BRAND CROSS OVERS ?
We are saving up for a new trailer. Thought I wanted a Coachman 17 BH. Today I see a Forest River Viking 17 BH. With the exception of no oven the viking looks identical. I ave also seen a Koala wh...
Forum Discussion
I have looked at a lot of the 17xxx series trailer over the last 2 weeks or so, in the Pacific NW, all over online, plus in person at dealers near Spokane, WA.
The Forest River brands appear to all come out of the plant in Dallas, OR, or Harrisburg, OR.
Dallas, OR is a re-purposed saw mill. Harrisburg, OR is the old Safari Motorcoach factory.
FR builds the Salem Cruise Lite, Cherokee Grey Wolf/Wolf Pup, and the Wildwood.
175BH is one model number they use.
There's also a 167BH Sonoma, with a higher price tag and hard sides instead of aluminum siding.
Coachman builds the Viking 17BH and Viking Saga 17SBH. The ones I've seen in person came from Indiana.
The Saga has no front window, no rear shower, no cargo door at the lower bunk. If it has an A/C, it's a household unit mounted through the wall.
The Viking 17BH uses a roof mounted RV style A/C.
Gulfstream make the Amerilite in the same floor plan.
Pacific Coach Works makes the same floor plan too.
Of all the above, I like the Coachman the best. There's a little more thought that went in to the engineering and construction of them, such as:
Water heater is located under a dinette bench bench instead of under the bed, which gives a bigger cargo area under the bed.
The cargo are under the bed is accessible from inside - there's a nice handle to lift the bed platform up with.
The cabinet doors are far nicer - they are as nice as the doors in my Arctic Fox truck camper.
There's more cabinet space. The road-side over head cabinets span the entire side wall and join with the front bed overhead cabinets.
Inside, at the lower bunk, there's a cabinet door that opens in to the storage area under the lower bunk.
Outside, there's a cargo door that opens to the lower bunk. The lower bunk can be folded up away from the exterior wall, pinned in place, so you can store big stuff like lawn chairs, bikes, etc.
The cabinet doors open vertically, towards the ceiling (which in itself isn't a benefit) but unlike one of the Forest River models that open the same way, there's struts on the Coachman models that hold the doors open.
At first I didn't like the idea of vertical opening cabinets, until I remembered how many times I leave a cabinet door open in my truck camper, then bonk my head on them.
More light fixtures.
More cabinet space in the kitchen counter area.
The Forest River brands appear to all come out of the plant in Dallas, OR, or Harrisburg, OR.
Dallas, OR is a re-purposed saw mill. Harrisburg, OR is the old Safari Motorcoach factory.
FR builds the Salem Cruise Lite, Cherokee Grey Wolf/Wolf Pup, and the Wildwood.
175BH is one model number they use.
There's also a 167BH Sonoma, with a higher price tag and hard sides instead of aluminum siding.
Coachman builds the Viking 17BH and Viking Saga 17SBH. The ones I've seen in person came from Indiana.
The Saga has no front window, no rear shower, no cargo door at the lower bunk. If it has an A/C, it's a household unit mounted through the wall.
The Viking 17BH uses a roof mounted RV style A/C.
Gulfstream make the Amerilite in the same floor plan.
Pacific Coach Works makes the same floor plan too.
Of all the above, I like the Coachman the best. There's a little more thought that went in to the engineering and construction of them, such as:
Water heater is located under a dinette bench bench instead of under the bed, which gives a bigger cargo area under the bed.
The cargo are under the bed is accessible from inside - there's a nice handle to lift the bed platform up with.
The cabinet doors are far nicer - they are as nice as the doors in my Arctic Fox truck camper.
There's more cabinet space. The road-side over head cabinets span the entire side wall and join with the front bed overhead cabinets.
Inside, at the lower bunk, there's a cabinet door that opens in to the storage area under the lower bunk.
Outside, there's a cargo door that opens to the lower bunk. The lower bunk can be folded up away from the exterior wall, pinned in place, so you can store big stuff like lawn chairs, bikes, etc.
The cabinet doors open vertically, towards the ceiling (which in itself isn't a benefit) but unlike one of the Forest River models that open the same way, there's struts on the Coachman models that hold the doors open.
At first I didn't like the idea of vertical opening cabinets, until I remembered how many times I leave a cabinet door open in my truck camper, then bonk my head on them.
More light fixtures.
More cabinet space in the kitchen counter area.
