14' Series Is putting an oven in worthwhile?

[Crew family]

Hi all,
We've got a 14.44-4 ordered for delivery in late October and had a call to finalise any extras we want to put on. I'm pretty happy with those we've ordered (detailed on a previous post) but have been thinking lately how much we use our oven at home for baking bread rolls, cupcakes, muffins and small roasts. Jayco says we would still have a grill; the oven would go underneath so would lose a cupboard.
Has anyone else put the oven in, and if so, was it useful? We have a microwave, Weber Q and a Dreampot.

 

[Drover]

We have no oven but then no kids either, the micro wave and Weber cover the job pretty well.

 

[Outback heaven!]

Hi there Crew family and congrats on your new purchase.
We faced the same dilemma with our 2004 2nd hand Expanda which came without an oven. Our previous caravan, an old Millard, came with an oven which we found useful on occasions esp when arriving late at bush camps (unpowered) and we were able to throw the lasagne, for example, into the oven to heat up while we were setting up camp and then voila... dinner's ready! Or if the weather was hideous outside and belting down rain, we were able to do our roast in the oven. Very occasionally we'd use the oven for baking muffins etc.
In the end we worked around the fact that our Expanda didn't have an oven and we were extremely glad for the extra cupboard space that an oven would have taken up. We bought a Turbo oven for when we had a powered site and it was absolutely fantastic, stored easily inside the van when not in use and could be used inside or outside depending on the weather. Another plus with that oven was that we were using the Caravan Park's electricity and not our own gas. When we bush camp, we plan our roast around the weather but we do have many a pic of us huddled under the brollies trying to fend off the pouring rain, while protecting our precious roast sizzling away in the camp oven in a pit fire.
In saying all that and reading that you have a Dreampot and a Weber Q which is hugely versatile, my opinion would be that you could safely ditch the oven idea and I think that you'll be glad of the extra cupboard/drawer space.
We are also waiting on the delivery of a new Jayco (20.62-2) and it comes with an oven as standard and they were throwing in a Weber on the day we ordered so now we are overwhelmed with options! We're still keeping our Turbo oven for those powered sites but nothing tastes as wonderful as roast lamb cooked in a pit fire and the Weber is brilliant for pizzas and roast pork and crackling!
Hope this helps and keep us posted on what you finally decide.
Cheers
Carolyn

 

[Dobbie]

Agree totally.

Oven takes up cupboard space, adds to the total weight and if you have a Weber that is all the oven you really need....unless you want to some Masterchef stuff.

Good luck with it.

:welcome:

 

[WHHEMI]

We have a Journey 17.55.8 OB and ordered it with the oven, you don't lose any storage as we store thing's in the oven when travelling, great for those late arrivals at bush camps, we turn it on with a few pies or whatever in it and by the time we are set up tea is ready, have had ovens in all our vans and wouldn't be without one.

 

[Outback heaven!]

That's true as well WHHEMI and it's certainly convenient having the oven there all ready to go. We sometimes used our Expanda's microwave for extra storage but I never used our Millard's oven as storage because we were worried about damaging it's internal thermostat with all the dreadful roads we used to take it on. The oven could be a bit dicky anyway.

 

[Marv_mart]

We use our Baby Q as our oven for roasts etc, van next to us used theirs to bake a cake and cookies when in Alice, just need to make sure to turn it to its lowest setting to get a nice 170° for that sort of stuff though.
Enjoy your new van, we certainly are. Just finishing our latest trip in our 14.44-5 OB to the Kimberleys and the Bungle Bungles. Cheers

 

[Sammy D]

We have an oven and it would take a fair bit to convince me to leave it out, in the summer and fine weather the weber is perfect but when you are away in miserable cold wet weather staying inside is the more comfortable option and I feel the oven earns its keep then.

Of course if you didn't have the oven you can work around it, obviously you don't have a roast dinner every night but dear oh dear a roast dinner goes down well in miserable weather:hungry:

 

[Dove]

We also have an oven. It gets used on those cold, wet, windy days when cooking outside is not fun. We have only ever cooked pizza in it. Friends also have an oven in their Sterling. It gets heaps of use.

If I was buying a new van I would prefer to have an oven. Now the griller we have never used and would happily have just the cook top and oven.

 

[Bushman]

when we ordered our beast the better half insisted on an oven, the van is 18 mths old and the oven only got used for the first time at Easter, works a treat and is fan forced

In saying that could we do without it? Yes as we've had 2 camper trailers and 1 Expanda without ovens and got by OK without. Friends recently purchased a van and sales guy talked them out of the oven

 

[Marv_mart]

They way most of you seem to be talking you all have bigger vans, must remember that it is only a 14.44 here.
If you get an oven, is it gas or electric?
Do you forfeit the space currently used by the microwave?
If you have the larger fridge (highly advisable) the microwave sits under the hot plate/grill in our layout.
The large drawer under this setup, hot plate-grill-microwave(oven) is very useful for crockery.
What would your setup be?
You need to ask the questions;
- how much would you use it?
- how often would you go away just to sit inside your van in cold miserable weather?
- how often would the Weber Baby Q be the more versatile option eg cooking, roasting, BBQing etc ( and keeping the cooking smells outside) and the smoke alarm quiet.
If you have the roof AC, probably also the recommended option, will your microwave sit in the spot where the other layouts have the AC next to he door?
Marv

 

[Maxisverymad]

Hi @Crew family, we have a 2015 14.44-4 and love it, it's perfect for me and Mrs Max.
We got the microwave and not the oven and we camp 99% off the grid. (So you might think we would get the oven) But all our oven cooking is done in the Weber, perfect, if it's raining the Weber is just outside the awning and no problem for me, the cook!
We also use the grill a bit which works really well. But really happy to cook oven food outside not inside!
It's really up to you (obvisiously) what you think will suit you guys as, as you can see from above we all have different needs etc.
As to @Marv_mart about air conditioner, we chose to have roof mount and couldn't be happier!

I'm sure you will enjoy your new van either way.

 

[Marv_mart]

Does anyone know or have it done, that is get a roof mount AC after market?
They are much quieter and distribute cool/warm air better.
Not really off topic as maybe @Crew family have not considered this as an option.
If it were possible to have it done (is roof strong enough with stronger gas struts?) we would move microwave up where current AC is, give room under grill for drawer (or oven??), get AC compressor away from next to the fridge which would then not be over heated by the AC compressor and cool much more efficiently in hot conditions, get noisy compressor away from neighbors on our off side.
So many advantages we didn't know we had the option to do when we ordered our 14.44-5.
That's what we would have done if we knew we could have.
PS: would still not choose the oven though, prefer Weber option

 

[Marv_mart]

Just checked the website for the latest layouts. They seem to have done as standard all the things we should have done but were choices we had but didn't know about, Roof AC, Lge Fridge, juggled position of sink and microwave and used the space better, damn, if only we knew we could have chosen to do these things when we ordered ours, too late now me thinks.
Best of luck with choosing your options!

 

[Crew family]

Wow - thanks for all your replies! Yes we have gone with the roof-top AC upgrade, and the 2016 model has the microwave next to the door under the kitchen bench, not under the grill/cooktop, so just a couple of cupboards that realistically could be done without. In saying all this, we would use the grill more (our youngest insists on toast for breakfast), so our query was really just to see who couldn't live without the extra gas oven (on top of all the other luxuries like microwave, weber, dreampot etc). After several years of making do with the Eagle quite happily, I'm sure anything will feel like an upgrade.
p.s. Love reading your trip report Marv_mart - we did the Bungles and West Coast in the Eagle 2 years ago. Bet you're having fun!

 

[WHHEMI]

Hi @Crew family, we have a 2015 14.44-4 and love it, it's perfect for me and Mrs Max.
We got the microwave and not the oven and we camp 99% off the grid. (So you might think we would get the oven) But all our oven cooking is done in the Weber, perfect, if it's raining the Weber is just outside the awning and no problem for me, the cook!
We also use the grill a bit which works really well. But really happy to cook oven food outside not inside!
It's really up to you (obvisiously) what you think will suit you guys as, as you can see from above we all have different needs etc.
As to @Marv_mart about air conditioner, we chose to have roof mount and couldn't be happier!

I'm sure you will enjoy your new van either way.

Did you consider ordering without the microwave, seems like you wouldn't be able to use it much.

 

[Maxisverymad]

Yes @WHHEMI we did, but resale value should be higher along with TV aerial and some other extras that won't get a lot of use, good salesman but made sense.
The other option instead of microwave for us was to have more cupboard space there but we have heaps of storage space for the two of us!

 

[Drover]

I wouldn't believe the resale value line any vehicle the extra accessories may cost more in the beginning but they don't add a great deal at the other end, well not a lot anyway..................
Certainly looks like the southerners are for an oven and northerners are happy with a Weber.................................great topic with some top pointers.

 

[WHHEMI]

Did you consider ordering without the microwave, seems like you wouldn't be able to use it much.

I only ask as we deleted the microwave from our Journey in preference to more storage as we free camp most of the time.

 

[Bushman]

- how often would you go away just to sit inside your van in cold miserable weather?

For me most of the time I take the crap weather with me, just ask anybody

- how often would the Weber Baby Q be the more versatile option eg cooking, roasting, BBQing etc ( and keeping the cooking smells outside) and the smoke alarm quiet.
Marv

Yep you're right, though for me lately half the time I take our Q it never gets used I gave up taking it.