What’s That Big Thing in Your Driveway?

 By Monique & Barry Zander, the Never-Bored RVers  What is an RV?  Easy question, since you either own one or are considering which type will best suit your RVing lifestyle. But is it all that easy?  For instance, the Good Sam Club Buyers Guide lists the following types of RVs (and who would know better?): Non-motorized versions include travel trailers, fifth wheels, folding camping trailers and SURVs, which is like an SUV.  Then there are the Motorized RVs, which the Buyers Guide breaks down into Class A Motorhomes, Class B Van Conversions, Class C Motorhomes, Truck Campers and Custom Coach/Bus. But is that all … and are non-motorized vehicles RVs?  On the Wikipedia website, there is a good argument made for 4-Wheel-Drive vehicles being considered RVs.  There was the night when Monique and I were tent-camping in Joshua Tree National Park – the wind picked up dramatically and blew live embers from the campfire into our tent.  The temp dropped into the 30s, so we “camped” in our SUV.  Apparently SUVs are often used as RVs in Australia. Then there is another entry in Wikipedia arguing that park models on wheels are RVs.  Well, maybe. I bring this up to open a forum in the Comments Section below about what you consider an RV, but first, I’d like to share a few experiences. Our home is in a 28-foot travel trailer*.  We parked in front of our son’s home in Huntington Beach last November, where we were cited for parking on the street on a street-sweeping day. ... Read more

First All-Electric Motorhome Introduced at Louisville RV Show

By Bob Difley The first all electric motorhome, a creation by MVP RV of Riverside, California, cruised the highways for 180 miles at between 65 and 70 mph, and set the standard for those who follow. That’s a considerable increase in mileage between charges from the first mass market electric cars. Even so, there are at present few charging stations on the nation’s highways which are needed to move electric RVs between campgrounds, so it may be some time before you can walk into a dealer lot and buy an electric motorhome. Read more  Read More →

RVIA Show, New Product Introduction

One subject that will always create a lot of conversation on the various RV forums is when someone asks about running their air conditioner via an invertor, powered by batteries.  The educated consensus is typically that you can probably do it, but the energy storage capacity of a battery bank will not power the A/C unit for any significant amount of time, thus rendering the system practically useless.  I worked a little math on this and, assuming my math is correct, a typical 13000 BTU coleman A/C unit will consume about 3800 watts per hour and a set of Trojan T-105 6 volt batteries, fully charged, has about 5400 watt hours available, or less than 2 hours of operation until the batteries are fully discharged.  Since we don’t want to discharge our batteries more than about 50%, or about 2700 watt hours, or in terms of a cold RV, about 42 minutes of operation.  In other words, not a very practical arrangement. Enter the Topleader Group Limited our of Dongguan China who were showing their line of DC operated roof top A/C units.  The photo below shows their DL-1200 unit. According to their literature, the AC unit operates on 24 volts DC, at 600 watts, and produces from 6200 BTU cooling.  I am going to assume that in the air conditioner has an internal inverter which converts the battery DC voltage to AC in order to run the compressor, either that or it actually operates with a DC motor.  Either of these schemes would be different from the typical US made A/C unit which... Read more

RVIA Expo 2010 Wednesday Dec. 1

Greetings from Louisville, Kentucky! Wednesday, Dec. 1.  Today was a very busy day at the RVIA Expo here as we prowled the aisles of the show for about 8 hours, looking at an amazing array of RVs and RV accessories.  Yesterday I posted some photos of a recent innovation from Monaco using a telescoping slide to provide a wider floorplan on their motorhomes.  Today I took a photo of the outside of the slide which I think, shows the operation of the slide a little more clearly. The slide depth totals 50 inches, consisting of a 32″ main slide and an 18″ second section.  When coupled with an 18″ slide on the curb side, the total slide width measures 68″, which I believe is the widest in the industry. Read more  Read More →

RVIA Expo, Nov. 30, 2010

Greetings from Louisville, Kentucky! Today was the opening day for the annual RVIA trade show here, and our initial impressions are that the industry is very upbeat about the future.  The day started off as usual, with the opening breakfast and industry presentation by the RVIA.  The reports indicated that all segments of the industry, motorhomes, towables, etc, experienced a significant increase in sales compared to 2009.  Of course, 2009 was by all reports, a disaster, so beating that sales level wasn’t too difficult.  Forecasts for future sales do indicate future growth, and hopes are high that will in fact be the case. Read more  Read More →

RVIA Expo. Monday Nov. 29

Greetings to all from Louisville, Kentucky!  Linda and I are parked at the Expo center campground.  (Under the topic of “name dropping”, we are next door to Bob Tiffin’s son’s motorhome)  It is nice to see that at least some of the manufacturers actually “go rv’ing”! Since  the actual show doesn’t start until tomorrow, we went over to the center, registered, and then went on a tour of Louisville, and our main objective was to visit the Louisville Slugger factory and take the factory tour.  If you are in the Louisville Ky area, and if you have ANY interest in baseball (and what good American doesn’t?), this is the place to go.  The factory, museum, and gift store are all located together, downtown, near the Ohio river.  The downtown area is very clean, and parking in this area is plentiful.  We parked right across the street from the museum, and of course took the requisite photo of the world’s largest baseball bat. Read more  Read More →

RVIA EXPO, LOUISVILLE KY

Linda and I are getting the motorhome ready for our annual trip to Kentucky to attend the RVIA show in Louisville to gather information on the general state of the RV industry, and to view new products at the show.  We will be reporting on events as they occur, here on RV.net blog. Read more  Read More →

Foretravel’s New Flagship

A Lug_Nut sighting.   Foretravel Inc. of Nacogdoches Texas is launching a new flagship, the IH-45.  The IH will be available in smaller models namely 42’ and 44’.   Power will be the Cummins ISX diesel with 600/650 horse power mounted on Foretravel’s custom TravelRide chassis.  That should push this 48,000 GVWR vehicle down the road with plenty of power to spare.  Increased basement and interior height is gained as the new IH is 10” higher than their current models such as the Nimbus.  This totally new design is truly a highline coach that will compete with such products as Newell. In this economy it is great to see a company like Foretravel forging ahead with this new offering.  I’m looking forward to seeing one of these new rigs in the flesh at one of the upcoming RV shows. The cost, if you must ask, is rumored at around 1.2 million.  Kudos to the Foretravel design and manufacturing team. Adding To Your Dream Book     -     Lug_Nut     -       Peter Mercer  Read More →

And taking the Checkered Flag………..

Number One   Several years ago, early in our experience with RVs, we were at the Spartan factory for service on our Coachmen motorhome.  During that visit, we were fortunate to become acquainted with a couple there who were in their seventh year of full time living in their motorhome.  We went to breakfast with these folks and spent a long time listening to their adventures as full timers.  When we returned to the service shop, they were kind enough to give us a tour of their motorhome, explaining various features of the coach that fit into the full time life style.  Their motorhome was a Newmar Dutchstar, and from that day, I have always believed that the Dutchstar was a great coach for full timers, perhaps more so than any other make or model of motorhome.  Therefore, it was interesting to me that, when I conducted my recent survey of diesel motorhomes, that the Newmar Dutchstar finished in first place.  This would not have been my initial prediction, but looking at it with 20-20 hindsight, it all makes sense to me.  First of all, Newmar makes a great motorhome, a fact that will be confirmed by many Newmar owners.  Second, the Dutchstar is a great motorhome, with many fine features, quality construction, and solid factory support.  What I found to be unusual, was that the Dutchstar met so many of my specific requirements, at least enough to finish in the top spot in this list.  Actually, the Dutchstar finished only slightly ahead of the Winnebago Tour in points and... Read more

White Flag lap on the journey to find the Perfect DP

  Number 2 Winnebago Tour BD               When I saw the Winnebago Tour at an RV show in Cleveland last January, I was immediately impressed with the layout, the features and the overall package offered by Winnebago.  We were with some friends and encouraged them to take a “tour” to see for themselves as they were in the market for a new coach.  The Tour BD is a beautiful motorhome with many of the features on our original list including passenger side dinette, queen bed standard with king option, a high quality water manifold system and effective battery charging system.  One area where the Tour really shines is the water tank storage capacities.  The Tour finished at the top of the list in this area with a 90 gallon fresh water tank, 94 gallon gray water tank and 57 gallon black water tank.  These capacities really lend themselves to boon docking with the Tour.  The BD also features a 42” LCD TV mounted in the driver side slideout that can be viewed while the slide is in, and can be watched comfortably from anywhere on the huge “L” shaped couch.  This particular feature merits further comment due to the clever way that Winnebago has built the couch to collapse when the slide is in, or expand when the slide is out.  You almost have to see the couch being “operated” to appreciate this feature.  The Tour features bottom mounted mirrors and wipers along with a large, single piece front windshield.   It is in the area of “negative” features... Read more

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