I felt the same way about the patriot vs 490 argument, but without having seen them in person I couldn't make the argument.
I went to the Overland Expo West and looked carefully at the Patriot and Conqueror. In my opinion, the Patriot (X1) is a higher quality product than the Conqueror UEV 390 (the x1 and 390 are comparable from a functionality view). One guy I spoke with, who has a lot of bush experience, indicated that I will not like the RRT design on these trailers. The removal and reinstall of the tent cover will be unhappiness because of the mass of dust collection (I live in the SW - major bull dust). Between the two, the Conqueror has more stuff but is not the same build quality. So if bells and whistles are of interest, the Conqueror is better. If things like construction (aluminum rivets verses SS rivets), the quality of the canvass and how the tent is made are more important, then the X1 may be a better choice. I have decided to eliminate the Conqueror at this point and leaning away from the Patriot because of the soft cover on the RRT configuration. Now if Patriot offered a hard shell cover (like the kamperoor or Kimberley), you would be better able to control dust ingress, would be even quicker to set up and would have a hard floor - all things I consider beneficial from my view.
I am shifting my focus to the
Kimberley Kamper. I have not seen the Kimberly Kamper first hand but, it is clear that Bruce Loxton and his team, who has been building these rigs for many years, takes the view on design that I can embrace. If you don't buy his camper, you may benifit from reading all of his ebooks. I find that I am better able to look at a trailer, how it is built, the functionality of features and how they are integrated, after reading his stuff. Bruce was able to build an "equivalent" Kamper to the X1 for less than the X1. I felt like the Kamper addressed some of my concerns with the x1, it offers more utility, yes - it is a bit bigger than the x1 but the quality appears to be sound.
