4 wheel drive class c

Several of you have mentioned the Ujoint company for kits or completed jobs.

I cannot cut and paste on this iPad without throwing it in the garbage, but if you search YouTube for "ujoint 4x4" you will see a short video of the work he did on an E450 class C. I think it is a leprechaun.

One thing he mentions is the improved handleing. I have no personal experience but I hear the E series class Cs can handle poorly. Perhaps those of you that know about these kind of mods could look at it and give your thoughts on how it would handle even with the 6" lift.

For what it's worth:

That craigslist add is for a "Winnebago Jamboree".

I don't think there was a Winnebago Class C in 2006 called a "Jamboree", or in any other year. Since Jamboree is written on the side of it, the Class C in the picture is most likely a Fleetwood product. Fleetwood has offered Class C models called Jamboree for several years.

It looks like a buyer of that 4X4 will have to be content with a Fleetwood product, instead of a Winnebago product.

Here is a Class C on a 4X4 chassis located in California.

https://sfbay.craigslist.org/scz/rvs/6153006785.html

turbobricklayer wrote:
Gary, really like your rig,I have a 28 ft c on an e350 with extensive water damage . Upon the rebuild I plan on wacking some off the back to bring it down to 24 ft. for years now have been researching a4x4 conversion and u joint would be my choice, one hang up has been keeping within my gvwr of 12500 as the conversion would add about 800 lbs. Any idea what your rig weighs comfortably loaded with full tank of fuel? Thanks .

I haven't got a clue what it weighs. Do I care...welll...yes and no. I have over-done springs fore and aft and air-shocks and biggest tires I can put on..and they look puny..but tires shops have been consulted and what I have it what I am supposed to have.

If you are going to go the U-Joint route let me know and I will put you in touch with a guy that used their kit. He loves it but no doubt he could share some 'secrets'.

I used an Aluminess bumper..that is less than 1/2 of the weight of steel...mind you the winch brings it right back again. The underside (rear) is armour plated so that I don't rip the guts out when I grind thru a creek bed or whatever. I can send you pix of you like.

Mine is not a low centre of gravity rig..as you can see. With the lift kit it looks more ike a threat than an RV. I love it!



Gary Haupt

tnrv'er wrote:
Does any company manufacture a 4WD coach?

A lot in Australia. Specific aspect of the industry here.

One important point that is easy to miss in how those expedition RV's are built - in addition to 4WD - is how they mount the coach box to the truck chassis. They use a 3-point mounting system so that any twisting or tipping of the truck frame doesn't get transmitted so as to try and twist the coach structure. The truck frame and coach structure must always be kept in a planar relationship to each other if 3-point coach mounting to the frame isn't used. Lack of this can tear apart the coach framing over time on rough surfaces. This is very important for extended off-road use to preserve the integrity of the coach structure.

We wanted a Class C we could take on desert roads occasionally for rock hounding, so as a poor man's approach to lack of 3-point coach mounting, we bought a 24 foot Class C on Winnebago's optional (for the size of the RV) E450 chassis. One of the reasons was to get the stiffest frame possible under a fairly light weight coach to hopefully keep the base truck frame from twisting when driving carefully on ruttted road surfaces. This helps keep the truck's frame and the coach mounted to it in a plane - in that the frame hopefully won't twist front to rear and try to take the plane of the coach floor with it.

As far as lift for ground clearance is concerned, you want to keep overall weight center of gravity as low as possible while at the same time having as much ground clearance as possible. You get this with tall tires .... but with the coach structure and the truck frame at the same time mounted down low as possible on the axles. I see very few 4X4 vehicles with tall tires while still keeping the structure above down low - this takes larger wheel well areas to clear the tall tires but with no - or only a very small amount of - extra spacing increase between the vehicle's coach and the axles. The military Hum-Vee is an example. I once went hunting in a Ford 4X4 PU that was a "low profile" model. It's body height was still tight down close to the axles while at the same time it was a 4X4 with large enough fender wells to allow suspension and steering clearance for taller tires. We use slightly taller tires on our Class C to give us a bit more ground clearance and it doesn't seem to affect acceleration or downhill braking due to it's 4:56 rear differential in an under-weight-loaded chassis. Most Class C motorhome designs have their heavy equipment down nice and low anyway (tanks, generator, storage bins, batteries, etc.) - except that they "look top-heavy" due to their tall coach wall and roof heights. Because of this somewhat low center of gravity, if they have good wide rear tire tracks they're going to remain stable on canted off-highway surfaces whether they're using 2WD or 4WD.

Gary, really like your rig,I have a 28 ft c on an e350 with extensive water damage . Upon the rebuild I plan on wacking some off the back to bring it down to 24 ft. for years now have been researching a4x4 conversion and u joint would be my choice, one hang up has been keeping within my gvwr of 12500 as the conversion would add about 800 lbs. Any idea what your rig weighs comfortably loaded with full tank of fuel? Thanks .

When to use a winch depends upon what it's on.

We could have used the winch on the Jeep we had "on purpose" to get into places where a winch had to be used to get there beyond what the monster tires, dual differentials, and 15 speed gearbox could make possible. That's one of the things that we assumed the winch was for.

As far as a winch on a Class C motorhome is concerned, it probably best be only a "just in case" piece of rescue equipment to be used to help negate undesired consequences.

of course bumpy understands it was just a fun retort


Gary Haupt

garyhaupt wrote:
You wouldn't understand bumpy.


Gary Haupt

Wondering if some punctuation is missing. After ten years here, I am just beginning to understand bumpy.

But are you saying bumpy wouldn't understand 4x4 issues? I think bumpy understands, he is just being bumpy. I find my thinking often lines up with bumpy's thinking, I'm just not out there as often.