Verdict
It may take longer than some air models to inflate, but once up the Ventura Pascal 390 is a sturdily built awning with fittings to make life easy.
Pros
It’s made from great-quality fabrics
We think it’s a good-looking awning
Cons
The air is held in non-interchangeable chambers attached inside
It may be branded Ventura, but this porch awning is produced in exactly the same way as Isabella awnings, with the textile manufactured in Denmark and the awning put together in Poland. Why? Because Ventura is actually Isabella’s budget brand, first launched in the year 2000.
The Pascal 390 is the only air awning that Ventura will be selling this year. It’s aimed, the company says, at caravan owners who want an awning that is quick and easy to install.
That said, we found that the two-litre hand-pump supplied needed to be worked almost 150 times before the internal pressure neared the required level and the awning began to feel taut.
Also, because as you pump air through four different valves into built-in chambers in the awning – rather than into individual, removable pods as on other systems that we’ve tried – it takes a while to ensure there are no kinks in them that could hinder your progress.
Still, what you end up with is a sizeable awning. It’s marketed as a porch awning but, at 390cm wide and 260cm deep, it’s actually larger than many standard awnings that it competes against.
It has doors and ventilation windows with mosquito mesh on both sides as standard, and three windows at the front: the central example doubles-up as a door.
There are also useful canopies at each point where the awning meets the caravan wall, to ensure that rain is kept out. There are optional glassfibre poles that you can include here to firm up the seal.
The Ventura Pascal 390 comes with curtains that are fixed with standard poles and held back by ties – there’s no tent-style Velcro here.
And, while there are zip fasteners on the air chambers, you will notice that these have been tied shut as a health-and-safety measure. The pressures that the system works under are so intense that, if you puncture or damage the built-in chamber, the whole awning has to be returned to Isabella for repair. That said, we understand that there have been no puncture problems with this awning so far.
The awning is 100% polyester, but is coated in acrylate to keep condensation issues to a minimum.
It comes in icy grey with accents of olive green. And if you think that every awning seems to be grey these days, there may be a reason for that: Salop Leisure, which sells Ventura and Isabella, reports that around 98% of enquiries that it receives regarding awnings from customers are about grey units!
It’s marketed as a porch awning but it’s actually larger than many standard awnings that it competes against!
Technical Specifications
Manufacture website | http://www.ventura-camping.com/uk/home |