Thor ACE experience - especially 30.1 and especially 2016

[k6ncx]

After 15,000 miles in a old Class C, we are seriously considering a (new) 2016 ACE 30.1.

I'm interested in hearing about people's experience with ACE's, especially 30.1 and especially 2016.

One concern we have is that the "queen" bed in the rear seems small. And further constricted of course by the head being in the slide. We sleep on a king at home which is certainly part of it, but the queen in the old Santara didn't seem so small. We're not skinny people.

We will probably be in it 8-10 weeks of the year.

[k6ncx]

We bought the 30.1. Thus far we're pretty happy with it.

[Kaz]

k6ncx wrote:
After 15,000 miles in a old Class C, we are seriously considering a (new) 2016 ACE 30.1.

I'm interested in hearing about people's experience with ACE's, especially 30.1 and especially 2016.

One concern we have is that the "queen" bed in the rear seems small. And further constricted of course by the head being in the slide. We sleep on a king at home which is certainly part of it, but the queen in the old Santara didn't seem so small. We're not skinny people.

We will probably be in it 8-10 weeks of the year.

We have a 2013 ACE 30.1 and love it. We've had no major problems and the few issues we had after delivery were taken care of under warranty. It is an "entry level" unit, but fit and finish was acceptable, all of the components have been fine, and we would certainly buy another ACE if we this one died. In addition, Thor customer service is top-notch. Purchasers are assigned a "concierge" after purchase who works with the buyer to make sure the unit is fine and any issues are satisfactorily resolved. After than, for a few minor issues that came up, Thor has 24-hour technical support available and we've found them to be very helpful. (Actually, we did have one major problem -- the torque converter blew but that was a Ford problem, not Thor, and it too was covered under warranty.) During our recent 2-1/2 month, 7500-mile trip out west, we had a slide motor go on the fritz (it's being fixed right now) but one of the things we liked about the 30.1 is that it is fully usable with the slides in, so even having a slide motor go out is no big deal. This was our longest trip in the ACE so far (most of our trips have been 4 weeks long or less) and we found that the unit was fine not only for living on the road, but for putting in long days driving, including up and over the mountains out west.

As to the bed, we have not had a problem with it being too small, which is saying something because both of our little yappy miniature dachshunds sleep on the bed with us. Even so, the "short queen" bed is big enough for all of us. It is a "short queen," meaning that its dimensions are 60" x 75" instead of 60" x 80" (standard queen). I.e., my understanding is that it's no narrower than a regular queen, just shorter. If that's not right, hopefully someone will correct me.

However, the mattress that came with the unit was terrible, barely one step up from the mattresses at the Hanoi Hilton, so we ended up replacing it with a mattress we had made at Original Mattress Factory. I understand that replacing the mattress is a common upgrade across all brands, so we weren't too upset about having to do that. The improvement in comfort was substantial.

If you've done your homework, you know that the RV industry is having a terrible problem with manufacturing quality, and Thor seems to be a company mentioned often in those areas. The solution, until the whole industry changes its stripes, is either to buy used (letting someone else take care of fixing the build errors) or to do a very careful and thorough pre-delivery inspection and refuse to take delivery until the unit meets your expectations. Checklists for PDIs are widely available; just google the topic.

Let me know if I can provide anything further.
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[k6ncx]

To clarify: It's the width, not the length that is an issue. And we did not have the concern about width in other models.

And we would rather have the head of the bed in the rear, but that seems to be rare. And we've only seen it - in current models - with layouts that we don't generally like.

Thanks for the responses.

[janstey58]

The FR3 30SD has a full sized king bed side to side, my Inlaws love theirs and liked this unit better than the ACE. It is HUGE in the front living area too!

[Effy]

RV beds are the same size whether you buy a Thor, Winnebago, Newmar etc so it doesn't really matter what make and model or year. In Rv beds it's the length that's shorter not the width.

[Mandalay_Parr]

My queen seems plenty big for two slightly oversized people.

[craig7h]

We just picked up our 2017 ACE 29.3,the queen bed was a concern for us also. We have slept one long weekend and found it no problem. But then that depends on how you sleep. We are not small people by any means, I sleep on my side maybe that made the difference but we have decided to stay with the queen.

[georgelesley]

k6ncx wrote:
After 15,000 miles in a old Class C, we are seriously considering a (new) 2016 ACE 30.1.

I'm interested in hearing about people's experience with ACE's, especially 30.1 and especially 2016.

One concern we have is that the "queen" bed in the rear seems small. And further constricted of course by the head being in the slide. We sleep on a king at home which is certainly part of it, but the queen in the old Santara didn't seem so small. We're not skinny people.

We will probably be in it 8-10 weeks of the year.

If you want a full length bed (80") you will likely have to get a bed that runs front to rear not side to side. If it has to be a king size it will likely be crowded on the edges to get in and out of. A king facing side to side will be a short (74") bed. That us what we have and plan to cut it back to a queen because the side access is pretty tight. I suspect you will have to decide which is most important, full length or King/queen. Or just keep looking at other floor plans.