Finally Entegra Owners! New to us Cornerstone 45B!

[1atom12]

First of all, I would like to thank everyone who answered silly newbie questions that I have asked over the past several weeks. The wife and I finally took delivery of our 2017 Cornerstone 45B on Saturday from NIRVC Atlanta! We are beyond excited to get to know this coach.

More silly questions to follow I am sure as we keeping it in the driveway this next week to finish moving in and getting to know it.

Below a picture as we arrived back at our house yesterday. Outside color is sunlit. Natural cherry cabinetry with stanford decor.

Again, I have a ton more questions, so please continue to be patient... Thanks!

Adam

[1atom12]

First question/request:

Our Cornerstone was orignally ordered without the Dometic freezer/fridge in the basement. I already have a Dometic CF80 and the MORryde SP56-115 freezer sliding tray on the way and they should arrive this week.

Would someone who has the Dometic freezer installed be willing to slide out their unit and post a picture of where the slideout tray is mounted? From others I have seen, Entegra seems to mount the tray to the left side of the compartment, but how far back? Any need to shim the tray rails or do I just bolt it straight to the compartment floor?

Any help would be appreciated... Thanks

[Gary.Jones]

Adam

Congratulations on the new coach. A Cornerstone is a first class ride once you get the new coach issues worked out of it. A 2017 should be in pretty good shape.

On the dumb questions, we all asked a ton of dumb questions when we first got into this business (the luxury coach business) so dont let that worry you. That is what this forum is all about. I will go out and take a pix of my basement Dometic and post it here in a few minutes.

Coach and toad look like they are ready to go. Hope your first two years of travel are problem free, but if not..... iRV2 is a heck of a resource
\
Gary

[Gary.Jones]

Here ya go....

[1atom12]

Thanks for the pics Gary! The slide out tray is out for delivery for today. The pics should help a bunch...

[Rollin101]

I believe your slide tray will be different than the one Gary is showing. I installed an extra cf-80 on drivers side and needed to raise the tray 3/4 inch so vertical latches wouldn’t drag on door seal.

[Balladeer]

Adam,

Congratulations on your new ride.
Don't know if you are new to the size, but here are some items of interest.
1. Be aware of the 25+ tons of weight when stopping.
2. Your coach is 13 feet high. Watch the trees.
2. Turn wide. you are 32.1 feet from front of coach to the drive wheels. (after pivot point)
4. Tail swing. you are 13.4 feet from drivers to back of coach. ( Saw one bus in Alaska leave the fuel pumps and not allow for tail swing and took off end cap on the pump protection post. (ouch)

Wishing you downhill grades and following winds.

[1atom12]

Originally Posted by Balladeer

Adam,

Congratulations on your new ride.
Don't know if you are new to the size, but here are some items of interest.
1. Be aware of the 25+ tons of weight when stopping.
2. Your coach is 13 feet high. Watch the trees.
2. Turn wide. you are 32.1 feet from front of coach to the drive wheels. (after pivot point)
4. Tail swing. you are 13.4 feet from drivers to back of coach. ( Saw one bus in Alaska leave the fuel pumps and not allow for tail swing and took off end cap on the pump protection post. (ouch)

Wishing you downhill grades and following winds.

Very good points! The wife and I are newbies. We bought a Thor Palazzo 37.4 (38 foot single axle) as our very first RV a few months ago. Within the first month we realized the Palazzo was not for us. So, other than the drive home yesterday with the Cornerstone, the Palazzo was our only exposure. I know I am being captain obvious here, but OMG what a difference in driving experience. Everything from the quiet ride to the not wandering from side to side in my lane or getting blown out my lane by regular cars passing us in the Palazzo. The Cornerstone is a ROCK. We are so impressed.

Speaking of most of your points above, it was a multi-point turn situation to get the Cornerstone into the driveway. We live a rather narrow street with concrete curbs. Our driveway is only 10 feet wide and is a straight 90 degrees to the road. I was able to back the Palazzo in first try. The Cornerstone took about a 10 point turn! I found a few Youtube videos regarding the best way to back into a campsite/driveway. Hug left side of road, 8 feet forward of the drive axle (pivot point) at the left-most portion of your turn in. Cut hard to the right forward to the other side of the street. Cut wheel hard back to the left and just back right in. Again, this worked fine for the Palazzo. I need a new back in method for the Cornerstone...

[Gary.Jones]

Adam:

Dont forget the rear end swings the opposite direction you are turning, the sharper you turn the more that swings out the opposite way and of course, your Jeep goes out the same way the rear end of the coach goes, so the advice you got above is spot on. Unless I am coming into truck pumps straight on, I never get close to the pump or island itself. I am looking at the length of the hose on the fuel dispenser as I approach and keeping the rear end swing of my coach as I pull in always in mind as I decide where to stop.

Of course you know, virtually never back up with the jeep connected to you 4 down.... it will jack knife so fast it will make your head swim.

Pay attention to each overpass you encounter. I have encountered several when not following the on board GPS and gotten myself in real trouble once, and almost in trouble once. A lot of people complain about those Rand-McNally GPSs but mine has never led me astray.... I have mis-interpreted what it was telling me a couple of times (its saying take a right off ramp but dont pay attention that the off ramp I am preparing to take is .2 miles closer than the one it wants me to take. I've had three RV designed GPSs and all of them have saved me lots of troubles over the years. of course, we back that up with an on-board Garmin which doesnt care about length, height, or weight as a double check. Be sure to set your dimensions and my experience, is always use you own good judgement, but 99% of the time, the GPS knows best.

Oh, and my freezer bracket is bolted directly through the floorboard. As JH has said, maybe your slide is different, and it might need to be shimmed up but nothing complicated. And, do you think that there was a refrig/freezer in there and someone removed it, or it was never there? I have never seen a Cornerstone that didnt have the refrig there from the factory....

Gary

[1atom12]

Originally Posted by Gary.Jones

Adam:

Dont forget the rear end swings the opposite direction you are turning, the sharper you turn the more that swings out the opposite way and of course, your Jeep goes out the same way the rear end of the coach goes, so the advice you got above is spot on. Unless I am coming into truck pumps straight on, I never get close to the pump or island itself. I am looking at the length of the hose on the fuel dispenser as I approach and keeping the rear end swing of my coach as I pull in always in mind as I decide where to stop.

Of course you know, virtually never back up with the jeep connected to you 4 down.... it will jack knife so fast it will make your head swim.

Pay attention to each overpass you encounter. I have encountered several when not following the on board GPS and gotten myself in real trouble once, and almost in trouble once. A lot of people complain about those Rand-McNally GPSs but mine has never led me astray.... I have mis-interpreted what it was telling me a couple of times (its saying take a right off ramp but dont pay attention that the off ramp I am preparing to take is .2 miles closer than the one it wants me to take. I've had three RV designed GPSs and all of them have saved me lots of troubles over the years. of course, we back that up with an on-board Garmin which doesnt care about length, height, or weight as a double check. Be sure to set your dimensions and my experience, is always use you own good judgement, but 99% of the time, the GPS knows best.

Oh, and my freezer bracket is bolted directly through the floorboard. As JH has said, maybe your slide is different, and it might need to be shimmed up but nothing complicated. And, do you think that there was a refrig/freezer in there and someone removed it, or it was never there? I have never seen a Cornerstone that didnt have the refrig there from the factory....

Gary

Sage advice. Thanks Gary! As to your question about the Dometic, it was purposely ordered without one by whoever ordered it. Also, the stock fireplace has been removed and two cabinet doors are now it it's place. I have a new fireplace arriving Wednesday. Not sure how I'm going to trim out around it, but the one I picked out is almost an exact fit for the fireplace opening once I remove the doors. Also, they ordered the coach with matching natural maple in the bathroom for the vanity. There is also a "custom?" drawer that has been made out of the blank cabinet panel in front of the two sinks. It literally pulls out in a giant "T" shape.

Someone was absolutely OBSESSED with storage on this coach. Oh, the kitchen pantry has about 10 factory looking shelves in it. So many shelves, I had to pull half of them out so you could actually use the area as a pantry. Strange...

Maybe this coach was a drug mule in it's first life???

Pics below of the current "fireplace" setup and a bathroom cabinet shot showing the matching natural cherry finish instead of the white cabinet. You can see the two pull handles on the custom made drawer in front of the two sinks. Or maybe this was an option? Not sure...

[Gary.Jones]

Adam

Your sink cabinet looks a lot like ours in our 19... ours is painted white to match the upper cabinet but the bottom looks very similar. Several guys on here talked about removing their fireplace and replaced it by storage. That made no sense to me as the fireplace is 1.) Pleasant to look at, 2.) warms up the front of the coach nicely on a cold morning, and 3. was the stock arrangement and I like keeping the coach largely stock.

Some even get rid of their Fisher-Paykel which someone will remove out of my coach only by prying it out of my cold, dead hands.... that sucker is worth millions to me.

I think that you are referring to the stainless steel or chromed steel pull out racks being in your pantry. On my 15 Anthem, I had 5 of those.... 2 on the top shelf above the main kitchen sink, two on the bottom shelf, and one big one in the bigger center section of the kitchen cabinets. We loved that arrangement. However, in 19, the stock Cornerstone came with only two on the top shelf, nothing on the bottom, and nothing in the bigger cabinet in the center (now on the left). We talked them into adding pulls out to the bottom also, but they would not put in the slide for the bigger cabinet so we found exactly the same trays on Amazon, and installed it ourselves. We have no of those slides in the pantry cabinet. Without them, Dee had virtually no ability to reach back into the back of the kitchen cabinets without the slides.... for her they were worth their weight in gold.

Gary

[757driver]

Congratulations, and welcome to the family.

[Mwoodofd]

Very nice coach with lots of horse power. Congrats on the purchase, and you will get the hang of backing it in.

I back into my closed storage facility that is 12' wide, and I have about 60 feet to pull up and back in. Got to where I can hit it without pulling forward. Just be careful, when I need to pull up, I do!

[Ann n Gene]

Congrats! Great coach and a better dealer.