TyroneandGladys wrote:
"The RV is not easy to drive under the best of circumstance, but mountain driving was particularly scary, especially from Bakersfield to Las Vegas, and Sedona into Phoenix. We have since gotten a sway bar installed, which has improved things some, but the fact is, the Mirada is a light, underpowered low end rig, and we have to deal with that."
Lets address this statement
Have you taken this RV to a truck scale and weighed it?
IMHO the majority of handling issues are the result of a under loaded front axle. You can throw money at all you want for handling upgrades but if that front axle is not at least at 80% you will have handling issues.
Weight behind the rear axle unloads the front axle and the further back from the axle the more it unloads, think of a see saw.
In mountain driving you have to use your transmission. Downshift going up and downshift going down to control your speed. Your first downshift is turning the overdrive off.
Thank you for this - and sorry for the late acknowledgement (notices went to spam).
Clearly, there are things we could do that we didn't realize - although my husband says we don't carry a lot of water in the fresh water tank since we don't use it anyway (we have not dry camped). He says the steering isn't a problem - but I sure thought it was hard to steer when I drove it for the first time on our most recent trip - the front wheels skitter all over the place (at least compared to my 2005 FX 35 with sports suspension). I will suggest we pull into a truck scales on our next trip, if we pass one, just to see how we are balanced. Thank you for the suggestion!
