Info Request: RV Motorhome Owners/Prospective Owners

Upstate NY RV Motorhome Owners/Prospective Owners Bulletin Board ^ | May 10, 2002 | Dick Gaines

[gunnyg]

I am interested in your experiences, both pro and con, regarding the purchase of, ownership problems, dealer/service satisfaction/lack thereof regarding the RV/Motorhome industry--which is apparently not regulated at all, as is the automobile industry, for instance.

I recently purchased a new Class C motorhome here in upstate NY; and although initially ok, ended up last week in Florida unable to drain the holding tanks when it became apparent that the factory had forgotten to provide access to attach a drain hose--yep, there it was all sealed up behind the rear quarterpanel--imagine my surprise.

No seaet, just return home early from vacation and the selling dealer will take care of it, right?

WRONG!

Nope--the old we're busy-take a number, routine.

I have set up a bulletin board to roundup, if possible, other owners--preferably in this area--but not limited to this area, to learn just how bad things are regarding rv ownership--have more lately read some real horror stories on the Internet!

Hopefully, some of you may post to my BB as well as here.

Thank you
Dick Gaines

[gunnyg]

My E~Mail addy is GunnyG@hotmail.com

[claptrap]

Your problem sounds extreme maybe you should take the RV to the dealership and begin to show it to their prospective coustomers, kind of like a salesman , you know dress the part put a price in the window and see how much of their business you can drive away.

[Darnright]

You might want to read the newsgroups alt.rv and rec.outdoors.rv-travel for a while, and dig a bit through the archives. Sad to say, RV's are not designed with forethought, many times and some brands are worse than others.

In addition, there's a wealth of information to be had at http://www.rv.org/. One thing most people will tell those wishing to get their first RV. It's probably better to get one 3 or 4 years old, thereby letting someone else take the huge depreciation hit, and letting most of the warranty work get done on somebody else's time.

Last year we got our first used Class C. We have really enjoyed using it. The kid begs to go out every weekend.

[genefromjersey]

Poor quality control - at mfr. and at dlr. seems endemic in the industry. We bought a used camper, which had been a rental unit, and noticed : hot and cold lines in shower had been mis-connected; hot water heater didn't always work; sewage tank had never been properly emptied.Skylight in shower also needed re-sealing.

The dealer did pretty well satisfy our complaints-although the shower was left "as is" for mutual convenience. ( We almost always use the campground showers, rather than burn fuel to heat hot water.)The hot water heater has been "repaired" 3 times, but still does not work right. Quality of repair work is pretty much crappy.