Is The Endeavor A Reliable Used Motor Home?

Al commented that he is looking at older RV’s and was wondering if older Endeavor’s are reliable and holding up well.

My thoughts on the 1998 through 2000 Endeavor are it's a good RV. For Holiday Rambler, this model is their top of the line for their gas motor homes. If it was well taken care of it's worth near $40,000 depending on options and miles.

One thing I noticed that sold me on the one I bought is the V10 is smooth and mostly adequate (newer V10 is much more powerful) and the Endeavor feels solid and well made. I enjoyed the test drive very much. Unfortunately the two times I drove it there was almost no wind, had there been 20mph winds or higher I may have had a change of heart. Lack of track bars either front or rear allow a rig of this size to be pushed from the side easily by either wind or semi’s as they pass by. I have had many white knuckle drives that turned my arms to mush.

One notable trip was going to Iowa and Minnesota during a very windy weekend. Thankfully I was towing our Ford Escape which made it much more stable but without the toad, the RV was being tossed all over the place. Diesel Pushers have much better suspensions and drive much better than gassers.

Other weak points are the drivers side slide seals. Almost all Endeavor's I have looked at like mine had water damage behind the drivers seat. When you bring the slide in water gets past the top right side seal and runs down the side of the slide and saturates the carpet.

Mine has stains from this happening in the past but we have had it repaired “mostly”. If I let water accumulate on the slide topper, when I retract the slide water will run off of the topper onto the slide and then come into the coach. What I do now is level the coach with a slight bias to the passenger side, this keeps the AC run off going down the passenger side making it easier to keep the inside dry. If water does build up on the slide topper I go up on the roof and get the water off before retracting the slide. If it’s raining I have the wife retract the slide while I hold a towel on the side of the slide to keep water from coming in. We have not had an issue with water coming in from there since we started doing this.

Also, mine had nothing to stop the slide as it retracts into the side, it literally would go in too far and you could see it bow in around the trim. I should have taken a picture, from what I'm told they likely all lack this and have this problem (1998/99). I had stop bolts installed and it works perfectly now but I am still careful when retracting the slide so I don’t run the motor too hard.

Everything in our motor home works as it should now but we did have to fix the following. Replace the headlights, the originals were cloudy due to age and sun exposure, tune up the generator, repair the generator exhaust, replace front tires, repaint the windshield wiper arms as they were rusty. Replace the engine battery and house batteries, seal the roof and one side wall. Replace the V10 serpentine belt, the engine had 33,000 miles on it and the belt was getting pretty worn. Replaced the slide topper, the salesman damaged it during delivery demo. Repaired AC unit seal, it was leaking into main cabin. I fixed that while at a campground.

Back flushed black tank for hours on end to remove black tank methane odors that drove us out of the rig. Fixed two auto vents to insure the tank was venting properly. Replaced the front TV, it no longer worked, I found out that HR used very cheap Quasar TV’s that are literally junk. There is more that I could list but all used RV’s have a list of issues that need to be addressed.

I think ours is pretty typical except for the lack of slide stop bolts. Good luck in your search and if you have anymore questions let me know.