I am ignorant

[Cooperhawk]

BTW, CC was purchased by Winnebago and CC owners may now attend the Winnebago Grand National Rally in Forest City, Ia. In fact some were already there last July.

[rvethereyet]

Originally Posted by cruzbill

C-7, C-9, etc refer to the engine capacity in liters. You might want to also consider a side-radiator coach. Easier engine access, found on longer, some with tag axle coaches.

Thanks for that info. Side radiator is what I have been looking for. I was on the highway traveling from place to place and saw a very small bus like 25' with a diesel with a side radiator. Tried to get the wife to get the make but she could not find it.

[RobbieH]

Originally Posted by rvethereyet

Oh by the way I looked at a couple of Safaris this past week as well.

They are very nice rigs, extremely well built. Beaver, Safari, and the older Holiday Ramblers are all built by Monaco.

[rvethereyet]

Originally Posted by Cooperhawk

I have driven a lot of diesel engines over the years and I feel our 3126 is just nicely broken in at 95,000. We just came back from a nearly 5000 mile trip with it and it used no oil and ran like new except for some bad fuel I got once.

I would take cross country tomorrow. No sweat.

Just now broken in at 95K so glad to hear that. Sounds like you had a great trip.

Safe travels

Ron

[RobbieH]

I sold my brand new 2014 Thor (well, traded it for the Monaco) with 12,000 miles on it and I was scared to death it was going to break yet again, even on short trips. Nothing to do with the engine, the 6.7 Ford diesel was great, but the quality of the coach was the pits.

[rvethereyet]

Thor is not at the top of my list. That is why I am looking at older quality units.

[Cooperhawk]

Originally Posted by rvethereyet

Just now broken in at 95K so glad to hear that. Sounds like you had a great trip.

Safe travels

Ron

Well maybe I should say that we do keep up on maintenance all the time. Last Fall we replaced the radiator with a new one and that eliminated a small overheating problem on long mountain pulls. You can expect that as radiators do lose efficiency over time. However we have never had to repair anything on the engine or transmission.

Something to note, Some models have a grease fitting on the fan blade hub that is hard to get to but still needs to be lubricated. I have to raise the bed and remove the panel to get to it on the top of the engine.

Another thing is the slobber tube is placed foreword of the radiator and will over time clog the fins with oil and dirt. We extended ours with tubing so that it is clear of the rear of the coach.

[Cooperhawk]

Originally Posted by rvethereyet

Thor is not at the top of my list. That is why I am looking at older quality units.

I wouldn't rule out Winnebago or Itasca. Parts are readily available and there are a lot of them on the road.

[Hit_the_Rhod]

Originally Posted by rvethereyet

Thanks for the reply. Like I said I am ignorant, but would not a cat in a CC be the same as one in another coach? Sounds like you got a good one. With 100k on your coach, would you feel comfortable going cross country and back? Hoping to find something with about 50K-60k miles on an older model.

Our 2001 Dutch Star has the Cat 3126B engine. 133k miles, only work done on the engine was oil changes and filters. Doesn't burn oil, doesn't smoke, works perfect.

Clean Oil, Clean Fuel, and Clean Air are the secrets to longevity in a diesel engine.

I would prefer an engine with regular usage over one with only 15k miles in the age group you are looking at.

Now if you want to talk RADIATORS, that is a different story, we just replaced ours AGAIN in our coach.

Radiators are generally aluminum with either metal tanks or plastic tanks. Copper radiators are getting harder to find and more difficult to pay for as well!

So to recap, our coach has 133 k miles, 20 k of which was in the last two years and I would not hesitate to drive across country leaving tomorrow. We went to WA from KY last August/September with a LOADED coach pulling a LOADED toad, both just under the limit for total weight, and total per axle, an unusual situation, but except for losing an awning coming across Montana on I-90, everything ran flawlessly.

Go ahead, get your feet wet! Better yet, jump in, the water's fine!

Oh, and ours is a side radiator as well. First one failed because of road debris, the next 4 just failed, no reason we could come up with. . . .

[Cooperhawk]

Radiators you say? Tell me about it.

Here is a link to the thread I posted when we replaced ours and extended the slobber tube.

http://www.irv2.com/forums/f26/radia...er-312721.html

[Mr_D]

Originally Posted by cruzbill

C-7, C-9, etc refer to the engine capacity in liters. You might want to also consider a side-radiator coach. Easier engine access, found on longer, some with tag axle coaches.

Good access is not a given even with a side radiator, he's a picture of one like mine:

[RobbieH]

Access is a piece of cake in the Safari with side radiator. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think all the CAT equipped Safaris have side radiators. This is what I see when I open my access doors. Access from the top is good too.

[Cooperhawk]

Correct me if I am wrong but don't the side mounts have to use a smaller radiator? I say that because they are mounted in a location where a larger one would need to raise the bedroom floor.

In the end most work is done from underneath the unit anyway. With the side mount it does make changing a fan belt or water pump easier.

[Skip426]

I should have included this file when I first posted .
Picture on the first page gives a good idea of the physical external size of the Cat RV engine line up starting with the C-7 on the left .
Engine Hp & Torque on page 13.