Success or Horror stories with older DP?

[mtofell]

Anyone care to share good or bad stories buying a +/- 15 year old DP of good quality? I'm thinking brands like Country Coach, Beaver, Newmar, Tiffin, Monaco, etc.

Do/did you have many unexpected and/or expensive repairs? Would you do it again the same way or spend more to avoid some pitfalls?

Obviously, there are all the easy things to check or figure in when we purchase - tires, fluids, batteries, a good inspection, etc. I'm mainly looking for stories of unexpected, unforeseen things.

We inherently hear mostly of problems on these forums and I'm hoping there are a lot of happy folks out there.

[Skip426]

My coach was 12 years old when I purchased it , and aside from maintenance I have yet so spend on repairs the amount that the dealer was wanting to charge for an extended warranty ; although the current air compressor problem will bring me very close. I do all my own maintenance and repairs when possible .

Lucky perhaps , but I've heard horror stories here in the forums of buyers of newer coaches being hit with repair bills , almost equal to my purchase price.

Condition and service records , are the big things to investigate prior to purchase.

[MSHappyCampers]

We bought the 2002 Monaco Windsor in 2012, so it was 10 years old then. It had 84,000 miles. It now has 110,000 miles. We have never had a serious problem with the engine or transmission. I've had to replace both A/C's and the cooling unit on the Norcold 1200 fridge, which are the only problems I would class as "serious". Otherwise it has just been the usual small things that happen with all RV's.



We have no regrets about buying an older MH!

[BUB1988]

We have a 2003 Gulf Stream which we purchased about 5 years ago. I don't see where many folks add them to the list of well built RV's. but these coaches are very well built.
The only issue, even tough really expensive, was due to lack of maintenance and a lying owner. While the RV was up on the lift having an engine replaced I had the opportunity of looking in the complete under carriage of the coach. I saw an RV that was totally weather and rodent proof. The coach is solidly built and still looks great, inside and out. Over the 5 years we have owned the coach we have only had to do normal maintenance and tire replacements. All of the appliances, including air conditioners, are original and all are used daily. As you will see from other posts the biggest thing is to look at maintenance records and if not available take the RV and have a complete inspection completed. Neither of these things did we do and we suffered the consequences. We know quite a few folks that have the above mentioned coaches and all have had many more issues with their (High-End) coaches.

[ArgoPilot]

Picked up a 1994 HR Navigator for under $10K; replaced tires and batteries (house and chassis), new front leveling jack feet and springs, radiator and the water system was fixed. Still ended up spending less than what most folks were asking for similar mh with similar miles and similar condition.

Even with a little dog earing around the corners, this land yacht has been solid as solid gets. Drives and handles REALLY well, maneuvers into spots with no problems, and the onboard stuff REALLY makes this thing a joy to RV in. The wife and kids love it, and want Daddy to make sure it's around for a LONG TIME. Not one regret in the world. We took it on a round trip (with stop and such) of a little over 1100 miles this last weekend. Comfy and secure...and the sound of that Cummins 8.3 with turbo whistle is so neat!

Yeah, I'm a dork...

[Spk64]

We love our well seasoned DP. We purchased our 12 year old Newmar MADP 4 years ago. Almost paid $25k more for a Tiffin Phaeton that was a few years older, it did not appear to be well maintained, batteries were shot and tires looked even worse. And I was worried about the big 4 or whatever it was being called at the time for factory repairs. With that in mind I budgeted the $25k we saved for upgrades and repairs. Been 4 years and I still have not spent the $25k and have made many expensive upgrades along with all new tires and batteries.
My advice to anyone looking at the older DP’s is to make sure you have 15-20k for upgrades and repairs. You will want to make upgrades and repairs go hand in hand with owing an RV.
As a side note so far we have not had any big surprises on the expense side.
Here is our 16 year old setup.

[ray999]

Purchased a 2002 Windsor 2 yrs ago. Very low miles, besides normal maintenance, tires was the biggest $$. Had the original tires with only 6500 miles on them. Still breaking it in!!! Love it. !

[slowmachine]

Horror.

http://www.irv2.com/forums/f258/2000...el-335623.html

[FIRE UP]

Well,
You didn't mention the brand but, we purchased an '04 Itasca Horizon 36GD with the C-7 330HP CAT right at 7 years ago. Yep, I've had to do some repairs/alterations/etc. but, this is a very nice coach, well built and rides great. It's equipped with the Freightliner XC Evolution chassis and, has done absolutely great in the 43,000 miles and 7 years we've put on it. It's got a very, VERY nice full body paint job that looks as good now, at 14 years old, as it did the day it rolled off the line.

We pull two different toads with it. A 2015 Jeep JKUR and, an 2011 GMC Sierra 1500 4x4 Extended cab that normally is carrying an '08 Honda GL 1800 Goldwing on a Rampage lift/carrier, in the bed of the truck.

I'd recommend one like ours any day of the week. Good luck on your purchase.
Scott

[HamboneTHW]

We bought a 13 year old Alpine Coach in April. So far, so good. I have done all of the maintenance myself so far. We went on a 500 mile round trip last weekend that went really well. It had 125,000 on it when we bought it. Below is a list of maintenance I have done so far:
-Generator Oil and Filter
-Generator Fuel Filter
-Generator Fuel Line replacement
-Generator Coolant Flush and Refill with Final Charge
-Generator Spark Arrestor Clean
-Generator Air Filter
-Engine Oil and Filter
-Engine Fuel Filters
-Transmission Fluid and Filter Change

I don't have $300K plus in the budget for a coach, so we bought a quality well-built coach and will work little by little to remodel and upgrade what we want to make it our own. We are loving it so far.

[VoiceNinja]

We bought a 2008 Gulfstream 40UL in April 2017.

It's been neither amazing nor a horror. I've done a lot (A LOT) of work on it myself. The previous owner took it to Freightliner once a year for an oil change and a chassis lube, but didn't follow the full Freightliner service intervals and didn't take care of the house as carefully as he should have.

We got it for a great price, but last year I put in over 130 hours of labor and about $3,500 in parts. We got quotes for all the work we did (repair a leaking skylight, replace a ceiling panel damaged by the leaking skylight, change front brakes, change front hub oil seals, fix a bad exhaust brake air solenoid, recoat the FG roof, clean and touch up all roof sealant, remove and replace all roof-edge, end-cap, and window sealants, change all marker lights to LED, front wheel alignment, and more). We got quotes from Freightliner for all the chassis work and our local RV center for the house work. The total through the service centers for the same work would have been ***$30,000+*** based on their quotes.

This year I've wrapped up the annual Freightliner maintenance schedule and am working on chasing down an air compressor issue, and still need to install a new refrigerator roof vent, black tank vent cap, and windshield wipers before we leave for the East Coast next week.

All of that said, we also spent about 100 nights in the coach between getting it in April last year and putting it in storage in early December. We pulled it out on April 28 this year and already have 16 days in it. By the end of June, we'll have almost 40 days in it.

We LOVE traveling in it as a family and I love seeing my young sons (5 and 10) as the watch the country roll by. And we would NOT have been happier with a small coach or a gasser. The ride and handling of the Freightliner XC chassis is wonderful, we're never even close to overloaded, and the coach is rarely pushed to it's limits to do what we ask of it.

Honestly, I don't know that our issues have been any more hassle than what I see from some of the newer model year owners. It's certainly been less hassle than what I've seen from some of the brand new coach owners who have lost their entire first season to warranty work delays!

I'd say go for an older model, but be ready to get your hands greasy and be sure to stay on top of everything, else it can get away from you pretty quickly...

[John Jones]

I bought a 2000 Country Coach Allure for 40k 4 years ago. It needed nothing (except a alternator on the way home ) We've enjoyed it, I can't believe how well its built (actually over built)

Keeping my fingers crossed, but I have had good luck up to date. I've replaced, exhaust manifold, lift pump, and leveling valves. If you have any mechanical ability, these aren't too bad to work on.

The ride between my gas class A and my Diesel class A is night and day.

[nothermark]

It will be interesting to watch this thread.

I don't see it so much as how much it cost as how much it could cost. A DP in general has more expensive systems that can fail than a gas unit. That makes it a question of when, not if they will fail. As long as they do not do it while any one person owns the unit they do OK. If any particular owner happens to need an engine or airbags or other things then they get the big bill. As was pointed out the cost also depends on who does the work. Some of us are able and some not so much.

[jimmy braden]

Been living in my scepter for second month now. Now in maine from tx (second trip) Got it almost 2yrs ago and no major $$. Put 1K$ in a the local freightliner to have oil drain hoses on motor changed. Just filters, oil changes, gen set service, engine belt and tensioner, gasket replaced for front roof AC.

I have a cracked windscreen that will need replacing (on first trip), and gonna to the gardian stainless steel plates under slides. Still gets 9 mpg - will pull most semis on hills - but I dont have a toad.

Iv put about 8K miles on it. Love it.

The basic hardware just works.. and it still looks pretty good.