raise the front of the van up a good bit to allow easier access underneath then lower the steadies place blocks under the high end if needed.
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Step three remove the reversing light and fog light from the rear clusters.
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Step four Remove the cover on the under van junction box.............be careful with the 4 plastic corner screws they only need a quarter turn to undo, then pull the lid downwards to remove.

You should see something like this............

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The cable coming in from the right side of the image is your 13 pin cable ..........note where the blue and pink wires are located (these work the reversing and fog lights)

In this image you can see I have swapped them over..............
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That is all that needs to be done in the box.

Step five at the rear of the van swap the fog and reversing light units over (I found it easiest to pull the plugs off and swap the light units over plugging them back in on the other sides)

Now for a test before before putting everything back together, plug your 13 pin plug into your car socket and turn the ignition on do not start the engine turn on the car lights and the rear fog light .............check the fog light (red lens) is working ok................ turn fog light off in the car and engage reverse gear then check the reversing light (clear lens) is working.

If all is well turn off the car ignition take it out of gear remove the 13 pin plug refit the light units into the van rear clusters and replace the cover on the under van junction box

rear views showing before and after (note positions of the lowest lights)

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Safety notes

Never go under the van unless the handbrake is on and the steadies down.

Never work on live electrics .......disconnect the supply beforehand

Disclaimer

If you are at all unsure how to do this work a local caravan dealer or caravan service agent will be able to do the work for you.
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2 Modification of the mains internal electrics.

There are 2 ways to go here one is to have all the 240v equipment in the van with continental plugs, This can be useful if you travel a lot on the continent and need to replace something while in Europe,

The other way is to convert the sockets to UK ones, this allows appliances to be used at home and in the van when away on holiday.

Eriba sockets are usually of the CBE 240V type and are readily available here in the UK from caravan suppliers eBay and numerous other outlets.

All that is required to change them is to gently prize off the surround and remove the 4 small screws holding them in place then remove the wires and wire in the new socket then simply replace the 4 small holding screws and snap back on the covers. This is very similar to changing a plug and should be within the range of most diy people.

If you are worried about getting the wires wrong a simple plug tester can be used to check the sockets at the time of work see images below.

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You may also consider the use of adaptors but I am not sure that these are legal as a long term solution ...........I may be wrong.

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3 Modification of the gas system.

The first thing to say here is there is most likely nothing to do inside the van as they are set up to run on butane and propane.

There are lots of ways to go here depending on what types of gas cylinders you wish to use and where you do your touring.
As stated at the beginning this will deal with using a European van in the UK.

Without trying to complicate things there are a few things you need to know before proceeding, butane is not the best gas to use in winter conditions as it tends to stop working at around freezing point so a lot of people tend to go for propane this is a matter of personal choice.

For the purpose of this I will use quotes from the calor website as they are one of the leading bottled gas suppliers in the UK

http://www.calor.co.uk

So having established there is likely nothing to do to the appliances that leaves the gas box and more importantly the regulator.

This page deals with which cylinder to get

http://www.calor.co.uk/products-and-services/gas-bottles/which-gas-bottle

Now comes the important bit .......................... the regulator

Continental gas cylinders have a different type of fitting to UK cylinders so some form of modification will be needed.

The first thing to do is check the van to see what pressure it is designed to run at this should be displayed in the gas box and \ or on the regulator.

Depending on the age of the van the correct regulator must either be adapted or a new one fitted ..............for advice on this I refer to this page and in particular to the pdf file at the bottom where it states

http://www.calor.co.uk/help-and-advice/technical-and-safety/gas-cylinders/caravanning-with-lpg/using-calor-safely-in-caravans

Zitat

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The Regulator
A suitably rated regulator must be included in the connection between the
cylinder and the appliance.The regulator is precisely set to control the
pressure of the supply and Must Not Be Adjusted. Replace any regulator,
which is not working properly, or after 10 years’ of life. Regulators must be
marked BS3016 or BSEN12864
For Caravan Holiday Homes and Residential Park Homes the regulator must have an
outlet pressure of 28 mbar for Butane and 37 mbar for Propane and be marked BS3016 or
BS EN 12864 (for cylinder use) or BS EN 13785 when connected to a piped supply. Where
an Automatic Change Over Device or Regulator is fitted to multiple Propane cylinder
installations, this must have an outlet pressure of 37 mbar and be marked BS EN 13786.
For Touring Caravans and Motor Homes, in 2003 BS EN 1949 was introduced which
requires the appliances be supplied at 30 mbar for either Butane or Propane. This regulator
must be marked BS12864 Annex D. Where an Automatic Change Over Device or Regulator
is fitted to this must be marked BS EN 13786 Annex D.
Touring Caravans and Motor Homes, produced before 2003 require an outlet pressure of
28 mbar for Butane and 37 mbar for Propane and must be marked BS3016 or BS EN
12864.
Guidance will be given in the manual for your caravan and a label attached to the gas inlet
in the gas locker.

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Please note the pressure change regulation for vans made in and after 2003


Ok so having run through all those issue's and having imported a van dated 2006 with a 30 Mb regulator fitted

P1300572.JPG - Bild entfernt (keine Rechte)
All I actually needed to do was buy an adaptor for my regulator and a UK type propane cylinder.

The adaptor came from
http://www.gaslow.co.uk

And can be found on this page listed as part no 01-1674 German to UK Propane Adaptor
http://www.gaslow.co.uk/pages/c_s3_1.htm

As far as I could see they did not seem to sell directly to the public so I ordered one through my local dealer listed on this page
http://www.gaslow.co.uk/dealers.htm

Once it arrived it took only a few min to fit and the gas system was up and running.

If you are in any doubt on tackling this work yourself please do get a caravan dealership or qualified caravan service company to do the work for you
With gas safety is of the utmost importance

Please find attached below the calor guide using-gas-safely-in-caravans.pdf which is also freely available as a download on the page listed above.

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Notes added after the van had a service

the van had a full service and the only slight problem was the European regulator has no gas test point (although the engineer did have an adaptor to find a way round it)

So consider fitting a UK spec regulator at the import stage if there is no gas test point on the van, I will probably get a new one fitted next year when the rubber hose goes out of date.

Note it is required in the UK that a registered person (service engineer) be used to fit a new regulator. This is not a diy job.

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4 Modification of the 12 volt electrics.

Unlike the UK a lot of continental vans do not have a leisure battery fitted as standard and to be honest unless you have a motor mover fitted or stay on sites without electric hookup there is no real need to have one.
Having said that if you do need one for a motor mover it will probably be fitted at the time the mover is fitted also modification of the caravan electrics to provide some method of charging it will be required both things to be factored in when looking into the cost of buying and fitting a motor mover.

If you intend to stay on sites without hookup and want the lights and water pumps and electrically operated loo flush (where fitted) to work then again you will need a leisure battery fitted and some means of charging it.

note The fridge will not run from a leisure battery. The 12v option is only for use with a towing vehicle while in transit. On a site without hookup the fridge should be run on gas.

Electrics are not my strong point so I would have to have such a system professionally installed.

Having said that there is a work-round for occasional short non hookup situations if that is all you need. You can buy a leisure battery a battery box and a socket to match the one on your tow hitch and a battery charger for your leisure battery.

Install the battery in the box and the socket through a hole cut in the box and wire the battery to the correct pins in the socket.
On arrival unplug from the towing vehicle and plug into the box with the pre charged battery inside this will keep the lights and water pumps working until the battery runs down be sure to change the fridge over to the gas setting before connecting the battery and remember to recharge the battery after returning home.

If all you need the battery for is weekend rallies music festivals and the like in the summer this should be enough to keep you going.
Fitting LED lights should help reduce consumption but that's another subject altogether.


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More notes after a UK service

there are no "drop out" holes for gas inside the van but that is normal for European vans and the electrics has a trip rather than an RCD but this does not mean it failed the test.

All the other modifications done to the van all passed the tests and the van has a clean bill of health for this year

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Final note
For some reason I was unable to attach the pdf file "Using Calor Gas safely in caravans, holiday parks and homes"

To get a copy please go to
http://www.calor.co.uk/help-and-advice/technical-and-safety/gas-cylinders/caravanning-with-lpg/using-calor-safely-in-caravans
Scroll to the bottom of the page right click on the word PDF and select save as (or similar) to obtain a copy
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This topic is not intended to cover all the possible modifications required just the basic ones to get you up and running after an import and having already stayed on a site for a few days to test my new Triton I did not find anything else that needed doing.

It is my hope that I have not put off anyone from importing as its not as bad as it may sound and the cost saving from doing so can be considerable.

I also hope other members importing or not found something of interest in this topic

Just remember if you have a Eriba without a battery it is more than likely the 12 volt supply is AC not DC and should not be connected to a DC battery!!! bang!!!! when connected to mains 230v.

Very good Neville, the battery also helps smooth out the 12v supply for
such fripparies as 12v TV's if people have them.

Having the engine running means you cannot engage reverse gear to test the reversing light

Quote: Pepé Le Pew wrote in post #13

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You wanna bet?

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Left my hard hat in the bin when I retired 4 years ago

Excellent thread Neville

Quote: crow wrote in post #17

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Excellent thread Neville

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Nev we waited two years for our Troll to come along

Just to finalize this topic the van had a full service today and the only slight problem was the European regulator has no gas test point (although the engineer did have an adaptor to find a way round it)

So consider fitting a UK spec regulator at the import stage if there is no gas test point on the van, I will probably get a new one fitted next year when the rubber hose goes out of date.

The only other things that were mentioned were the stabilizer pads need changing soon and there are no "drop out" holes for gas inside the van but that is normal for European vans and the electrics has a trip rather than an RCD but this does not mean it failed the test.

All the other modifications done to the van all passed the tests and the van has a clean bill of health for this year