The basic concept of the motorhome hasn’t changed much throughout history. Generally, a coach is going to be a relatively large place to sleep, cook, and defecate. Sometimes, motorhome builders try to bring car elements into RVs and things get weird. I’m still not sure what to think about Skydancer, a company that says it’s the first to build motorhome cabriolets. That’s right, this company builds motorhomes with convertible roofs and that sounds like one of the coolest and worst things.
Over the past few weeks I’ve been seeing photos online of a wild convertible motorhome. There appears to be multiple pictures of just one coach and it was a custom build that evolved over time. It reminded me a lot of the modified flybridge-equipped motorhome driven by Jeremy Clarkson in the Grand Tour. This got me thinking. Is there a company out there that builds convertible motorhomes right from the factory?
To my genuine surprise, the answer is yes. I eventually found some old videos and a more recent piece by Autoevolution showing that not only is there a company that builds convertible motorhomes, but it’s willing to sell you a license to the design so you could have one built wherever you live. This is Skydancer, and this company builds RVs where the lower floor is all living space and there’s a second deck that’s something like a convertible car meets yacht skybridge.
Mixing Cars With RVs Has Always Been Weird
As weird as this particular concept sounds, it’s just another example of a motorhome builder trying to blend cars and motorhomes together.
Generally, motorhomes are good at serving only one purpose. They are buses and trucks designed to allow you to make home wherever you park your rig. As many ambitious builders have found out, the best houses on wheels don’t make great cars. Giant motorhomes are lumbering beasts that handle like the buses they’re based on, aren’t fast, and aren’t exciting to drive.
That hasn’t stopped some firms from breaking the mold with examples including the GMC Motorhome, the Vixen 21 TD, and the Champion Ultrastar. Those coaches promised more car-like driving experiences with the Vixen being perhaps the closest the world’s gotten to an RV sportscar. In the present day, brands like Wingamm are trying make driving RVs more accessible.
While efforts to make an RV handle like a car have been dotted throughout history, I’d never come across an instance of a company chopping the top off of an RV to emulate a convertible car. Well, that was until today.
The World’s First Production Convertible RV
The Skydancer is the brainchild of Piotr Kubinski, the founder of the German firm Skydancer GmbH. In 2014, he made headlines when he unveiled the Skydancer 7.5 concept, four years after filing for a patent for a “Recreational vehicle with driving and living compartments.” This one-off RV was based on a used Mercedes-Benz Atego commercial truck and employed a concept Kubinski called the “reverse alcove.” In this concept, Kubinski takes a standard truck or van and builds a second deck forward and up. This creates a cabin with seats for the whole family. But the trick is the roof, which slides back, giving the whole family an open-air, panoramic experience as if they were driving a 7.5 metric tonne convertible. Well, that’s pretty much what the RV was, anyway.
The second deck is purely for the family to ride together and enjoy their trip. The lower main deck contains the living space, including sleeping areas in an alcove under the upper deck.
A year before, Kubinski showed off a test mule for a Skydancer 3.5, another double-decker RV based on the Fiat Ducato, which is sold here in America as the Ram ProMaster. Amazingly, Skydancer actually pulled through and built a real version of the 3.5-tonne RV. In 2019, that motorhome launched as the 2B Concept and yes, despite the looks, there’s still a Ducato under all of that bodywork.
The 2B Concept (which is supposed to mean “Two Floor Height Motorhome”), also known as the Cabrio, took Kubinski’s convertible roof concept even further. By day, this coach features four seats for fun under the sun as your family drives somewhere. At night, you can plop down a bed in the upper level and sleep under the stars. Roof hatches have been an adventure RV gimmick for a while, but this takes that to another level.
Skydancer says the goofy design of the 2B is also intentional. The glass greenhouse is supposed to ensure every passenger has the same view out of the coach. At the same time, Skydancer wants the occupants to feel like they’re in a limo rather than a truck or a bus, so the seats sit close to the floor like they would in a sedan.
The company also says the all-glass elevated cabin is better for visibility and the engine maintenance hatch up front is bigger than a typical European RV. Skydancer even claims the 2B is safer than the typical European motorhome since the occupants sit higher than the bumpers and trunks of a typical car.
Other claimed benefits are no beds above the driver’s head, better aero, and the driver will be able to detect an issue with bridge clearance before it’s too late. I’m not so sure about that last one. Even with ample warning people still manage to wreck trucks on America’s infamous canopener bridge.
As of writing, Skydancer sells two distinct models and you can sort of buy a third, but we’ll get to that in a moment. The 2B is sold as the Cabrio in either Apéro trim or Sky Diamond trim. The Apéro is supposed to be a standard RV while the Diamond, which is going into production next year, is the same 2B design, but with a more upscale interior design inspired by yachts.
No matter your choice of Cabrio, the company says you get a coach that starts off with a metal frame under a custom fiberglass body. Ignoring the observation lounge concept, it’s also a standard RV with a cooking area, bathroom, heated water, and holding tanks. There’s nothing that special about the camping part. The weirdest part is probably the bathroom, where the sink and toilet fold out of the wall.
Otherwise, the Cabrio can be ordered in 21.2 feet, 22.9 feet, and 24.5 feet lengths and it stands 9.7 feet tall. The giant sliding roof portion is said to open electrically in just five seconds with the push of a button.
Opting for the Sky Diamond gets you a greenhouse that emulates the look of diamonds, digital mirrors, leather interior surfaces, Aguti seats, glass by Bertone, and interior customization at the buyer’s request. We’ll just say that it’s striking, but maybe not pretty.
As you could guess, this is a very European rig. As such, the Ducato underneath has a 2.2-liter diesel rated at 140 HP or 180 HP depending on the donor chassis. You also have a choice of a six-speed manual or a nine-speed automatic. Loaded up with a family, water, and gear, Skydancer says the Cabrio variants weigh 7,010 pounds.
Skydancer says it builds these RVs entirely by hand and amazingly, at least a few of the Apéro variant have been sold. The price for this madness seems somewhat reasonable, too. The Apéro launched with a price of around €130,000, or $138,000 at current exchange rates. The Sky Diamond isn’t out yet, but it’s expected to launch next year for €212,966 for the longest version. That’s $226,127, or what you’d pay for a high-end camper van in America without any trick features.
The Catch
There is a plot twist to this whole story. Skydancer’s Cabrio models will be Europe-only, but the company says that the Cabrio modifications could be made to any Ducato chassis. As for the original Skydancer 7.5? It’s been renamed the XL Skydancer. The company didn’t put it into production but does say it will happily license the rights to you so you can make your own copy wherever you live. Kubinski has an active US patent for his design and it seems he believes you could turn just about any large RV into a convertible with enough work.
I hope that maybe someone in the U.S. follows through and finds a customizer crazy enough to do it. I want to see a Prevost with a flybridge!
That said, I’m also somewhat concerned with the overall concept. Anyone who has owned an RV before knows that the more holes you have, the more chances you get to have water intrusion. At the same time, anyone who has owned a convertible car before knows that seals don’t last forever. This combines both giant holes and a convertible roof into one. You might assume that mixing convertibles and motorhomes would be one of the worst ideas, but I suppose it’s a bit too early to tell. There probably won’t even be enough of these built to even say for sure.
Sadly, all of this means that Americans cannot enjoy a turn-key version of Kubinski’s work. For now, most of us will just have to look at pictures of these crazy things and wonder what it’ll be like to drive a convertible motorhome.
(Images: Skydancer GmbH)
The post This Company Invented A Motorhome With A Convertible Roof And It’s Simultaneously The Best And Worst Idea appeared first on The Autopian.
