Any warnings on brands to beware of?

[kbtravels]

I posted a few months ago about looking to upgrade our 2015 Jayco 19FRB to a similar size trailer but with one slide. After hours looking at floor plans, I've found a few that would work for us, from lots of different manufacturers. I've tried looking for reviews and it seems you can find both glowing reports and horror stories for everything, even the really expensive ones. Hard to know what to believe. Does anyone have experience, either positive or negative, with any of the following brands? Winnebago Micro Minnie, Coachmen Freedom Express Ultralite, Cruiser RV Fun Finder, Palomino Palomini, Forest River Flagstaff MicroLite, Keystone Premier Bullet, or Pacific Coachworks (they have a bunch of different names with basically the same floorplan - Tango, Panther, Sea Breeze, etc. Not sure what the difference is, All are Pacific Coachworks)
Thanks for any advice. I will probably be looking to buy a lightly used one. Partly to save money and partly because we live in NM and only a few of these are carried by a dealer anywhere close to us.

[rbpru]

From what I have learned those TTs that are a cut above average, such as Lance, Nash, the Arctic series and of course Airstream; have a price to match.

Even these models have their detractors.

Do not confuse design trade-offs with shoddy construction. My 2010 TT has design issues that make me shake my head. They were not built wrong, there were built as designed. There is an annoying amount of "fix it" projects, still, it does not leak.

Good luck

[WNYBob]

I have a Cruiser RV Shadow Cruiser which is one step below the FunFinder. By below I mean in the way it is appointed, with suspension and hitch upgrades as examples, not in the way it is built.

Poor workmanship and piece-work is the major issue. Workers being pushed to get pieces out an not trained to do the job properly. All mfg are prone to this. Here is what I found on my camper!

In the spring after I bought my camper I noticed that there was water being held under the camper (the cover fabric covering the insulation held the water in). So I looked for a way the water was getting in there. I noticed the angle trim was not a feared to the side, so I removed it. It was being held in place by a few screws driven up through the bottom of the angle. What amazed me was there was a bead of caulk in the inside corner of the angle, still round! The caulk did not touch anything! I replaced caulk with butyl tape o. The camper sealing the corner, and then mounted th angle trim. To finish I added a bead of caulk betw8the siding an the angle. Guess what... no more water.

End of rant!

[Last_Train]

Another positive vote here for the Coachmen Freedom Express 192RBS. As far as a couple's camper goes, this rig has worked very well for us and was delivered new to us in August of 2015 in virtually perfect condition (it's a 2016 model).

I do carefully watch and maintain the roof, seams and seals, and we have never had any water intrusion. Otherwise I'm proactive in regular inspections and maintenance and cleaning. All systems have worked as designed and advertised from day one. The only major component I've replaced was the factory supplied Chinese made tires after 12,000 miles (internal belts were failing showing accelerated and uneven wear). I replaced them with a new set of Goodyear Endurance, and they've been great so far.

We've only clocked just over 15,000 miles towing this unit, but it has always tracked stable and true behind our truck and is a delight to tow. I can sympathize with those who have experienced QC problems, but that has not been our experience. When we've arrived at our destination we've not had to worry (so far!) if something would or would not function correctly.

We recently returned from a ~3000 mile/3 week round trip to the Midwest (eastern Ohio) and back to Houston. On the way back we looped up to Middlebury, IN for a tour of the Coachmen plant. I went into this with a jaundiced, skeptical eye but actually came away fairly impressed. Our appointment was for mid-afternoon after the work day had finished and all workers had departed, so it was just my wife and I (and our dog which they welcomed) led by a Coachmen representative, so I had the opportunity to ask lots of questions. Basically I came away with a better understanding of the materials making up our unit and the process to put them all together.

With all that said other posters in this thread have offered wise counsel to very carefully inspect your prospective rig - no matter the brand or model. Any of them are subject to imperfections and/or malfunctions.

[SidecarFlip]

mobilefleet wrote:
I've rehabbed and flipped over 200 trailers. From my experience the top 2 would be winnie and keystone. Don't even look at forest river. This is my opinion

You said a mouthfull there. If it's FR, it's basically slapped together. Expect issues down the road.

Not all bad but most.

[SDcampowneroper]

Run away from cable operated slides.

[ScottG]

donn0128 wrote:
And from my 12 years experience FR builds decent trailers with decent quality.
In smaller trailers I would pick Lance or Northwood products first.

My 13 y/o FR wildcat was a good trailer. Never a leak and build quality at least equal to my new Northwood.

Gdub is right though, basically all RV's are junk.

[Gdub2]

You can Google any it doesn't matter what rv maker
it is there are hundreds of complaints on Forest River
jayco, winnabago, heartland and so on.. just Google any maker
for reviews and complaints. Click on pissed consumer.com
and read.

[Yosemite_Sam1]

Gdetrailer wrote:

kbtravels wrote:
I posted a few months ago about looking to upgrade our 2015 Jayco 19FRB to a similar size trailer but with one slide. After hours looking at floor plans, I've found a few that would work for us, from lots of different manufacturers. I've tried looking for reviews and it seems you can find both glowing reports and horror stories for everything, even the really expensive ones. Hard to know what to believe. Does anyone have experience, either positive or negative, with any of the following brands? Winnebago Micro Minnie, Coachmen Freedom E...

'''EVERY RV has one main issue, WATER INTRUSION.

Yep, water leaks from the outside can trash even the highest quality RV ever built in less than a few months.

As a RV owner, YOU MUST BE WILLING TO DO SOME REGULAR MAINTENANCE.

Failure to do this maintenance will result in your RV rotting away.

Roof, side seams, window and door openings NEED to be checked at least ONCE PER YEAR, looking for cracks or bad caulking. Any bad caulking needs to be removed and replaced with new, often means getting on roof or even removing windows/doors frames to do this work..

You need to take this into consideration BEFORE committing to buying a RV. If you can't/won't do this preventative measure on a yearly basis then you are better off forgetting about owning a RV.

Now, that's a good advice. As a newbie, I'll take that with much appreciation.

[Gdetrailer]

kbtravels wrote:
I posted a few months ago about looking to upgrade our 2015 Jayco 19FRB to a similar size trailer but with one slide. After hours looking at floor plans, I've found a few that would work for us, from lots of different manufacturers. I've tried looking for reviews and it seems you can find both glowing reports and horror stories for everything, even the really expensive ones. Hard to know what to believe. Does anyone have experience, either positive or negative, with any of the following brands? Winnebago Micro Minnie, Coachmen Freedom Express Ultralite, Cruiser RV Fun Finder, Palomino Palomini, Forest River Flagstaff MicroLite, Keystone Premier Bullet, or Pacific Coachworks (they have a bunch of different names with basically the same floorplan - Tango, Panther, Sea Breeze, etc. Not sure what the difference is, All are Pacific Coachworks)
Thanks for any advice. I will probably be looking to buy a lightly used one. Partly to save money and partly because we live in NM and only a few of these are carried by a dealer anywhere close to us.

If you listen/read every single complaint ever complained about, you would find out that every make and model and every yr will be "junk" by at least one person's "opinion".

You WILL drive yourself crazy fretting over the supposed quality of each trailer you look at.

Quality is subjective, what is great quality by one person is often junk by another persons standards.

EVERY RV has one main issue, WATER INTRUSION.

Yep, water leaks from the outside can trash even the highest quality RV ever built in less than a few months.

As a RV owner, YOU MUST BE WILLING TO DO SOME REGULAR MAINTENANCE.

Failure to do this maintenance will result in your RV rotting away.

Roof, side seams, window and door openings NEED to be checked at least ONCE PER YEAR, looking for cracks or bad caulking. Any bad caulking needs to be removed and replaced with new, often means getting on roof or even removing windows/doors frames to do this work..

You need to take this into consideration BEFORE committing to buying a RV. If you can't/won't do this preventative measure on a yearly basis then you are better off forgetting about owning a RV.

[Yosemite_Sam1]

Do a thorough walk through and test everything. Walk out if something is not right -- even if you think you can fix it. It's sometimes a symptoms of bigger things even just a dirty floor or rusts in the underside.

[donn0128]

And from my 12 years experience FR builds decent trailers with decent quality.
In smaller trailers I would pick Lance or Northwood products first.

[SoundGuy]

kbtravels wrote:
Does anyone have experience, either positive or negative, with any of the following brands? Winnebago Micro Minnie, Coachmen Freedom Express Ultralite, Cruiser RV Fun Finder, Palomino Palomini, Forest River Flagstaff MicroLite, Keystone Premier Bullet, or Pacific Coachworks (they have a bunch of different names with basically the same floorplan - Tango, Panther, Sea Breeze, etc.

You haven't listed any specific models, the size of the unit, or what amenities it should have - that said, we've owned our Coachmen Freedom Express 192RBS for 6 seasons now and it's served us well. Yes, a few minor issues I've taken care of myself, a couple of major ones taken care of by my dealer, but overall for what we paid for a mass produced couple's trailer it works pretty well. :B

[mobilefleet]

I've rehabbed and flipped over 200 trailers. From my experience the top 2 would be winnie and keystone. Don't even look at forest river. This is my opinion