RV FEATURE

WOW! WHAT A RESTORATION!

Australia has a caravanning heritage worth celebrating. Old Dons, Coronets, Franklins, Millards, Viscounts … if you’ re of a certain age, you’ ll also have fond memories of seeing these vans on the road, or perhaps even staying in one.

For Andrew Phillips, the owner of The RV Repair Centre in Bayswater North, Vic, restoring these vans is a passion. He might use the word obsession. One look around his shed, which is filled with collectible memorabilia that he has restored over a very long career, tells you all you need to know about his attitude towards restoring stuff. He doesn’ t do it by halves.

Andrew’ s fully restored two-door, 26ft 6in 1975 Franklin Princeton is the latest in a long of painstaking restorations. We’ ve covered some of his projects in the past – one of which was an old Don whose offside wall was being held together by duct tape when he bought it – and when Andrew had finally finished the Franklin, we were given the grand tour.’

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