Slideouts

Slideouts are probably the most common solution to get a bit of extra space in a mobile vehicle and there is good reason they make about many hundreds of thousands of these every year.

Pros

• Relatively cost effective and commonly used.

• Solid and mostly reliable now (historically have had weather sealing issues and can get stuck in out position)

• Easy to include furniture, windows etc in the slideout.

• Fast and easy to set up and pack down

• Good insulation

Cons

• They take up the same amount of space when in as when out. The flexi-fold out adds 6 times more space than it takes up when folded (diagram)

• Difficult to install in a van where you typically need to cut a hole in the van structure (mostly only installed on vehicles with perfectly straight walls - part of the reason you don’t see many on vans). The flexi fold out does not require any modification of the van structure.

• Heavy for the amount of room added - typically it can be about 100 kgs per square m of added space. This is 2-3 times heavier than a flexi-fold-out is about 25 kgs per square me of added space

• Weather sealing is complex - when you have moving seals they are inevitably less reliable than a system that if fully sealed all of the time like the flexi-foldout.

• Difficult to manually close if the automation fails. The flexi fold out can be easily folded up with total loss of power. (See video

Flexi-foldouts add much more space for less weight with a more robust weather seal.

Poptops/roof tents etc

This includes internal access pop top tents or just added to roof tents with access by external ladder.

Pros

• Easy way to add extra sleeping area to a small van

• Moderate price and lots of options

• Exterior ones are easy to install onto a van

• Easy to put up and down

Cons

• On a nice day they are great but in windy conditions they are very unstable such that it can be difficult to get a good night's sleep

• Internal stairs or ladder can take up a significant amount of space but are not needed for flexifoldout.

• For internal access you have to cut into the structure of the van that can require certification

• The new space on the second level is not integrated into the rest of van space. The real advantage of the flexi fold out is that it genuinely extends the sense of space in the rest of the van.

• Safety issues climbing up and down as you can’t have normal sized stairs - this typically means that you can’t use it with small children or older folks. The nice thing about the flexi-fold-out is that the bed is at a normal height and does not require any climbing but has plenty of head room and a sense of space. It can be used as part of living space as well.

The main advantage of the flexi-foldout is the extra space is integrated with the rest of the van and much more stable in wind while being much easier to install as well.

Awnings

The cheapest way of adding more space is typically to have a side awning

Pros

• Super cheap

• Lots of extra space for not much weight

Cons

• The amount of time it takes to set up and take down. The joy of a campervan is the ability to move around easily and most vans don’t have awnings as they are just too painful to set up and pack down (typically they are more useful for caravans that are left set up for a while)

• Poor insulation - they are typically quite noisy and not very well insulated.

• Not well integrated to the rest of the van - they typically don’t make the rest of the van feel larger.

• The floor is on the ground and it often becomes unusable in wet muddy conditions

The key advantage of a flexifold out is adding significant amount of integrated well insulated space with the press of a button