Swift Kon-Tiki 669 - Practical Motorhome

Find out what Practical Motorhome's test team think of the Swift Kon-Tiki 669 by reading this expert review

Verdict

Great for families. If Swift could fix the kitchen noise, it would be outstanding.

Pros

Superior upholstery and specification
A true family-berth motorhome.

Cons

Road noise and the flimsy-feeling plastic bed surround lets it down.

Living

The Kon-Tiki comes with an L-shaped travel seat-cum-sofa. The swivelling cab seats are a little too close to the sofas, especially if you want to pack the lounge with friends and family, and you cannot use both cab seats at the same time if the adjacent sofas are occupied. The cab seats can be rotated to line up with the sofas becoming, in effect, recliners.
For entertainment, you get a small drop-down cab screen, complete with speakers in the lounge.
The lounge area is lit by plenty of halogen spotlights – pleasant to read by, but they draw a lot of battery power and get hot.
With its folding table, the lounge is more flexible than in Continental ’vans, which have obstructive, fixed, tables. The table’s storage position at the back of the rear bed box is difficult to reach if the front of the bed box is full. There’s also a boom-leg coffee table for the swivel seats as standard.
There’s a full-length central corridor with a galley kitchen and a central, combined, washroom ideal for family use. Overall, there’s quite an open feel, with a through-view to the bedroom (which can be enclosed with a pleated fabric blind).
You get a level floor with 1.97m of headroom, right back to the bed where there’s a 15cm step at either corner.
There’s plenty of natural light, which brings out the pleasant tone on the lockers, and there are lounge wallboards for ventilation, curtains, and some fabric trim. The Kon-Tiki also has net curtains and this model’s microfibre seat-edge trim should wear well – it feels reassuringly expensive, too.

Kitchen

The kitchen offers all you need to cook a Sunday roast for four.
You get a movable draining board and chopping board/sink cover, and a clear route to the table for serving diners – there are sensibly positioned power points, too.
We like the elastic-strap, moulded plastic crockery storage lockers.
The moulded plastic walls, with handy shelves, are easy to clean but seemed to be the chief source of on-road rattle. Although the under-sink space is taken up by the combi boiler, there are two large, slide-out wire shelves beneath the three-compartment cutlery drawer.

Washroom

The centre washroom is geared to four-berth use and can be accessed by overcab bed users without the need to intrude on the end bedroom.
The circular shower has plenty of width and headroom, with a sunken floor and removable duckboard so you can have a dry, level floor after taking a shower. Around the toilet, there’s a reasonable amount of space, but the area is a bit cramped around shoulder level. Likewise, the sink is big enough to wash in but is a little close to the door (55cm) when leaning down to wash your face. There’s a frosted window, but no rooflight.

Beds

The bedroom is well lit by a rooflight and two windows. There are wardrobes and dressing tables either side of the beds, but only a 25cm gap between the corners of the bed and the dressing tables – exacerbated by the 15cm step down to floor level at this point.
However, the bedroom offers genuine comfort. You can watch TV in bed (there are speakers here), and there’s even a DVD connection.
You get a full-size headboard, but (9cm) less headroom than the Cheyenne. We also feel that the acrylic plastic bed surround would last well, but its flimsy feel may disappoint some people.
The overcab bed is well finished with microfibre and soft-touch plastic trim, and 60cm maximum headroom.
The lounge single bed is made up simply by removing the back cushions.

Storage

The Kon-Tiki has roof bars and a ladder (as standard), so you can fit a large roofbox. Standard trim also includes a pre-strengthened chassis ready for a towbar, available as a relatively low-cost factory fit. Its maximum towing weight is 1500kg.
Payload (835kg) includes 90 per cent of the fresh water and gas capacity, so you could add 112kg if you travel with an empty fresh tank.
The rear underbed storage space is neither heated nor big enough for bikes or a scooter, but the rear panel has room for a bike rack. The Kon-Tiki has a maximum load capacity of 200kg, or 150kg when towing.
There’s only one, offside, exterior locker door parallel with the gas locker, but this opens onto a double floor space (110 x 146 x 8.5cm tall) and the seat base above it.
Internal storage space is good: half of the rear bed base is available and twin wardrobes and overhead lockers surround the bed. There are five lounge overhead lockers: three with one shelf and two with none. The nearside seat base is mostly fouled by the gas locker and there’s nothing to hold the slats up – likewise the hinged board on the offside seat base which allows access to the deep, offside, seat base/locker space. There’s some room beneath the travel seat, among the seatbelt fixing points, but this is hard to reach with the cushions in place.