Handling issues

Vach wrote:
I agree price and floor plan are most important. I've for that figured out ok. I'm trying to understand and be confident that handling can be improved without throwing lots of money at the issue. I can handle a wrench ok. Want to try and be certain I can invest what to me is a significant amount of money in a motorhome and not have an endless problem.

Sharing my story, our earlier Ford E-Series generation 2007 E350-V10 chassis rig handled like a drunken sailor when it was brand new. With only 800 miles on the odometer, I took the rig to a motor home/bus/truck/ambulance/fire truck suspension shop who charged us $3900 to make the rig perfect. It truly handles wonderfully to this day 7 years later, very tight and well controlled, even under very poor driving conditions. What I learned from it is that nearly every such suspension improvement can be done by the owner himself on his driveway at a fraction of the cost....just as j-d and others have done.

If the rig you find "ideal" for you is having handling issues, I wouldn't let that get in the way of buying it because I feel you can make it right at a reasonable price buying the heavy duty parts and installing them yourself. It's really not a big deal to a mechanical novice, installing heavy duty front & rear stabilizer bars, shocks, and steering stabilizer. The only challenge I hear can be installing the rear Henderson trac bar. I recall the shop that installed everything for us mentioned it was a bit tricky when installing it in conjunction with the Roadmaster heavy duty rear stabilizer bar. Maybe the heavy duty rear Helwig stabilizer bar will not have the same challenge.

I also hear swapping the driver-side front shock is a little tricky, but still done with common tools.

Of coarse the ease of any project is dependent upon rust or a lack there of. Rusted bolts will always be difficult to disassemble. At least all new heavy duty parts will include new hardware.