Quote:
Originally Posted by HamIam
I'm seriously considering purchase of a 2003 Fleetwood Excursion 39L that I recently located. Mileage is low, floor plan is good, cosmetic appearance is good. Still trying to get my hands on maintenance records and a few other things. Are there any specific issues with this model that I should be aware of? Any thoughts from other owners? Thanks in advance for any guidance you can provide.
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Tires, batteries, fluids and filters, like any other rig of that vintage. Indoor storage and steady maintenance trump mileage, always.
This was our first RV, and I was delighted with its elegance and value.
The Hehr windows those years are prone to fog, a real pain. I bought mine at 84K miles, sold it at 100K. The salesman said it rode better than any of the 200 buses he'd sold to date. The key: new Koni shocks, new tires, lots of undercoating, a new bushing kit for the anti-sway bar, scrupulous adherence to Spartan maintenance guidelines plus re-torquing the anti-sway brackets when doing lube service.
One horrible oversight by Fleetwood in those years was the use of vinyl clad particleboard cabinet frames. While a brown laundry marker can dress up the inevitable edge-scuffing, make sure they've been gently used.
The tandem fresh water tanks often leak via the tubing that connects one to the other, or as the thin-walled nipples collapse under the strain of ring clamps. Easy to rectify, but ensure that the bay has not rusted beneath the tanks.
Spartan chassis of the vintage break boots around the ball joints. An ESP like Good Sam -- this one is worthless in my humble experience -- will deny coverage of suspension problems that can be traced, no matter how indirectly, to boots.
The final check: drag your finger under each and every window, around the entryway. Sight down the side, look for bulges in the fiberglass; and, if the wallpaper or fiberglass is bulging and/or wrinkled more than a tiny bit, run -- don't walk -- away. Leaks that have led to exterior or interior delamination generally are show-stoppers.