UK Tax and Insurance and fuel consumption for larger Overland truck - Horizons Unlimited

**wytco0** · #1 8 Oct 2012

I am in the early stateg of planning a long overland trip to Australia from the UK and I am considering using a larger truck like a MAN 4x4 or something based on a Iveco Daily 4x4.

Does anyone know how much these larger trucks cost to Tax and insure and how much fuel they use for normal on road driving? they seem to fall into the commercial categories and I haven't been able to find out much info from searches.

I know several people on here have used larger trucks so any advice and info you have on them would be much appreciated.

**graysworld** · #2 14 Oct 2012

My Iveco Daily is registered as a motor caravan tax class private heavy goods £165 per year and it does 22 miles to the gallon or 12 litres per 100 Km in Euros.

Graeme

**Mervifwdc** · #3 14 Oct 2012

Our unimog likes to guzzle about 25 litres of fuel for 100km, and insurance varies depending on where you are. Road tax (depending on your point of view) is zero, or for an Irish truck about €280 per year (very roughly).

google search for "Stephen Stuart silk route club" - He drives a Man, and is UK based. Also take a look here: The Africa Overland Network The Africa Overland Network and search for large truck.

And for Iveco based travel, http://www.philflanagan.com/

There is not loads of info out there, but there is some! Good luck with your search!

Merv.

**monster** · #4 16 Oct 2012

Hi
we have had a truck in South America for the last 3 years and for us this was the way to go as we were living in it full time. previous vehicle was a landy for asia.
most overlanders with toyota-landys type vehicles say to us that our truck is to big to get about in. but we went every where.
ours was 2.9m high which helped. most overland trucks are very tall and can stop you going into small villages due to low cables, so these trucks take a motorbike.

insurance was ony 150 pounds for us three years ago in the u.k but will be higher now. road tax was 195 pounds i think.

taking a vehicle into oz means cleaning-cleaning-cleaning,and shipping. have you thought of starting from oz and buying one there and doing the reverse trip

we averaged 18 ltrs per 100 km ( 7500kg truck) for the whole of our trip in South America and driving through Venezuela was a great bonus for cheap fuel, felt like being back in Iran.

we only drive at about 40 mph when travelling as we think you get to see more of the country you are in. we averaged 67 kms a day over our 3 years and will be looking to reduce this on our next trip

sometimes planning to much can take the fun out of it

safe travels

**rclafton** · #5 16 Oct 2012

Big trucks = big shipping bills and you will have to ship

Have a look at some of the aussie trucks - they are designed to be shipped and have hard lifting roofs. A home built fuso i saw recently could be dropped in an afternoon by taking out the centre of all the walls (i'll dig out the url,) they have driven from aussie and are going back next year

bigger = more fuel used, one of your biggest expenses, i get abouthe same as graeme in my Iveco, not alot different from a 4.2 cruiser or even a loaded defender

We drive a bigger truck as it allows me to manage my health but its still only 4.5 tonnes, do you need a big truck ?