Windish threw in a starter pack as part of the deal ... sewer hose, teflon disk, and a few other dodads that I can't remember now. See post above yours for other edits.
Ahh. Interesting. Just learned that "Refresh" on Tapatalk doesn't pick up edited post changes. Web view works if you know there was a change made though.
Height... Yeah, I saw someone else say to post the height on the visor, the dash, and right over the stereo too with post-its. And measuring and confirming sounds like a good idea. Tomorrow will be no overhangs and no gas stations so I'll just concentrate on getting the darn thing home without needing to exercise the brand new add on to the insurance policy. Ha.
Speaking of that, here's a chuckle. I was looking at Good Sam's insurance info on their website as part of the research a while back. Then I hunted down my insurance company's marketing webpage for their trailer coverage and laughed.
The underwriter must be identical. Not only was the coverage exactly the same, but the exact words/copy were on both webpages.
That or one of the two companies has a VERY lazy website copy writer. Haha. Cut and paste rulez!!!
Doesn't the trailer already have one? When I was pulling them for Quality DriveAway a decade ago they all came from the factory with one, at least the ones built in Goshen and Shipshewana did. Also, it won't cut into a parking space as tight as a bumper pull will either since you don't have the 3' of knuckle between the axle and hitch, which is also why they pull nicer down the highway and won't whip you when the CG gets a bit aft.
If you mean the disc thing, no. Frankly the industry is going through the destruction of multiple companies that used to compete with M&A activity already having occurred in the economic downturn. Companies who competed with things like better frame builds (SunnyBrooke) and other labor intensive or expensive stuff either were bought by bigger players (in the case of SunnyBrooke, Winnebago bought them), or flat out died. Kinda like aviation after the 70s but with massive mergers. Two things resulted, as best as I can tell.
1. The industry survived but most trailers are made all within a 25 mile radius of the same town in Illinois for the most part.
2. They're all built about the same unless you go for a really high end luxury brand and you'll probably need a true tractor (day hauler type with or without a sleeper cab) to pull the thing and in some states, a CDL. The "regular" end of the market is suffering from mass production syndromes and getting a bit sloppy on details.
Case in point: Most trailers now tout "ducted" vents in the floor and ceiling for heating and cooling. Sounds nice, right? Well, in reality it's not ductwork. It's dryer vent hose to lower weight so 1/2 ton trucks can pull ever larger trailers, and lower costs. And it's usually not installed very well. A number of people report vents that seem to get low airflow, and upon pulling the belly covering off or tearing into the ceiling find that a 20' dryer hose was used to run 13' and the extra is coiled up and smashed on top of itself in some rigs. Others the installer took their time.
The diehards just immediately tear apart their trailers as soon as the 1 year warranty is up or sooner, and re-run troublesome ducts, electrical wiring, whatever they find that looks shoddy. And with most trailers coming from a small number of giant conglomerate's factories, they're all coming off the line with similar little problems like that.
Frankly, we've new tent or pop-up campers for most of our lives. (Good memories of one of my sets of grandparents having a very small hard-sided Aspen back in the day. Good fishing trips with grandpa in that thing.
So how should I put this? Having a relatively decent bed, any heat at all, and carpeted floors to walk on to go take the morning leak after cranking up the coffee pot? We're already feeling like royalty. Ha. It's camping for goodness sakes!
So anyway, the mergers also mean the companies are cutting every possible corner to save a buck. Like Greg said, a good dealer will price such that they can throw in some of the stuff a manufacturer might have tossed in a few years ago. (And often their starter kits are "okay" stuff that'll get you by until you shop for some better stuff, like upgraded sewer hoses with better thickness and more solid connectors. Or realize the water line they threw in is falling apart and too short for regular use. Stuff like that. They just want you to have a successful first outing so you're hooked and then your wallet can go wandering through their attached store or Amazon or Camping World later on. Ha.
(Camping World : the Walmart of RVing. Big Corporate entity. Everywhere. All roads lead to a CW somewhere. Seemingly everyone ends up at one eventually for something. Technically they also are a dealer too, but individual locations vary wildly on quality of service, and their pricing on RVs is all over the map.)
This type of camping is more like dragging a small drafty house around, than what we're used to. One floor vent not blowing well? We might not have even noticed or known about the ductwork problems, if we hadn't found photos of the stupid messy duct installations on the Interwebz! Forums on RVing are as useful as this place jumping on a student pilot. Opinions and level of DIY projects are quite varied.
We honeymooned in a pop-up. All over the Desert Southwest. We were broke. Gas money and grocery money and a borrowed trailer from Karen's folks at the time, was plenty good for us. (We later co-owned that pop-up with local siblings of Karen's and that darn 1984 Coleman just wouldn't die. Until it did. It literally started disintegrating on Karen's brother on a recent West Coast trip.
It destroyed itself so well he had to find a place to scrap it mid-trip. "Hi, um, we need to dispose of an old travel trailer. No, we don't live here. Is there a place I can tow it to and drop it?" Seriously. It was that bad. We got a phone call with little detail asking if it was okay to scrap it, and we agreed after a brief description of the carnage.
Family got their money's worth and more out of that thing. We weren't the only honeymooners it housed in its lifespan, either. Quite the little beast it was.
So. That in mind... This new trailer is already beyond our wildest dreams. For fun one night when I was looking at trailers, I showed Karen one of the luxury 5th wheel trailers. Her mouth kinda just dropped open. "That's nicer that our house!" Ha. Yep.
Here's a laugh. I think the trailer has a bigger TV than any of the TVs in the house! Maybe we'll fire it up on shore power and watch the Super Bowl in it. LOL! Get the dog used to hanging out in it. Ha.
