I got to the Lake County Fair Grounds and found the parking lot pretty low on cars. I had expected to see the place swamped. Since it’s Sunday the mandatory 25+mph winds were here, this has become a tradition.
Where to park?? 
The RV’s, all of them, were dirty, a few of them were filthy. The older rigs, didn’t even look they have been cleaned up since they were traded in or however they got them. I realize tomorrow is the last day of this sale/show but if I’m going to show vehicles to sell, at least clean them up so people might have some interest, I’m talking about the interiors, almost all of them smelled bad, even the newer ones. Collier RV does a much better job at presentation than Camping World judging by this show.
One row of Class A’s Second row of Class A’s
2006 Winnebago Vectra 40KD $149,995
The star of the show in my view, the 2006 Holiday Rambler Imperial 42PLG, there were other nice rigs, but they were locked or sold so I couldn’t view them. As the owner of a Class A gas rig, I can tell you one big thing I found when walking into other gas rigs and then going into the diesel pushers. When you walk into a gas rig, it settles or rather, leans toward you and it rocks a bit when you get into the main cabin. Step onto the first step, for example this HR Imperial and it doesn’t budge, not even a twitch! AWESOME. I want it!
Inside the toilet room there is another sink which is nice, great quality!!
‘06 HR Endeavor 40PDQ, Sold ‘01, Harney Renegade Sedona, locked
2011 Winnebago Adventurer 35P $139,995, unimpressive interior design
Winnebago Sightseer, sold ‘07 Coachman Sport Coach – sold
2011 Winnebago Vista 30W, $89,995, looks like a good value for the money
‘07 Allegro Open Road, $67, 995
‘06 Georgie Boy Pursuit 3190DS, $57,995, lousy kitchen layout, very tight
1997 Fleetwood Flair 29V, $14,995, needs a good cleaning but could be nice
2006 Damon Challenger, $59,995, very tight with slides in, HUGE bathroom!
This actually would be rather large inside with the slide out considering how deep it is! This deep slide unfortunately means it has to be out to make the rig useful, this doesn’t bother everybody but it would kill the deal for me. The shower faucet is about a foot from the floor, what were they thinking??
The bedroom is definitely hard to use with the slide in. Look at that wall!
There was a locked ‘03 Travel Supreme going for $89,995, I would have liked to have gotten inside this rig. Interesting graphic on the side.
There were several other rigs that I looked at but my camera died so I couldn’t take pictures of them!! My Samsung camera did not hold up in the battery dept.
I learned something about Fourwinds quality today, all of the Class C models had quality like pictured here. Look at this door, it scrapes against the vent!! The picture on the right shows a gap at the edge of the counter, you’d think you could just push it back in right, nope, it’s solid, as if somebody did it on purpose! This got past QC?!? This rig cost $79,995!!!! Really?!?!? Unacceptable, why does the dealer accept this?
I wanted to take a lot more pictures but had no idea my fully charged camera would last about 50 minutes before giving up the ghost. I actually took the Travel Supreme pictures with my new HTC Thunderbolt cell phone but even that was running low on battery so I needed to conserve it since I need to get work email on it.
I walked around and looked at quite a few 5th Wheels with huge amounts of space. You have to admit, a 5th Wheel can be a great way to go if you have the right truck to pull one around. I looked at a bunch of TT’s and Pop-Up’s as well and the TT’s have some huge slide outs and are also a good option if you have a good truck.
Last were the Pop-Up’s, did you know they are putting big slides in them too?? Wow! I could never go back to a Pop-Up but if I were in my early 20’s again I could see buying one, although now they are pretty pricey! Knowing what I know now, a used Class A is one heck of a way to get the most bang from your buck, but that’s my prejudiced opinion of today so who knows what I would do as a 20 something in 2011, no way to tell.
That’s all folks! I had a good time but wished there were more Class A’s to ogle at.
13 comments:
That Holiday Rambler is indeed a beautiful specimen! What a lot of room. We drove a 2011 Winnebago Vista before we decided to go with the Lazy Daze. The Vista was easy on the eyes but it drove like junk! Wandered like a drunk hitchhiker! Looks like you had fun even if your camera did poop out on you. I always wondered why anyone would try and sell a dirty and/or smelly rig. YUK!
Donna K,
I tried to take video of the HR Imperial but that's when the camera died. I looked at the Vista but it didn't make sense to me, the rig was nice to look at from outside but the inside layout was just too confining for the money.
I like the Lazy Daze rigs, a lot of thought and quality go into them, they remind me of Coach House, bullet proof rigs! The only Class C's they had at this place were Fourwinds and some used Coachmans, I'll take the used Coachmans over a new Fourwinds anyday after today.
I did have a good time but I expected this show to be somewhat bigger. I know Camping World in Island Lake has A LOT more rigs and they had the space to show them off, so why not bring them?
As for the smell, yeah, a few of them really smelled bad, my guess is people were using the facilities and none of the rigs had water in the tanks, the smell was pretty much the same in all of them, like black tank odors.
A turn off for sure, I wouldn't hand over a dime until the rig had been gone over so I could inspect it. It's buyers market so I would imagine these places should cover the toilets to avoid people abusing them, all the toilets were accessable.
General RV is opening a new store in Huntley, IL next month, that should be a good show to go to!
Always interesting to look thru someone else's eyes.
Sorry the show wasn't great. We have a 2007 38' gas Winnebago Voyage. We bought it new in Dec '08 when the bottom was falling out of the market. We got a good deal and went with Winnebago because we felt the company was more stable at the time than a lot of others. We have been very pleased with our Winnebago...drove it 10,000 mi last year without a prob. We did have a prob with the A/C that was covered under warranty and the gears did wear out on our steps, but our ext warranty took care of that. So far, we are pleased with our gas Winnebago.
Merikay, agreed.
Alan and Marilyn, Winnebago has some great RV's for sure, I saw one that had a layout that didn't make any sense to me but most Winnies I see are great!
A few were locked up so I couldn't check them out which is too bad.
What a fun blog! Thanks for sharing!
thanks for sharing your day and all the information!..my goodness..way to keep track of each one!!!
Sue and Doug,
Yeah I take a lot of pictures. This helps me track quality, space and overall design so when the boss errr I mean wife and I are in the market again I get an idea based on my pictures which companies make a good product.
Camping World would never take the same kind of pictures. I have heard bad things about Fourwinds products on various forums but didn't want to hold anything against them until I took a look at their products up close.
Disclaimer time: I mean no offense to people who own their product and I definately don't want to knock the rig they chose. I'm just speaking to what I saw as I saw it.
I was at the show saturday. They were SWAMPED!
Thanks for coming when we were not open- Sunday hrs. are 11 am -5pm so our employees can attend church and spend time with their families. Perhaps you would of found the number of cars in the parking lot more to your expectations had you come when we were open. BTW there were more class A's C's B's TT's and FW's (110) inside the facility.
Tech,
I'll bet! I wish I could have gone during the week when I'm sure there were more rigs and I could have had more time. Maybe next time.
My response to Camping World Employee PCARR is located here.
Copy and paste into your browser.
http://eriksrantz.blogspot.com/2011/04/rv-show-comment-response-to-camping.html
I notice now that "pcarr" takes you right to Camping World website... I wonder if the person who didn't know they were having an RV show still works there....
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