The Drifter - Specs and FAQ

Yeah a couple weeks ago but haven’t heard anything back to confirm or provide a rough estimate of completion. I don’t want to keep bugging them when I’ve already reached out multiple times over the past month. I’m just trying to find out if I should expect another month or more wait based on others’ experiences.

 

Please update us when you find out an ETA. 13 months is definitely over the estimated timeframe. I would be definitely getting annoyed/concerned at this point.

I'm at 9 months and they quoted me 10 months when I ordered. Next month I will be sure reaching out to them.

 

I ordered 1-15-19 (11 mo ago) and received an Invoice 9-15-19 (month 9). I am hoping to have my camper finished by the 12 month mark (Jan 2020). I didn’t order power coating.

Even with the powercoating, I would have expected to get at least an invoice by now. I think calling the shop is your best way to reach out. I have always had someone answer.

 

Today is month 5 for me. Four months (hopefully) until they call for the rest of my money!

 

So a bit of a background for context:
I placed my order on the website 11-9-18. Received initial invoice on 11-14 (invoice 1085). Discussed initial timeline sometime May- June 2018. Was templated for October delivery. I talked to Phil in mid summer and was told that a switch in a supplier caused a delay in production. I am / was unemployed and made the call to go international for a few months and notified Phil of this decision, making it clear I was aiming for an early December install. I was then told in October that I was slated for the November production batch, which I think was a delay from where I was originally slated had I not shared my decision to go international (lesson learned). Anyways, I reached out two weeks ago and was told my unit was heading to powder coating and I’d have a more solid estimate by last week. Since then, crickets. Not going to lie, I’m running out of runway and patience. Had I known it was going to be this long at the beginning of the process I would’ve likely seen this as a pipe dream and saved up for a couple more years for a Khaya or given up on overland type rig altogether (along with corresponding thousands in preparatory upgrades). I completely understand (as much as I can) the challenges of growing and scaling a business like this, but I have my own limitations. I figure others making a decision should know others’ experiences and hopefully lead times rapidly diminish from here forward. (And hopefully this doesn’t cause issues with the VO team, but hey, my experience is what it is).

 

I would preface my response with, I empathize with you and everyone who are waiting.
I have ignored these types of posting in the past, but as my timeline matches your timeline (invoice 1088 received 11-16-2018). I am speaking up.
I received the notification on September 16 that my Drifter, which was powder-coated, was ready for pick-up. It was installed on October 5. Accordingly I suspect if not for your special circumstances you would be in a Drifter today.
I am not part of the Vagabond cult. But I am a very satisfied customer. I would echo what many have stated previously "it was worth the wait".
They are not cranking these Drifters out. The workmanship, care, pride, Phil and team put into the Drifters will be very evident. They are a small team dedicated to creating something that will last. These are not crank out in an assembly lines by persons working a 9-5 shift who don't give a damn.
(Unpaid testimonial by an actual Vagabond owner, who was in your position).

 

Hi everyone,

I figured I'd chime in on the lead times. Phil has accurate lead times on each of the campers in queue, so asking him will get you that info. I will say that we had set backs when we switched suppliers for the majority of the bending and forming that caused delays. The delays caused a ripple effect on the majority orders and we have been trying to play catchup since.

Like @SDGrandpaTaco said we are small and take a lot of pride in our work. Our goal is to get these campers out as fast as possible, but we will not sacrifice quality at the expense of speeding up production. The goal from day one was to have a camper that was well designed, reliable and offer years of trouble free use. From a business stand point, warranty work is expensive, so we would rather take extra time to make sure things are as they should before the camper leaves our facility. This takes care of two things, we are mindful that we are a young company so making sure we grow in a sustainable manner is very important; second when you have the product on your truck you don't have to worry about any major failures.

I know the wait can be arduous and frustrating, but I can assure you we are focused on getting these out the door. Right now all our resources are going to that which is why sometimes it seems like radio silence. I promise we are not ignoring anyone, and we aren't winning any prizes by making you upset and us taking longer to produce our products.

Lastly I just want to say how thankful we are of the support everyone has given us. When we first started prototyping back in 2016 it was hard for us not to just jump out of the gate and say "look at us we're first!" We had to make sure what we were selling was something we would be proud to own ourselves. That pride hasn't left us and we want every camper to outlast the truck it's on and be handed down. We have had our fair share of struggles dialing in production, but we are new and hit some unforeseen setbacks. They are no ones fault but our own, but any patience you can give us is greatly appreciated.

 

As I asked yesterday, how many Nomads have you made?

 

So far only one Nomad has been made. That's because when the nomad was released mid this year, those orders got added to the back of the production list becuase we don't skip anyone in line for any reason.

The design is essentially the same as the Drifter just scaled larger, so it's not like created a whole new camper, it's based on the trued design of the Drifter.

 

Woo Thanks Iggy!

Now...what was that little board you were working on yesterday?!

 

Thank you all (and to VO) for your replies and experiences! It's easy for me to see how my circumstances (i.e. notifying VO I was unavailable for delivery Aug-Nov and thus being rolled-back in production batch) stacked on top of production delays and, I assume, a bit of a holiday backlog at the powdercoater brought me to this point. I will work my specific situation offline with Phil. And, despite my serious lack of mechanical know-how, I hope I am able to share some of my Drifter mods / experiences with the community in the near future.

 

The Powerboard is something I’ve been working on to streamline wiring. Currently there is nothing wrong, but it’s time consuming to make mini harnesses and wire everything up for all the different power configurations. This is going to help so all the electrical accessories plug right into the board to we only have to do minimal crimping.

Those that don’t follow my ramblings in instagram here’s the Powerboard. It’s still i testing, but just shows some of our design capabilities and eagerness to speed things up.

 

Man I swear you guys think of everything! Good stuff

 

Some Alucab 270 eye candy....

 

You have every right to be frustrated! I’m by no means down playing your experience. We can do better and are working on improving as much as we can.

 

Anybody with a Drifter / DCLB and a swing out? Seems it would be super L......O......N......G, but I like the idea of a swing out for lots of reasons.

 

@anomalyTRD had that setup.

 

A dual swing out = not so L...O...N...G.

 

Hey, Christy,
Definitely some 270 candy there. Expecting the same on ours.
See you have a Yakima rack. Is it mounted to the L-track? If so was it a diy fab or something off the shelf?
Thanks!

 

Not very skilled in the DIY space. They are actually Yakima tracks installed by Vagabond. We purchased them from Rack and Road and sent them to Iggy/Phil/crew. At the time, I was unable to get good instructions on how to mount a box with the L tracks. The Yakima system has towers for the cross bars that add more height than we care to have. We had the box from our previous vanagon and so re-purposed it. We are looking to upgrade to a box that is not as tall. Maybe something like this:
https://www.rei.com/product/876513/...KsDsxCep8fp7jAvvOccdDMtxSYgMa5sRoCiIgQAvD_BwE

One thing about the Alucab awning...we had it mounted to the passenger side and I'm not sure I'd do that again. If you add a single arm swing out, it will swing out to the right and be underneath the awning. Our initial enquiry suggests that they don't make a left opening single arm swing out. Something to consider if you have or plan to have a swing out.