RV consumers Purchase question ?

2gypsies wrote:
They are not even RVers and have never owned an RV. ...

Google for a Hurricane owner's group and start reading. Good luck!

Complete BS, where did you hear that, some RV salesman?

The founders of the RV Consumer Group are full-time RVers. Many of the working members are also.

It has been a while since I looked at RV Consumer. I used it when considering our first two buys. Their biggest negative was wheel base under 60% (?) of overall length resulting in potentially difficult handling. I would not disagree with that thought. Not only will such a coach be difficult to handle in any kind of wind or any passing large vehicle, the overhang will swing out and hit objects would would not expect to hit in low speed maneuvering. If you are stopped parallel to a wall 1 foot away and turn the wheel sharply away from the wall your tail will hit the wall before forward motion moves you clear.

I did some other research on them and found them to be honest if somewhat biased.

Well I guess I'll be the first Hurricane owner to reply (unless someone posts while I am typing).

Acquired a 2006 31D in the spring of 2011 with 18K miles on it. Very good price below what others were selling the same model for but I guess being a repo may not have helped. Four seasons, 25000 miles and over 100 nights camping later I have zero regrets. Fit and finish is fine, exterior and roof are still in good shape, the Ford chassis suits the coach and has never let us down. Done several 400+ miles days behind the wheel and was a bit tired but no worse than I would have been in a car. I'll set the cruise control for 62 and drive with one hand for hours. Road wonder is no worse than my daily driver but with how wide any coach is you don't have a lot of lane room to wonder in. Bad roads will get things to banging and windows rattling though.

Everything in the coach (fridge, A/C, water heater, furnace, generator,,) is no different than any other coach. Windows, fiberglass walls, roof, floors are not much different than any coach within the same general class (gas coach with an MSRP of say $100K). The cabinets are a bit light but that keeps the coach weight down which gives me either more carrying capacity or better fuel usage.

Now the big question, would I recommend a Hurricane? New, nope not a chance, not to my x-wife. Well maybe the X. Just way to many post delivery problems but my recommendation applies to any manufacturer. As a first time owner a two year old at a good price is a much better purchase. Let the last owner sort out warranty issues.

Are budget RV's dangerous? Sure but what 10 ton vehicle moving object isn't. At speed any RV accident that results in a roll over is going to be ugly just as it is with any vehicle. But we do have one feature in our favor concerning most common accidents. The floor in the coach is about the same height as the roof of 90% of the vehicles that are most likely to be the second party involved, cars. As such the impact will be going into the chassis below the floor and not the occupants. Hit a tracker trailer, tree, light pole, bus and other such tall objects and the outcome is going to change not in our favor.

Good luck with your search.

Winnebago uses a steel cage up front and roll tests its RVs.

Hurricane is an entry level MH which means thinner cargo doors, a little less spent on appliances, maybe plastic commode, The V10 comes from Ford but may be on a lighter chassis. You really have to look and compare. That is why RV shows are good. You can compare RVs all in one place.

If you are looking at class a Gas units new you pretty much are going to wind up with a Ford Stability has a lot to do with how its loaded tire pressure and so on. Danger of fire hurricane is using same components as all other entry level class A. I don't know of any class A that is not dangerous in a collision or roll over with out spending a LOT of money. Driver fatigue well it will not be as comfortable to drive as a quality diesel pusher also will be no where near the price. As others have recommended test drive the unit you are interested in

They are not even RVers and have never owned an RV. They get their specs from the same mfg. specs you can obtain online - free. You can also tour mfg. plants yourself. Read other folks' experiences with different manufacturers. I would take their comments as more factual.

Google for a Hurricane owner's group and start reading. Good luck!

The RV Consumer Group can be a valuable resource, I have used them every time we have bought a rig.
No they don't "buy" every rig, no they don't even walk into an example of every model offered.
They tour factories to look at construction methods, they look, in detail, at an example from every model line, they do have "formulas", but these formulas are based in common sense, like the ratio between total length and wheel-base. As noted above, a longer wheel-base (for the same total length) is safer then shorter. Yes it will not handle well in "in town" driving, but honestly, were are you using the rig?
Another thing they look at is were tanks are located. Well, located, centered, balanced gets a higher "score" then a builder that puts all the tanks on one side, or towards the back (better balance, better handling)

I think RV Consumer Group is the same group (or guy) that I paid for a subscription to before I bought my first RV over 12 years ago. The guy sounded very knowledgeable and I trusted what he was saying, at first. However, after more research and looking at some of his stuff, I finally figured out he had a political agenda. He basically felt that every RV was unsafe that had a slide and he even didn't like some that didn't have slides. He also felt that RV's should all be built to the exact same crash standards as cars. On the surface that seems like a great idea. But the problem is you wouldn't have an RV on the road cheaper than $500k if he had his way.

Dan B,
I would recommend that you check out Midway RV, 5590 S. Division Avenue there in Grand Rapids. We bought our Dutch Star from them and they were terrific people to deal with. The salesman that we dealt with was named John. I can't remember his last name, but recall that it was an Italian sounding name. I believe that started with an "M". Unsure if he is still there. We bought four years ago.