Unless you spend every minute of the working day with those 'craftsmen' who are putting that van together how on earth are you going to know if they cut corners? I'm not talking about the materials used as such, I'm talking about any cock ups/bodges they may end up making whilst attempting your one off's. My point is, proper conversion companies who make X amount of set layouts will have more in the way of jigs and templates to aid in assembly, fit and finish.
I have actually had parts of our van apart, the fridge area for example when I discovered that the 240v element did not work so I know what I'm talking about here.

Here in the UK, what materials do we actually make from scratch? not a lot, most of it comes from abroad, don't mean to say that it's all crap though, same with people, often our foreign cousins work harder and have more pride in doing a good job than some so called craftsmen here.

You seem very biased about the UK, same with the whole VW T4/5 thing so no doubt I won't get through that thick skull:D I'm not saying that it's a bad van, far from it, we've had ours for 8/9 years but we have out grown it now, there ARE bigger panel vans around so that's what we have to look at.

It don't matter which country, I'm sure that there are good and bad craftsmen in all of them.

[quote=listensqueak]I wouldn't slate the vans that come already built up into caravans, the market is out there and they have made a lot of people happy. I suspect they are well put together for the purpose they serve. [/quote]

Yeah, to think how many have been sold over the years, can't be all bad can they.
At one point in my life I did think about designing and building my own car and I'm not talking about the likes of a Lotus 7 replica etc, a practical car that you could use every day all year round. Again, not got the time or want the hassle, life's too short.