Hard side expandable trailers

[MFOX]

Hi! I am not sure if I should post this in expandables or travel trailers but I want to know people's experience and opinion on hard side expandable trailers. We have a limited amount of space to store a trailer so this seems to be one of the options. We presently have a pop-up and want to "move up". We are looking at a 2006 Coachman Captiva 280ex or 2006 kz frontier. What are the pluses and minuses. We have three kids and both have the quad bunks in the back and the slide out queen size bed. Thanks for your help

[MFOX]

Thank you everyone for all your advice. We decided on the KZ Frontier now we just have to sell our popup which is proving to me more difficult than we expected. The KZ with work for us with quad bunks and the length is great since we have limited space. We can use the kitchen and bathroom which is great for loading so that is accessible for us. Thank you again - any ideas of helping sell the popup would be appreciated.

[Doug33]

The only thing I have heard about is leaking problems with front beds (water gets in during towing). We looked at these TTs years ago but decided that I had to lay across the front bed, so I had to crawl over my wife (or vice versa) to get in and out of bed. And there was also less privacy compared to a standard TT with a front bedroom.

Also, my TT is completely usable with the slide in, although I realize some floorplans are less so.

[1stvee]

I had a Trail Manor 2450KB. It was the best towing trailer of the 5 that I have owned. Good quality very comfortable even in Texas heat and South Dakota cold. I just got tired of putting it up and down. FYI It had the best resale value of the 14 RVs that I have had.

[trsky]

I have a 2011 KZ with a rear king bed slide and have had no problems. We really like it and would not steer anyone away from one. I'm not sure if what you are looking at has the same slide mechanism but we have experienced no issues.

[rexlion]

TTs with slideouts are very common nowadays, and they seem to work fine 99% of the time. Occasional water leak problems around them, and once in a while someone has a motor go out on the slide (usually there's a hand crank backup, check for this) or some sort of alignment problem. But they are the exception.

I had a slide on a 2005 Rockwood, owned it for 3 years, no problems with the slide.

[ReferDog]

Too many to list pick the one that fits your needs, both are decent manf, both make duds. Slides are dependable gone are the days of bad slides

[wmoses]

Just a small point ... 🙂

These are not actually hard sided expandable trailers - they are travel trailers with a rear bedroom slide. Hard-sided expandable trailers are like Trail Manor or the now defunct Hi-Lo lines of RVs.

So you are in the right forum. Hope you get the feedback you are looking for.

Based on the comments about a rear bed I have seen so far, peeves include it not being a "walk-around" so more onerous to make the beds, getting in and out of bed requires crawling to the foot of the bed, and access to the rest of the coach is quite compromised when on the road and the slide is in. But the last one is the case with most RVs with slides.