the hunt begins
well I recived royal assention from the wife to oficial upgrade the old slumberqueen. so now the hunt begins. We have decided on the Adventurer 901sb, in her eyes because fo the kitchen layout, and...
Forum Discussion
Wow! So I used to say the only things cheaper in Canada was playin hockey and hockey gear. (Actually. Most youth programs are heavily subsidized, even premier or AAA type programs. And the gear was probably 20% or more cheaper even including the exchange. Always bought new skates when needed, up there, and stocked up on sticks for the boy)
Now I can add TCs to the list!
Guess I know where I’ll be shopping when I get to that part of my (want) to do list!
FWIW, I always thought Lance was the most overpriced comparatively, and Eagle cap a close second. AF not far behind though. But like you said, TCs are I think the second worst $/sf or $/amenities of all “normal folks” RVs.
With them #vanlife Sprinter conversions taking the cake there.
ya with the exchange rates as low as they have been for the last 5 or so years its a no brainer for americans to shop in canada, you get an extra 0.30 on each dollar you spend pretty much. its not like it was for so long where the CDN buck was higher, at par or just slightly lower than the US grean back I find .85 is that sweet mark, lower than that, it costs to much to go to the US, higher than that it is good.
haha, that darn van life doesnt have to be near as expensive as people make it. I chuckle when I see some one spending 10K on a electrical system that you could have put in for about 1500.00 guess we know where their priorities are.
I always tell people truck campers are so expensive because of the engineering that goes into them because you are not just setting a box on a premade frame, the whole thing has to support and contain its self, while giving you room to live with the moderen conveniances all while fitting in the back of a truck with out blowing out the tires.
I think all truck capmers are overpriced right now, they have been coming down, but not to pre-covid levels now. before covid I could have bought a good bigfoot new for under 60K, during covid that went up to just shy of 100K now it is about 70K same with NL.
now to be totaly clear the 901 I will be getting will probably be bare bones, no microwave, no a/c, I will try get them to throw in the motors and controler for the jacks as I would like the electric jacks. but most of their rental units didnt have any real options. we don't use any 120V stuff in the one in my 1991, so it isn't a big deal that way, I would have liked the A/C just so if we go somewhere and want to go sightseeing and the dog can't go we could rent a site with power and have the A/C setup for him, but thats always somthing I can add myself if we decide we need it.
Oh yah that’ll be a nice unit! And you’re handy enough to add anything you may want or need later. Assume they come pre-wired for A/C though? That could be a real world challenge.
Ha, I remember the par years. Worked for a Canadian company for many years with company offered stock, so the exchange rate has been a huge deal for us forever and still is.
I dunno how that all works but I’d love to see the two currencies much closer to par, for personal gain!I think the prices of TCs is so high due to (small by comparison) volume, obviously more labor to assemble than a typical trailer, but mostly because it’s what the market will bear.
IMO any additional engineering effort was many moons ago. And that cost was passed along, a long time ago.
Transportation from the factory? Eh maybe more expensive but you can load 3 TCs on a semi step deck or even a long hot shot trailer. Vs 3 separate pickups to haul 3 trailers.
TCs for the most part haven’t changed a bit. Look at your newish Adventurer for example. Same configuration and exact same shape “box” as a whole host of brands, including Host lol, for the last 25+ years.
Icbw but the only significant engineering changes in that time are going from wood frame to aluminum on many models. And the arched roof on AFs which is a minimal engineering effort and not a lot of tooling. Bend some tubing, the rest is the same.
Other “things” that are newer or different amenities are th same across the board trailer’s included.
I wasn’t around in the early decades of TCs to know how the prices compared to trailers but I firmly believe the a majority of the price difference is simply what people will pay.ya I have always thought our two curencies should be tied togeather. I view the US and Canada as two countries that were founded by the same people and only differed in the type of goverment they setup. I have at least 10 distant relitives that fought in the civil war and eventualy the families wandered up to Canada. so me of my relitives came here briefly left a sibling then went back to the US.
then you have all the buisness movment back and forth accross the boarder that benifits all of us. if we were always ties togetather pricing would be more stable. heck I bought my harley when we were almost par (98.9) I bought my harley. now that we are at 72 cents I could probably sell it for a killing because the used harley prices ate tied to the US buck
I have seen a few advancments, the hydronic heat and hot water systems, I wish every camper would have moved to that. artic fox went to that curved roof as it was the only way they could make a block of foam strong enough to be self suporting, but I think they dropped the ball when they made it so thin along the edges and reduced the r-value. frames ya alumium was a good move. adventurer takes it one further and puts wood inside the alumium for more screw bite which I kinda like. I was unsure about it at first but now I think it was a pretty smart idea. truck campers have always been expensive for what they are, but there is no way in heck that any truck camper should cost more than a 40 foot 5th wheel haha
