Frustrated by short beds and uniformed salesmen

[Stevensondrive]

We are shopping for our first travel trailer. Something around 26-30ish long. The lighter the better.....

I'm 6' tall aka 72". Most of the mattresses are only 74" long. So with my pillow I'll probably be hanging off the end and not comfortable. Some of the salesmen acted like they had no idea the mattresses were shorter.

I'm finding it frustrating to compare brands and features. We have a toddler so we need a bunkhouse with a tub. I looked at a Keystone Premier that had the bunkhouse but no tub. 😞

And finding what a fair price is annoying too.....

This whole process is frustrating

[RandACampin]

Any good mattress store can mattress of most any brand, style and firmness. We had a custom one done for our trailer and IIRC it was $300.00 and matches the house in firmness.

[Stevensondrive]

pickjare wrote:
Op, on the subject of bathtub or not:
BUY a trailer that has a small tub. Our trailer has a small tub and for kids it is as useful as the large tub in our house. When our kids were babies we bathed them in kitchen sink. Now 2 yrs. and 5 yrs. they bathe in the small tub. Works excellent. We have a 6 gallon water heater that produces truly scolding hot water. I don't know how the pipes, connections, and valves handle it. Think about it, if you mix 6 gallons near boiling water with 6 gallons cold water you fill a small tub with very comfortable warm water. Half hour later another 6 gallons is ready.

It's great, one of the best parts of our camping is the small tub and 6 gallon water heater. On an early spring outing last year, our kids both took hot baths at 7,000 feet with snow outside. I told them not many people have taken a nice hot bath way back in the mountains like that. It's what a camp trailer provides for us. Get the 6 gallon water heater and small tub. Good luck on the mattress.

Thank you!! If the bedroom has the space a pillowtop mattress from Sam's Club will be the answer 😉

[pickjare]

Op, on the subject of bathtub or not:
BUY a trailer that has a small tub. Our trailer has a small tub and for kids it is as useful as the large tub in our house. When our kids were babies we bathed them in kitchen sink. Now 2 yrs. and 5 yrs. they bathe in the small tub. Works excellent. We have a 6 gallon water heater that produces truly scolding hot water. I don't know how the pipes, connections, and valves handle it. Think about it, if you mix 6 gallons near boiling water with 6 gallons cold water you fill a small tub with very comfortable warm water. Half hour later another 6 gallons is ready.

It's great, one of the best parts of our camping is the small tub and 6 gallon water heater. On an early spring outing last year, our kids both took hot baths at 7,000 feet with snow outside. I told them not many people have taken a nice hot bath way back in the mountains like that. It's what a camp trailer provides for us. Get the 6 gallon water heater and small tub. Good luck on the mattress.

[afidel]

My trailer is perhaps smaller than you were looking at but it's got an almost full size queen (54" instead of 60" wide but 80" long) a shower with deep basin, easily deep enough for a 4 year old, 6' 6" ceilings, bunks big enough for my 6' 190lb older son, and room to feed 4 large people comfortably. The only downside for me is no couch for rainy days and the 600lb CCC is a bit tight for 4 people for multi-week trips. The upside is I fit in basically any spot and the unit was inexpensive at $12,500.

[SouthpawHD]

FWIW, our Palomino SolAire has a tub and full size queen pillow mattress. It's a little bigger than what the OP is looking for, but it's something to think about.

[SoundGuy]

Bols2DawaLL wrote:
There must be a few brands that use "full" size queens . I know Coachmen Freedom Express line do even in their smaller trailers.

Including some models that also have a tub / shower, the Coachmen Freedom Express 257BHS being just one example. :B

[stevemorris]

rv salesmen are useless in the mostpart
you need to do your own research and carry a tape measure

[rbpru]

Our hot water heater delivers 6 gallons of boiling water. It is hot enough for any bath or shower.

I told my DW she could probably cook spaghetti with it. 🙂

It is a electric and/or gas model; you can run both for a quicker recovery.

According to the manual the water temp is set at the factory. They must have set it to hot and hotter.

The only advantage is it is insulated well enough so that when we turn it on in the morning, by the time we eat and do dishes, I shut it off and it will stay hot the rest of the day.

[2012Coleman]

Coleman has some models with bunks and a full tub like the Coleman 244BH. Coleman is a decent entry level TT, and is usually sold by Camping World. When you look at Coleman floor plans, it will say Tub or Shower, the later being a low sided shower pan. Looks like this one has a full queen - but check to be sure it's not just a "short queen".

We used the tub for our youngest the first few times out - filled at least halfway with hot water - don't remember having issues with not enough hot water - just turned on gas and electric.

Anyway, that got old fast as I was always going to the dump station with the tote to empty the gray water. After that, we just sat him in the tub and used the shower wand.

[Mortimer_Brewst]

DutchmenSport wrote:

6 gallons of hot water will not go very far... Tubs are useless in a camper. Teach the toddler to take a shower, or just simply give him/her a cat bath...

A cat bath? Granted I'm not a cat person, but don't mother cats lick their kittens clean? I'm thinking that kid's gonna have some issues.

[DutchmenSport]

Bols2DawaLL wrote:
There must be a few brands that use "full" size queens . I know Coachmen Freedom Express line do even in their smaller trailers .

My Outback came with full size queen. And actually, it's very comfortable. Even though we had a King in our house and a Queen in our camper, and I'm 5'8" tall, I dangle my feet over the end of the bed. Been doing this since I was kid.

Few years ago I was in the hospital for a few days. Those hospital beds have foot boards. I slept in some pretty weird configurations so my feet would dangle over the sides. I don't know how many times a nurse came into my room trying to adjust my feet to get them back on the bed!

[Trackrig]

pennysmom09 wrote:
We have a 12 gallon water heater, don't some travel trailers have more than 6 gallon heaters?

Yes, ours has a 10 gal unit, but in the light weight units everything has be smaller to save the weight.

My main problem with most light weight TTs is to save weight they shorten the walls so I always feel like my head is on the ceiling.

Bill

[pennysmom09]

We have a 12 gallon water heater, don't some travel trailers have more than 6 gallon heaters?

[Rumtan]

This is exactly why we bought our Keystone Passport, the bed is long enough for a comfortable sleep.

Find and make a list of all styles you like then eliminate the ones with a shorter bed.

[Trackrig]

wrgrs50s wrote:
We had a short queen in our first rig and we pulled the mattress out from the headboard about 6 or 7 inches and stuffed a piece of foam across it. Put a full queen size memory foam pad down over that and ahaaa !!! You could never tell the difference since your pillows went to the headboard anyway.

Yes, this is what we did in both the MH and TT. I'm 6' 2" and it works just fine. And as said most factory mattresses are poor at best. Do the above, then put a foam topper over it and life is good again.

Bill