Hi all,
I'm new to the Renegade party and thought I'd introduce myself. We just transitioned from a Fleetwood Excursion 33D to Verona LE 40LTS, and our first impressions are "Wow!". I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir, but I figured I'd share some first impressions:
Driving Dynamics: Concrete highways, expansion joints, truck traffic are stable and composed, complete non-events. Our Fleetwood swayed, floated, and shook with road imperfections and traffic. Cornering is much flatter and with the inboard seating, my wife seemed MUCH more at ease ...there where no claw marks in the armrests when we got home
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Engine noise when accelerating is a more than our DP, but once up to speed the Verona seems quieter. I do plan to add sound deadening mats to the firewall and cab floor - that made a huge difference in sound with our Fleetwood.
Power is up and Torque is way up vs. our old coach, the tranny downshifted to 5 only once on the highway, and I kind of forced the issue be mashing the throttle on an uphill grade just to see what it did. Over the same terrain, the Fleetwood kicked into 5 numerous times.
Cab doors are handy. Stopping at a rest area my bride started climbing out and to head back to "the door" until I reminded her that there was a door right beside her. We will learn.
Although 7 feet longer, the Verona is a couple inches more narrow than our Excursion and feels smaller on the road. Likely due in part to how stable it is. Construction, toll booths, and even getting sandwiched between two semi's in adjacent lanes ...none where white knuckle events.
But when parking at the house this rig felt every bit of its 40 feet. The longer wheel base and a tight driveway, made docking (in the dark) an interesting event.
Driver seat - On my initial test drive I was hopping down the road like a kid on a bouncy ball. No fun. Bringing her home I just put the seat all the way down, no air ride but still very comfortable. I do want to sort out the seat so I can get both air ride AND a non-bouncyball ride.
Interior fit, finish, and overall solidity is a big step up. No glitz, just good solid construction; I'm a fan.
Firefly/Spyder system, I like it, but I haven't really lived with it yet, and have zero documentation. Any of you have documentation for it?
Aquahot - we frequently "camp" in cold weather and this feature with the heated bay was a key feature for us. I am still trying to sort it out. with a few cold nights this week, I left the system on to prevent freezing and noticed that coolant hoses that route to the engine are hot ...I didn't see the preheat pump indicator light on but suspect it must be circulating. Still need to find where to shut that off, but the "switch" is hiding somewhere in my spyder control panel. There are times when a real button would be nice.
Storage - definitely more than our 33 footer, but I do miss having a passthrough for important things like fishing rods and skis. We'll need to figure out something; perhaps removing part of a compartment divider wall to make a longer storage area.
Sorry for the long post. I spent a lot of time on this site before puling the trigger, and figure these new owner thoughts might help another contemplating a similar transition.
Linear Mode
