Triple Treat

BY THE TIME AUSTRALIAN EXPEDITION VEHICLES HAS FINISHED WITH MSA 4X4’S BRAND-NEW LC200, IT’S GOING TO BE ONE OF THE BIGGEST, BADDEST TOURERS ON THE PLANET.

- Dean Mellor

WHAT DOES a family of seven do when they want to go on extended off-road adventures without a trailer in tow? Build a monster offroad rig with three axles and three rows of seats, and a decent-size service body on the back, of course.

That’s the off-road freedom plan of MSA 4x4 proprietor Shane Miles and his clan.

“Between Tameka, my fiancée, and myself, we have five kids, so there’s not really any sort of vehicle where I can put drawers, fridge slide and all our camping gear in,” Shane explains. “The only way we can tour anywhere is to travel with a very large trailer or a caravan, and being a bit more of a four-wheel driver I don’t really want to tow a trailer when we go to places like Cape York or across the Simpson Desert … and finding something that’s got six or seven seats, and also some sort of ute or tray-back, it just doesn’t exist.”

Shane has been searching for a solution to his dilemma for some time now and he’s done plenty of research into six-wheelers, but most vehicles with a third axle added are dual cabs – and five seats just won’t cut it (pun intended).

“There’s no use in me cutting a vehicle behind the second row of seats because I’d have to leave two kids at home,” Shane says of the traditional process of chopping the back off a standard 4x4 wagon and converting it into an extended 6x6. “The standard dual cab conversions, there’s a whole heap of companies that do them … but no one would do the third row.”

Then Shane met Mick McMillan from Australian Expedition Vehicles (AEV), and the two began to hatch a plan.

“I spent a lot of time talking to Mick at AEV, discussing whether we could do this; cut a wagon and keep the third row,” Shane says. “Mick’s was the only company that said ‘yes, we can do this, and it will be legal’.”