2015 Earthcruiser EXP
In September of 2017 I took a plane out to Salt Lake City, Utah and drove home to California in an off road beast.
I had been watching the classifieds on the Expedition Portal for around six months when a pristine used Earthcruiser came up for sale. Although it was way more than what I could afford, $265,000.00, it checked a lot of boxes. I was single, didn’t have a mortgage and had a decent job and figured if not me, who.
After getting established in Australia Lance and his wife Michelle decided to open an Earthcruiser production facility in Bend, Oregon.
One of the things that makes an Earthcruiser special is that it is built from the ground up to be a dependable platform for global travel. Everything is thought out and field tested. Many of the campers parts and building techniques were adopted from the marine industry.
In Australia there are quite a few different configurations of the Earthcruiser because of the different trucks they have available to them. Until recently here in the states we were limited to the Mitsubishi Fuso, a 4WD cab over with a small diesel engine. Starting in 2020 Fuso is now gasoline powered and available as a four door. More on this later.
For the first few months I was overwhelmed. Not by just all the subsystems and knowledge behind them but the sheer amount of attention you get where ever you go.
The adjacent pic is the Earthcruiser’s command center. Each system is terminated here with a relay for easy monitoring and turning on or off. Some of these are the electric powered awning, retractable cassette toilet, electric retractable stairs, outside lights, water pump, refrigerator, heater, water tank heater, water heater, solar charging system and battery management system.
Below this pic is the water system plumbing. This allows you to route water between the two water tanks and also syphon water from an outside source such as a river. The Earthcrusier has an onboard water filtration system that allows you to gather water from suspect locations and filter that for potable use.
The temps were already dropping so many of my early adventures were in the cold. I was very impressed by the heating system. In the FJ there was none. The Casita had a propane powered Suburban that sounded like a jet taking off and pumped out a ton of condensation. The diesel powered Webasto heater in the Earthcruiser was quiet and dry. I was in love. I sat around in my boxer shorts sipping coffee while it was in the twenties outside. Finally I could be civilized while getting my travel fix regardless of the time of year or location.
I had some amazing trips in this rig. I really enjoyed the layout and functionality of the camper. You could literally pull into any location and be set-up within minutes.
I was comfortable driving the Earthcruiser through deep sand and snow but it was not impressive on hills due to the lack of a proper transfer case. There was no 4Lo. At the base of a climb you needed to have a head of steam to climb to the top. This was fine unless the climb involved shelves or rocks. It was just a matter of time until I surpassed the capabilities of the Duonic transmission.
I dropped the front end into a mud filled ditch. With 4WD engaged and tires aired down the drive train wouldn’t even spin. The torque converter on the auto transmission was not set up for anything like this. You could give it gas but the truck just sat there.
After an hour of digging and breaking out the MaxTrax I was able to get the truck rocking enough to get the needed momentum so that the transmission would grab. After this incident and a few insurmountable hills I just didn’t have the confidence to take this truck to remote area’s given this limitation.
Another issue I had with the truck were the drum brakes. I have gotten so used to disk brakes I had forgotten how bad drum brakes are. If you need to navigate a steep downgrade and need to navigate a shelf by dropping a wheel at a time over the edge you need a lot of control to gently lower your truck over the edge. The drum brakes on the Fuso would grab or cut loose and invairably the truck would just bounce around. Sometimes this is just an inconvenience but if the trail is off camber or the drop puts the truck at an awkward angle having the brakes grab could cause a seriously butt clenching moment.
About this same time the fuel pump died on a trip back from AZ. Being stranded on the side of the road with your broken down zombie apocalypse escape vehicle seemed ironic. I decided to sell the Earthcruiser when I got back to town.
While the Earthcrusier’s off road capabilities would have been fine on any number of RV’s I considered it lacking on one costing this much and marketed for off road exploration. I had hoped it would have been as capable as the FJ but that was not to be.
Pro’s
Excellent camper design
Well chosen quality components
Diesel heater and water heater allow for just one fuel source.
Easy access to all systems for easy troubleshooting
Con’s
Drum brakes.
Duonic Transmisson/no transfer case.
Weak off road capability.
In Conclusion
The build and design of the Earthcruiser camper is well thought out and executed. It is quite likely the best camper I will ever own. However to have an off road rig that is not suitable to go off road except for relatively flat dirt roads is not what I was expecting. Especially for a rig that looks as capable as the Earthcruiser.
To be fair I went back to some of the area’s that challenged the Earthcruiser with my FJ Cruiser and the Toyota passed without breaking a sweat. I have even gone out to some of the hills that challenged the Earthcruiser with my Ford F350. I could have sipped tea in the F350 and climbed any of the hills the Earthcrusier struggled with.
In 2020 Mistubishi introduced a new Fuso cab-over truck to the USA. Mistubishi has made some improvements that would appear to address the concerns I had with this platform. The Fuso now has a transfer case and the truck has disk brakes. I have not driven one but if I had the money I would definitely like to check one out.
Below is the YouTube ad I created to sell the Earthcruiser if you are interested to see the inside and outside.
