Full timing in Winnebago - Destination? Via? Adventurer?

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tubaronnie

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Planning on going "Full Time" in 2015. Love Winnebago/Itasca and will upgrade in time to go full time summer of 2015 (selling the house and taking off on our grand adventure). We spend a lot of time in our current Adventurer.  Intrigued by Destination. Why was it discontinued? Any issues we need to know about if we are looking at at 2009 Destination? Like mileage of Via, concerned about size for full time. If we are planning on work camping in locations for 4-5 months and traveling the 6th, stick with gas or go to diesel? Concerned about diesel just sitting for 5 months but would like the power. Also concerned about service costs diesel vs gas.

We are pretty much Winnebago for lifers, so want to find best combination for full time.
 
Do you really need a diesel? If you are going to be towing a heavy load and doing a lot of mountain driving then a diesel will suit you well. If not then I would recommend going with a gasser. It sounds like a gasser would be better for you if you are going to be sitting for 5 months at a time.
 
Welcome Ronnie!

For the ultimate in a full-timing rig, the 42' Tour/Ellipse is it if you have the bucks.  When we were coach shopping, a gasser was never on the radar - only a pusher for us.  Our Horizon sits for maybe six months out of each year and we have no maintenance issues due to our use cycle.  Chassis maintenance is going to be more expensive with the pusher, no doubt about it.
 
John Canfield said:
Chassis maintenance is going to be more expensive with the pusher, no doubt about it.
Click to expand...

Sorry John, I have to at least partially disagree with that statement.  Attached is a M-3 maintenance schedule from Freightliner Gaffney last time I was there. Any gasser owner doing the required maintenance on their rig is not going to be much different.  There are a few things on the heavy duty chassis that you may not find on a gasser chassis, like draining and replacing the oil in the front hubs, or replacing an air dryer dessicant cartridge ( if required). 

But on the flip side of the coin, my diesel calls for oil and filter changes every 15,000 miles. The latest workhorse manual calls for 3,000 mile oil and filter changes.  In my book that's 5 times as many trips to the service center and 5 times as many trip interruptions.

For the weight carrying capacity, torque and better gas mileage of a diesel, I don't see a disadvantage of going diesel. 
 

Attachments

  • M3Maintenance.pdf
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Marty - there are more fluid volumes involved with my chassis - it seems like any fluid I use (axles, coolant, tranny, oil) is 26 quarts.  M3 maintenance runs me about $1200 dollars at Gaffney.  Be that as it may, maintenance costs were never a factor in choosing a pusher - zero regrets after 70,000+ miles of using the coach.
 
And I totally agree that our diesel's use more fluids than a gas chassis. I just think that it is overstated and accepted as fact.  I would like to see a cost comparison of two similar chassis, one gas one diesel maintenance charge done by a qualified shop.  I wonder if Gaffney would have any idea of the cost differences between the two chassis.

I also agree that if a buyer's decision was going to be based on maintenance costs alone, they should probably buy a towable. 

Hey John, do you have any idea why the PDF file didn't display in my first post? When I upload photos they always display, but the PDF file just showed up as a link?
 
SargeW said:
Hey John, do you have any idea why the PDF file didn't display in my first post? When I upload photos they always display, but the PDF file just showed up as a link?
Click to expand...

Marty - I'm pretty sure you only get thumbnails of image files and not pdf, doc, docx, etc.
 
All you see for a pdf is a link below the message. A thumbnail of a pdf file would be hard to read  ;D
 
Intrigued by Destination. Why was it discontinued? Any issues we need to know about if we are looking at at 2009 Destination?


We just purchased a new 2009 Destination 39N Diesel.  The Destination and Journey lines of product were merged together to cut the number of product lines Winnebago was producing.  No issues so far and really not expecting any either!

With parking 4 or 5 months at a time is mileage really an issue?  A friend teases me about the mileage and then loads his family in an old Suburban and chugs away with 14 mpg.  I can load my whole family in a "house" and drive down the road and get 8-10 mpg!

 

 
We have had a 2009 Destination (37G) since May 2010. it was new when we purchased. It is a very nice motorhome - of course it depends on how it was ordered from the factory. I think ours only lack 3-5 of the "high" end amenities. We have about 10K on it and other than a couple of "brand new" issues (like exhaust brake not being connected, a leak in the chassis air conditioner), it has been trouble free (knock on wood). Diesel vs Gas is something everyone has their own opinion of. We went with diesel because we had ridden in a Gas and did not like the noise - of course that was a 97-98 model and things might have changed. We pull a Jeep Liberty (2008) and average 8 MPG. When looking at any motorhome - floor plan is the key. I can't count the number we walked out of when we saw the booth dinette, we like the table and chairs, bathrooms are another concern, I like large and my wife likes a big closet.
Good luck -
 
Thanks all for the comments. I also found the Adventurer "Limited" 2008? - 09? was a gas pusher. Having never been around diesel, and always having to fix my own gassers over the last 40 years (until we finally got a great paying job - whew) I am just so "novice" around the diesel. I guess it is partly a comfort thing. When something starts clunking on the gas Winnie, I know right where to start looking and most things I can do myself. I'm afraid I would look at the diesel and go, "Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore." However, I really like the idea of great power in the big mountains, and the durability of diesel. We plan on fulltiming it for at least 5 years as work campers, and probably another 5 on the road, with toad - so how many miles am I going to put on the rig? 50K for the first 5 years, and then 100K for the 2nd? 150K on a gasser?? I'ld be nervous the last 3-4 years right at a time of life when I don't want to worry about a major engine catastrophe. The diesel would just be getting warmed up. Maybe I should just get over the fear.

 
I doubt if you would put on 100k miles in that second 5 yeas. If you do, you are driving too much and not stopping to enjoy enough. And while workamping you will be in one place for 3-6 months, so not driving a lot then either. So a gasser would probably see about 100k miles in 10 years unless you criss-cross the USA frequently.

Also, the diesel engine block is the thing that lasts a million miles. The rest of the engine, e.g. alternators, fuel pumps, radiators, etc. wear/corrode at about the same rate as on a gasser. It is a mistake to think that a diesel needs no "engine work" for a million miles. Au contraire!

On the other hand, a diesel just takes some learning. In a couple years you will know your way around it, from doing routine maintenance and from talking with others. It's still just air and fuel, coolant and 12v electricity.
 
Thanks for the mileage estimates. So at 100,000 the gas rig will be about done, the diesel going strong and I need to get used to the idea of smelling like diesel after I work on it rather than gas.    :) I can deal with that. The learning curve shouldn't scare me - I've been fixing things since I was old enough to hold a screw driver, so it is just different.
 
A modern gas engine will easily do 120k and probably 150k+, even in a heavy RV. And if you get one with an Allison tranny, that 's should be good for as much, with reasonable maintenance.  In fact, chassis life length is mostly about good maintenance - take care of it and it will take care of you.  I'm not trying to talk you into either one - just saying that a gas chassis rig would work for you if that's your comfort zone.

There may be other reasons for buying a DP, e.g. air suspension and rear engine (noise factor).
 
By the time you wear out a gas engine your income will be at $55k per year. I would think you would be able to afford to have the gas engine rebuilt at that point.

I have owned both gas and diesel and I love both of them. Different tools for different jobs. There are three areas of cost to consider, initial cost, maintenance costs and operational costs. This is the way I see it.

A diesel initially costs more money than a gasser. But the diesel holds it's resale better than a gasser making the initial cost a push.

A diesel costs more money to maintain than a gasser but a diesel lasts longer than a gasser so it is a push on maintenance.

Diesel fuel costs more than gas right now but diesels generally get a bit better gas mileage so once again it is push.

So I see it as six of one and a half a dozen of another.
 
I think the most miles we ever put on our Horizon in one year was maybe 9-10,000.  The coach is almost exactly seven years old and I think we have about 72,000 miles on it.  If you're doing 10,000 miles in a year, that's a whole bunch of travel, now  an over-the-road trucker might do 200-300,000 miles a year.

There's advantages to both gas and diesel coaches like Tom mentioned above.  Drive a few models of each type and then decide.
 
Actually it's not that hard to put 10K on a rig in a year John. I had the Meridian 4 years and put 40K on it, and I have had the Journey about 22 months and have about 22K on it now. We don't drive far, we just like to move every 4 to 7 days. I get happy feet after about a week and get the itch to move on and see whats around the corner. 

And June 1st we head north towards Alaska. That will be a few miles!
 
We've full timed in both a gasser and a DP, and frankly, if it wasn't for the bigger coach body and 4 slides, we'd have stayed with the gasser.  It performed just as well as the DP in the mountains of the west, where we spend most of our time, and was simpler and much cheaper to maintain.  Anyone who says that a DP is as cheap to maintain as a gasser hasn't owned both.  With my W24, I had the oil changed with synthetic oil twice a year for about $60 each time, the air filter cost $20, a fuel filter for $20 every three years and that was it.  The DP oil change at Speedco is $160 once a year, the air filter is $75+, then there's the primary fuel filter/separator, the secondary fuel filter, the dryer filter, and the ELC at $18/gal.  Not to mention any maintenance on the air and hydraulic systems which my gasser didn't have.  And in all reality, I probably won't put any more miles on the DP then if I had a gasser, and today's gassers will run 100k+.  Oh, did I mention the fan hub bearing that failed and cost $2800 to replace because half the rear of the coach had to removed to access it?  Perhaps if you do your own maintenance you can mitigate the expense, but as a full-timer there's very little I can do while on the road.  The Adventurer is a great coach with just about the same level of quality as a DP - I wouldn't hesitate. 
 
We don't full time, and we put over 25000 miles on our Reyo in 19 months. We don't like to just sit around, we prefer to get around and see the sites. We had it in for numerous repairs and didn't drive in the winter, so it sat off and on for several months with no problems. We met a couple with a 2012 Reyo. They full time in theirs and love it. After a year and a half of aggravation, our Reyo is finally enjoyable, good mileage, handles well even in high gusting wind on I40, and climbing up 12000 feet. My husband likes the ease of setting up, sometimes just plugging in. We can take it into most cities without a problem, except for parking sometimes.
 
tubaronnie said:
Thanks all for the comments. I also found the Adventurer "Limited" 2008? - 09? was a gas pusher. Having never been around diesel, and always having to fix my own gassers over the last 40 years (until we finally got a great paying job - whew) I am just so "novice" around the diesel. I guess it is partly a comfort thing. When something starts clunking on the gas Winnie, I know right where to start looking and most things I can do myself. I'm afraid I would look at the diesel and go, "Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore."
Click to expand...

tubaronnie,

I am with you all the way on this!!

For whatever it's worth, I earned an authentic mechanic's licence dated 1963; and then like you "finally got a great paying job."; and it's been continuously uphill since then!! :-\

Like you, when it comes to diesel, and diagnosing problems, all I can do it look at it with perplexed astonishment.  :-\

For Ford gassers, I carry five hundred pounds of tools, including an AutoXray 6000 scanner; and know how to use them!  :)

 
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