Where are you in PA? One other thing I forgot to mention - I have a scanned copy of the owner's manual if you need a copy.
I'm not quite sure what rubber part you are referring to on the slideout - could you be more descriptive.
One thing that we noticed is that taking the trailer down is a two-person job when it comes to sliding the ends in because you almost have to have someone on the inside guiding the slideout rails into the channels of the dinette slideout and making sure that they don't pinch/rip any canvas at this location. You could do it by yourself but it would take some patience.
The mini-van did fine but one thing I might look into more now that I've done it is to look for a different style hitch that leaves as much ground clearance as possible. If you look at many SUVs, you can see that they have a towing knockout in the bumper to keep the hitch connection up high. For the minivan, everything mounts below the bumper which sits kind of low. The transverse bar bolts to the frame below the bumper and the hitch reciever tubing is welded to the bottom of that bar so you are loosing a lot of clearance in the rear. They probably have hitches where the transverse bar and the receiver tubing are welded such that they are in the same plane. That would save you a couple inches. As it is, I have to be careful when I pull into gas stations with any kind of dip at the curb or my hitch will be scraping.