Heading up to Scotland in August in a borrowed motor home. It’s bigger than anything I have ever driven before & I’m completely paranoid about finding myself stuck & becoming the unwitting star of a Facebook viral video.

I usually use google maps for driving navigation, is there anything that exists that would tell me I don’t want to take  my 6m long motor home  down that road?

https://www.practicalmotorhome.com/reviews/accessory/37151-smartphone-sat-nav-apps-for-motorhomes

Loads out there

Someone has been around and stuck metal posts into the ground next to the roads with information signs on for just this sort of thing.

They all tend to feed off the same sources. You could try Waze as it has community fed data, but then Google own it and they grab the same data from Waze. Just Waze will alert you to some stuff. I don’t think it tells you a road is a dirt track to nowhere though.

I think you can configure these things to stick to main or easy routes, so it will prefer A roads etc.

Or use a paper map 😉

heights are well marked on signs – what i suggest is if its not already marked put your height in feet and inches and in m on a highly visable easy to read sign in the cab. because especially as you get further away from civalisation and there is a mix of local signs and national signs they are not always as you would expect , ive come across height signs in just feet , just meters and in both and its ok saying quick conversion in your head but by then you have gone crunch already.

as for actual  roads – at 6m long your not going to have issues. Youll be surprised where they go – that said is it a coach built ? i found them more of an issue due to increased width than my 7.2m camper. Just take it slow , dont be pressured , remember more than anything your a bigger heavier vehicle and you dont corner or stop as quick as you would in your car. take the space you need , remember your over hang and remember your wheel base is longer so you have to swing our for gates and even tight corners.

oh and what you want is a lorry sat nav , tom tom go professional or such – these allow you to stick in your dimensions and will route you accordingly . i looked into before realizing it was a non issue for my vehicle.

frankly I’m more worried about going to the lakes than i am the west coast of scotland and the highlands and islands – and a majority of that was down to the high number of people traveling at speeds unsuitable for the roads.

The signposts?

To answer more seriously I’m not sure good for asking.

frankly I’m more worried about going to the lakes than i am the west coast of scotland and the highlands and islands – and a majority of that was down to the high number of people traveling at speeds unsuitable for the roads.

We’re hoping to stop there on the way up/back down…

They all tend to feed off the same sources. You could try Waze as it has community fed data, but then Google own it and they grab the same data from Waze. Just Waze will alert you to some stuff. I don’t think it tells you a road is a dirt track to nowhere though.

I’ve tried Waze a few times, I really like it, but… it always seems to crash just as I actually need it!

Some top help here as ever – thanks!

oh and what you want is a lorry sat nav , tom tom go professional or such

Probably too expensive an option for one trip I’d of thought.

Sat nav won’t help with idiots speeding either.

Buy a lorryists map (which has low bridges and narrow roads ) and get the wife to navigate ?

Be cheaper than the tech version.

Buy a lorryists map (which has low bridges and narrow roads ) and get the wife to navigate ?

Be cheaper than the tech version.

do you know how much a wife costs?

marked height and width restrictors, fords etc are one thing, but generally narrow/steep/twisty roads are hard to quantify. The biggest factor is going to be meeting another large vehicle coming the other way at a point where neither can really reverse.

some fairly minor roads have streetview mapping, so you can gauge the general feel of the road before you go.

“meeting a large vehicle coming the other way at a point where neither can really reverse.”

The only time I’ve come across this was when a teat in a golf refused to reverse about 6m to a passing place and instead wanted me and the three cars behind to reverse down  steep s bends

I’ve yet to find somewhere that it’s anything other than people being knobs that caused issues.

Dont forget It’s only a meter longer than a Mondeo.

It’s larger than used to but it’s not large by any stretch.

They also generally have better steering lock than most cars

Remember DHL and yodel get to almost everywhere in their sprinters (which are 7m)

I’ve even met a DHL van on the wrong side of a locked gate inside rothimurchus estate on a Forest track……

Just take a book. It won’t help you navigate (unless it happens to be a book containing maps), but it will give you something to hold up in front of you to pretend to read while the person you meet head-on who won’t move froths and waves their arms around* 😀

More sensibly, what I was taught when doing my truck test for those meeting-something-smaller-head-on situations was ‘pull over, and let them try to get past you’. It’s a lot easier to squeeze a car past a coachbuilt van/HGV than vice versa.

Some roads have ‘not suitable for HGV’s’ or similar, but as long as you take it easy and are prepared to stop quickly you should be fine on that type of road in even a coachbuilt. If it’s a normal-width van, you’ll be fine on pretty much any road.

* I got this tip from STW years ago, so I’m feeding it back in now. It’s the least I can do.

“meeting a large vehicle coming the other way at a point where neither can really reverse.”

The only time I’ve come across this was when a teat in a golf refused to reverse about 6m to a passing place and instead wanted me and the three cars behind to reverse down  steep s bends

Had one of those once, single-track stretch of road, I’m coming down a 1:6 and Reginald Molehusband is just starting up, three metres past a passing place, and absolutely refuses to roll backwards into it, instead expects me to reverse back up the 1:6 hill, around the blind left-hand bend to the passing place a quarter of a mile back! I pointed out that I couldn’t see any car, van or tractor coming down behind me, and if he didn’t roll backwards, I’d haul him out of his car and do it myself. He did it himself. Muppet.

You can get a motor home specific paper roadmap, it also shows bridge weights and heights which at 6m I suspect will also impact you

fyi our 5.7m motor home is scratched to bxxgxxxry as we use it on the Scottish boondooks roads and when you go down small roads not frequented by lorries, buses etc you’ll often get overhanging shrubbery issues