RV living

Hogie1 said:
Do you prefer regular trailer set up, or 5th wheel?
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I haven't pulled a trailer in very many years. When I did, they were owned by others. If I were to go out as a couple, or alone, I would get a new fifth wheel Escape or wait to see what InTech comes out with. I am trying to keep up with friends/technology as a bucket list item. Matt
 
Matt_SERE said:
I haven't pulled a trailer in very many years. When I did, they were owned by others. If I were to go out as a couple, or alone, I would get a new fifth wheel Escape or wait to see what InTech comes out with. I am trying to keep up with friends/technology as a bucket list item. Matt
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I am looking into renting a class C rv for a Grand Canyon trip next year. I figure that's a good way to dip my toes in the RV lifestyle to see what we might like. I am about 9 yrs from retiring, so I have time to experiment and learn. Thx for your insight, I appreciate it! -Paul
 
AHM said:
(Of course police in all 57 states reserve the right
to jack you up for "distracted driving"
regardless of what the actual laws state).


Massachusetts, LOL.

idjft.jpg


Enable voice-commands in Android Auto/CarPlay,
and use earbuds with microphones.

Hey, man - I was controlling my car.


FTFY.
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57 states?
 
cockpitbob said:
I'm starting to think I took the wrong career path. Buy land, install utilities, hire out most of the maintenance, then sit back and make money and enjoy the FL weather. The type of people that can afford prices like that means I probably wouldn't have to hire a bouncer or put the local police on speed-dial.
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There are at least a couple different types of people who spend time in a campground. You've got "seasonals" whose camper/trailer is there for the entire season - and they differ from families with kids to snowbirds to retirees. Then you've got the families who take their kids camping for the weekend, week or month at a time. And then you've got groups of people who vacation - and they vary a lot. When you've got four sites of guys who are out to party - it gets interesting sometimes. Plus, we're near enough to Foxwood and Mohegan that people camp here and go there.

We've got security, they're ramped up on weekend nights during the summer, lighter staffed during the week and as the season starts/ends. As the head of maintenance described it to me the other morning - "we've got three waves, campers, partiers and then campers again in the Fall".

Talking to head of security a couple of weeks ago - he said that he's had to call the state police in this past year more than he can remember. People getting out from covid lockdown apparently tend to party harder.
 
Hogie1 said:
Do you prefer regular trailer set up, or 5th wheel?
Click to expand...

The natural progression is to move from a small travel trailer, to a bigger travel trailer using a WDH (Weight Distributing Hitch), to a 5th wheel, to a motor home.

Generally speaking set up and breakdown is easier as you go through the normal progression and cost goes up. The towing experience also gets better.

The hitches for a WDH and 5th wheel are heavy and has you age it gets harder to physically manage the hitches. The WDH goes in and out of the truck for each tow. The 5th wheel hitch goes in and out once, or a few times, a season. Connecting a car that is capable of four down towing is easier still when you move to a motor home .

Bob
 
HorizontalHunter said:
The natural progression is to move from a small travel trailer, to a bigger travel trailer using a WDH (Weight Distributing Hitch), to a 5th wheel, to a motor home.

Generally speaking set up and breakdown is easier as you go through the normal progression and cost goes up. The towing experience also gets better.

The hitches for a WDH and 5th wheel are heavy and has you age it gets harder to physically manage the hitches. The WDH goes in and out of the truck for each tow. The 5th wheel hitch goes in and out once, or a few times, a season. Connecting a car that is capable of four down towing is easier still when you move to a motor home .

Bob
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This is correct. I didn't bother with the 5er because that would have required getting a new truck and the availability and prices were out of sight. I've towed before and drove larger vehicles so the learning curve wasn't that steep. With my coach and flat towing the crew cab pickup, I think I'm around 65' overall. It really isn't intimidating to drive and with the steerable tag it's really a pleasure. Just no backing up. I was at several shows and the 5er's are incredible inside. Higher ceilings which give a much larger feel but you sacrifice storage. I can set up and break down in between 20-30 minutes taking my time. I'm never in a rush doing that.
 
I have been thinking about a "small" RV for an eventual move. Nothing nearly as fancy as Frugal Fanny and spouse, just something which could house and support two people for up to a week, with regular stops for logistics.

But I have almost no knowledge of this field. Am listening into various online discussions trying to find a starting place.
 
F350 dually or similar 4X4 with a truck camper. Anything smaller will only haul a popup and you'll want a hardside. Don't want a full size truck ? Look into a used Winnebago View or Navion. On the Mercedes Sprinter chassi. (better MPG) Park in a different spot at work every day, drive to NH, plenty of free camping spots if you know where to look. Then there's Boondockers Welcome, a website for folks who will let you park for a day or more for free ir a very low cost. In winter you'll need to winterize and use a plastic liner in the bathroom and not have running water. Check youtube for better info on full time RV life. The Mrs & I will be snowbirding in a motorhome soon. It's not too difficult to adapt to. Thor makes the Compass / Gemini AWD a small class C camper on the Ford transit chassi which might suit your needs best.
 
I was considering something similar. I sold my primary residence and wanted to move into my vacation home down the cape full time- but the commute was too much. Smaller house, cheaper to operate, walking distance to the beach.

I ended up splitting a 3BR apartment/flop house near work with a couple co-workers who have similar set ups. One is a divorced father who moves back into his house on the weekends to be with the kids (his ex got him by the balls). Another's wife lives in DC and he travels back and forth every few weeks. I drive up Sunday night or Monday morning and head back down the Cape Thursday after work. We each pay about $750 a month after splitting utilities. Just seems like a much better deal than RV living. Yeah I have to share a kitchen and a bathroom, but we are adults. We have a house cleaner come in every other week too. Someone else deals with the maintenance and overhead. Only got a few more years left until I retire so this seems like the best option. No sense in buying a house for 3-5 years.
 
Twigg said:
Then there's Boondockers Welcome, a website for folks who will let you park for a day or more for free ir a very low cost.
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Here's a tip; join your local Moose Lodge, it's only $38 a year, they have lodges all over the country, many have camper spots with water & electric hook-ups. It's either free or very short money to stay for a few days.
I've been a Moose since 1999, my cousin was a governor of a lodge for a few years, and he told me about the camper spots. I took advantage of it when I went to the Nascar races at Dover, there was a lodge a few miles from the track in Camden/Wyoming Delaware where we stayed. Nice place with some shady tree cover, unlike staying at the track, where you bake in the sun. No charge, but we did make a donation to them before we left.
 
FPrice said:
I have been thinking about a "small" RV for an eventual move. Nothing nearly as fancy as Frugal Fanny and spouse, just something which could house and support two people for up to a week, with regular stops for logistics.

But I have almost no knowledge of this field. Am listening into various online discussions trying to find a starting place.
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It might be worthwhile to rent one for a few days a time or two too see if you even like it.

There are people that retire buy a motor home and make a trip out west and hate it. The come back and sell the motor home at a big loss.

Bob
 
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HorizontalHunter said:
It might be worthwhile to rent one for a few days a time or two too see if you even like it.

There are people that retire buy a motor home and make a trip out west and hate it. The come back and sell the motor home at a big loss.

Bob
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Some good points. Renting one for a few days is something I definitely should do

I don't intend to buy a large motorhome and take long trips. That doesn't really appeal to me. But a smaller one (that is self-contained) for moving, maybe trips to shooting events, shows, etc is what I envision.
 
BBQ.Uncle said:
The Winnebago EKKO is new to the market and I like a lot about it, however, I’m hearing from some dealers that Winnebago is experiencing some quality control issues in the past few years that gives me pause.
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Check out Matt's RV Reviews on YT. He's unbiased and entertaining. There has been huge consolidation in the RV market across the entire line. Most are owned by three or four major companies now. After the 2008 bloodbath many of the original independent ones could not survive and because acquired by the larger ones. I can't keep track of who bought whom, but even Tiffin and Newmar are wholy-owned subsidiaries of someone else now. Quality has generally declined in the last 10-15 years unless you're going for the upper end of things. I personally don't care for Winnebago because of the quality of the build; if you're looking for a small Class C, I would look at the Tiffin or Leisure Travel Van lines. I've been in both of their C's with varying floorplans and they're very nicely done. Not cheap, but plenty of value. If you do buy new, plan on fixing stuff. These are not without their issues and teething. If you can find something used ~3-4 years old with a good ownership pedigree with documented maintenance logs, I would go in that direction. Let the first owner deal with the headaches and the big chunk of depreciation.
 
mu2bdriver said:
Check out Matt's RV Reviews on YT. He's unbiased and entertaining. There has been huge consolidation in the RV market across the entire line. Most are owned by three or four major companies now. After the 2008 bloodbath many of the original independent ones could not survive and because acquired by the larger ones. I can't keep track of who bought whom, but even Tiffin and Newmar are wholy-owned subsidiaries of someone else now. Quality has generally declined in the last 10-15 years unless you're going for the upper end of things. I personally don't care for Winnebago because of the quality of the build; if you're looking for a small Class C, I would look at the Tiffin or Leisure Travel Van lines. I've been in both of their C's with varying floorplans and they're very nicely done. Not cheap, but plenty of value. If you do buy new, plan on fixing stuff. These are not without their issues and teething. If you can find something used ~3-4 years old with a good ownership pedigree with documented maintenance logs, I would go in that direction. Let the first owner deal with the headaches and the big chunk of depreciation.
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We had an 04 (?) Leisure Travel and were not impressed with the quality of the upfitting at all-the chassis was phenomenal, as I recall we had about 1,400lbs of ccc and the 5 cyl MB diesel returned an honest 28 mpg (checked by visual fill) not a dual rear wheel . Service quickly became an issue as Dodge made Freightliner quite angry and the Dodge dealers had quite a bit to learn about the diesel.

Rv quality is beyond bad and rv dealers are worse-much much worse and traveling far from home in the current climate is nuts in our opinion. We have about a 600 mile safe range and that really is how far we will venture.

Aside from quality, and service being weight legal is another huge issue for the vast majority of rv's, especially the truck campers.

The irony of it all is that we cannot imagine not having our small coach and traveling any other way.
 
snubnose said:
We had an 04 (?) Leisure Travel and were not impressed with the quality of the upfitting at all-the chassis was phenomenal, as I recall we had about 1,400lbs of ccc and the 5 cyl MB diesel returned an honest 28 mpg (checked by visual fill) not a dual rear wheel . Service quickly became an issue as Dodge made Freightliner quite angry and the Dodge dealers had quite a bit to learn about the diesel.

Rv quality is beyond bad and rv dealers are worse-much much worse and traveling far from home in the current climate is nuts in our opinion. We have about a 600 mile safe range and that really is how far we will venture.

Aside from quality, and service being weight legal is another huge issue for the vast majority of rv's, especially the truck campers.

The irony of it all is that we cannot imagine not having our small coach and traveling any other way.
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That's disappointing to hear. When it comes to the Sprinter/MB-chassis Class C's, I was really impressed with what LTV had to offer. Their floorplans were head and shoulders above the others as well. At the Tampa show earlier this year and the Scottsdale show this past summer, I thought they blew away the competition. I will say that the competition of Winnebago, Thor, and some other second or third tier players was beyond embarrassing. The way of the new builds seems to be getting to be a race to the bottom in terms of quality. Nonetheless, I'm glad that you still enjoy it!
 
mu2bdriver said:
I will say that the competition of Winnebago, Thor, and some other second or third tier players was beyond embarrassing. The way of the new builds seems to be getting to be a race to the bottom in terms of quality.
Click to expand...

That's why you still see people using Airstreams built over 60 years ago.
 
HorizontalHunter said:
The natural progression is to move from a small travel trailer, to a bigger travel trailer using a WDH (Weight Distributing Hitch), to a 5th wheel, to a motor home.

Generally speaking set up and breakdown is easier as you go through the normal progression and cost goes up. The towing experience also gets better.

The hitches for a WDH and 5th wheel are heavy and has you age it gets harder to physically manage the hitches. The WDH goes in and out of the truck for each tow. The 5th wheel hitch goes in and out once, or a few times, a season. Connecting a car that is capable of four down towing is easier still when you move to a motor home .

Bob
Click to expand...
Definitely good advice, especially taking into account aging owners. Thank you.
 
mu2bdriver said:
That's disappointing to hear. When it comes to the Sprinter/MB-chassis Class C's, I was really impressed with what LTV had to offer. Their floorplans were head and shoulders above the others as well. At the Tampa show earlier this year and the Scottsdale show this past summer, I thought they blew away the competition. I will say that the competition of Winnebago, Thor, and some other second or third tier players was beyond embarrassing. The way of the new builds seems to be getting to be a race to the bottom in terms of quality. Nonetheless, I'm glad that you still enjoy it!
Click to expand...

It really was a rolling oxymoron-they took the time to fully spray the underside with some sort of epoxy (?) rust proofing but used smooth staples for joinery-if you had to remove a screw near a joint the pressure needed to get the screw to turn would most times cause the joint to separate, the mechanism for the dining table contained plastic guides; little things that turned out to be huge issues. I believe LT was one of the first to offer a sani con pump-cool idea until you figure out that the rate of drain is painfully slow and slow enough to allow 'stuff' to cling to the walls of the tank causing what should have been the expected result. Nothing beats the large diameter stinky slinky, especially one that is constantly attached-rapid drain and the ability to transfer gray to black for added cleaning. For those who have a more current version LTV hopefully things have changed for the better in the many years since we had ours.

Coach House appears to have nailed, in every way, the design of this segment of rv with their Arriva model which is for us THE ideal smaller motor home. All metal (I often wonder why no converter hasn't had a go with a short/mini school bus chassis), NO SLIDE dry bath, good sized holding tanks, it is all there but to get a gasser- I have reservations about compliant diesel engines- the only one available model is a Transit with CH's renowned one piece glass body -which we are considering.

How about grafting an Airstream to a vintage IH DT466?

the link to CH was funky Google coach house rv for a direct link

i
 
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That's good to hear. Thank you for the description. I have small pipe toilets also and know what you mean. The mascerator does a good job but 'it' seems top stick top the walls all the way down. I put Downy detergent down the side of the bowls every few days and that lubes them up a little bit and you can tell when the lube starts drying out and needs a reapplication.
 
The poo pump is one of those things that you don't really think about until you are at a dump station, in the rain, listening to that blasted thing scream away for 3-5 minutes or so-3-5 seconds is way better.

Permanently attach a 'waste master' type hose and your time at the dump station will be reduced by about 375%-ours has been attached for many many thousands of miles-epdm covers the small part of exposed hose-I need about 20 seconds to dump which includes one cross over transfer.

We have had this since its inception by the inventer way back when give it some thought-drilling out the bayonet fittings for the cam loc isn't as bad as it seems BUT the potential is there for creating a really interesting problem I suppose-using a 'socket saver' my install went quickly with out a hitch-however I am a fairly experienced hvac installer-most of the time I know what I am doing. We ordered a much shorter piece of hose (about 8' expanded at the original rate not the improved newer hose which expands even more per foot) AND converted to the new electric valves which are slick but expensive and have engineered a manual opening option just in case-and yes conventional pullers probably make the most sense.


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44oizRX_AZ0



View: http://www.youtube.com/watch/v=wZ8CQy2jRZc
 
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