The call of the wild doesn’t just appeal to rugged individualists. Many of us with significant others, children, parents and close friends — which is to say, most of humanity — still crave the great outdoors; it’s just a little more difficult to bring the whole family along, especially if you’re planning on pointing your four-wheel-drive into the area past the pavement. Luckily, Earthcruiser’s new quad cab overlanding rigs enable more people than ever to tag along on an off-road camping excursion.
The 2020 Earthcruiser Dual Cab FX and EXP models, as they’re formally known, each pack a full-sized cabin up front, with quad captain’s chairs bringing the total seating capacity to four. Other than that, well, they’re basically the same nigh-on invincible overlanders that the two-seat models are. Beneath the boxy body lies the bones of a Mitsubishi Fuso truck chassis, powered by a GM-sourced 6.0-liter V8 making 297 horsepower and 361 pound-feet of torque. A six-speed automatic sends power to all four wheels, with a two-speed transfer case and front and rear locking differentials at your command.
Both the pop-top EXP and fixed-roof FX versions are purpose-built to spend long periods away from civilization. A 60-gallon gas tank provides hundreds of miles of range (even in spite of what we assume is abysmal fuel economy); a trio of 108-watt solar panels (with the option to upgrade to five) feed into the lithium-ion batteries — 400 amp-hours standard, 800 amp-hours optional. There’s even an integrated water filtration system that lets you feed the on-board tanks from any water supply.
Not that it feels uncivilized inside, of course. There’s room inside the 87.7-square-foot living area for a six-foot-four-inch person to stand upright, and even more in the EXP model with the roof popped up. There’s a full kitchen packing a 4.2-cubic-foot fridge/freezer, stainless steel sink, induction cooktop and expansive counter space, as well as a bathroom with a full-height shower and a composting toilet. (There’s even a standalone coffee bar.) And, of course, there’s a place to sleep: the main bed in back, with an optional “sky bed” that goes above the pass-through between living room and driving room.
Don’t expect all this capability to come cheap, of course. Earthcruiser’s website lists the FX as running for $220,000–$245,000 and the EXP for $255,000–$265,000, depending on specification; that said, those prices are from 2016, so a) they don’t apply to the brand new quad cabs and b) have likely gone up regardless. But even if the price tag pushes closer to $300,000 than $250K…just think of it as a rolling second home instead of a motor vehicle, and it’ll make way more sense.
