This Lifted Mitsubishi Delica Camper Is Our Kind Of Mobile Home

The Mitsubishi Delica is kind of cool anyway, but when you lift it, give it switchable four-wheel drive and a cabin full of a home away from home, it’s super-cool

Matt Kimberley

31 Jan 2019

This Lifted Mitsubishi Delica Camper Is Our Kind Of Mobile Home

The current mainstream SUV craze has had a weird side-effect: old-school MPVs, once the epitome of beige motoring, are in some cases getting cool again. In this case, our cool-ometer is off the chart.

A camper van conversion specialist in Scotland has revealed this, the Mitsubishi Delica-based D:5 Terrain. It’s based on the Japanese people-mover but is massively upgraded for maximum awesomeness.

It’s a product of Campers Scotland, Falkirk-based specialists in importing, converting and selling Japanese MPVs – and also Volkswagen Transporters, if you like. The D:5 Terrain comes decked out with chunky bodywork extensions for that rugged look and a reduced chance of accidentally losing paint. It looks to us like the bodywork is shared with the Australian Delica Bushmaster – another outdoorsy conversion.

The new Scottish effort is lifted, shod with the tyres of your choice and packs a switchable four-wheel drive system with locking differentials. It should be pretty much unstoppable when it comes to accessing your chosen remote getaway, even if those black alloys look delicate.

It will tow 2.5 tonnes of bikes, motorbikes, banger racing cars, canoes, animals or whatever else you’d like to move around the countryside. Inside it there’s a hob for cooking, solar panels on the roof to supplement the batteries and an elevating roof where a couple of people can sleep, usefully out of reach of the midnight advances of bears/wolves/angry badgers. What? It happens…

Campers Scotland likes to minimise energy usage wherever possible. The hob uses renewable energy, for example, even though the Delica underneath uses a petrol engine. Other campers in the company’s stable come with hybrid, or even ‘tribrid’ – petrol, electric and LPG – power.

The D:5 Terrain will make its debut at the Camping and Caravan Show at Glasgow’s SEC, starting on 7 February. Prices for this brilliantly converted Delica reportedly start at £27,995, which is about £10,000 less than the entry-level VW California. Just think of all the road trips you could take…

Comments

Yeah the Delica platform is insanely popular over here in Canada for all-terrain camper preparations, but it’s mostly the old L300 Star Wagon and (from time to time) the bigger and more recent L400 Space Gear (especially the Chamonix trim) although that one is heavier and probably not as good in offroad as the Star Wagon. I mean, Westfalias are a lot more expensive (and I’m talking about models from the same era made on the old Vanagon) and while they’re already all prepared and ready to go camping, they aren’t as powerful or as worthy on bad roads as the Delica. And to be fair while the Bongo can be interesting (it already has the possibility of having an openable roof unlike the Space Gear or the Star Wagon), it’s not really intended for off-road use or anything. Plus I low-key kind of want to get a Star Wagon (or a Space Gear since it’s longer and bigger and so better suited for a camper conversion, although I prefer the Star Wagon), just because they’re so versatile and can do a lot.

It’s actually quite pleasant to hear that the present-day Delica is still being modified and converted for off-road use and camping. The only thing that’s surprising me is the lack of a diesel, as the most popular Star Wagons over here are generally equiped with the turbodiesel engine: is there any reason for it not being available with a turbodiesel?