Frustrated with new 5th wheel issues.

Hello all. I will try to just stick to the facts of my frustrations and not turn this into just an out and out rant. My wife and I picked up our 2016 thunderbolt XLR 385 from Couch's RV in Hamilton,Oh on Wednesday morning. We had a 3+ hour pdi with Jason who was very thorough and answered all our Question and was very patient with us as total newbies. We had bought the unit back in October and they held in for us until spring as we had nowhere to put it till then. When we purchased it we gave our salesman a list of little things that needed repair (loose light strip, covers that wouldn't latch etc). None of these items were taken care of over the winter, fortunately Jason was able to get these taken care of while we were there. We then drove to a nearby campground to try out all the systems and all seemed to work fine. The front landing gear seemed a little loud but again newbies so we didn't give it much thought. The next day we drove 4+hrs home. We stopped at a rest stop and noticed the fridge was not running (residential with an inverter). Could be our fault, Maybe we needed to flip a switch but thought it was automatic. We arrived at our seasonal spot in the rain and mud and found our 5er wouldn't level and we were getting error messages on our level up system and one of our front landing gear was much further out than the other. Spoke with coachnet tech and while running through some possible fixes with him on the phone he could hear the noise our landing gear was making and decided we needed to get it in to a dealer. It is going in next Thursday to a local General RV dealer. We also discovered that one of the speakers in the bedroom was not working and the place where the sewer hook up goes is leaking constantly having checked all the valves and assured they were closed. We plan to speak to our salesman and voice our displeasure but he is currently on vacation. This has saddened the both of us that something we had planned and looked forward to for many months started out this way. Really hoping this isn't reflective of the over all quality of our Forest river product. I am at work right now and work at a hospital which reminds me that compared to many our problems are small. Thanks for letting me vent.

this probably wont help much but, the problem is that these things are built by hand with little quality control and even less of a shakedown after they are built very few are actually tested they are just shipped - expect a couple more issues but be patient it will all work out

I don't think you can buy one and have no issues.  It's RV world.  Patience is tested at times, but it will get better.

Never, ever, ever sign the dealers paper work until all the "bugs" are worked on and corrected at the dealership, because after the trailer is yours there really is no incentive for the dealers to correct these issues on time. I wish you good luck and happy sailing after you get your rig back.



The information is out there, all you have to do is let it in.

I've been working on my 2014 Open Range for two seasons to make it better than factory, I had your same frustrations and now I've reconciled with the fact that it will be as good as I make it.

Unfortunately this is nothing new and really doesn't have much to do with the name of the manufacturers data plate.  As you found out the hard way it's imperative that a new buyer drag their purchase to a nearby campground and actually "camp" in the thing for a few days before you get too far away from the dealer.

Most RV salesmen have a hard time spelling RV, they're in the business to get you down the road killing bugs not to educate you on your new purchase.  It's unfortunate but it's the cold hard facts.  Stay after the dealership and hopefully they will get you taken care of.

We were fully expecting to have some issues from everything I had read about new units but was really not prepared for something major like the leveling system that pretty much makes it unusable till repaired. Due to time constraints we were only able to camp 1 night close to the dealer before returning home and of course everything seemed to work fine that 1st night. The floor plan we got was in our research unique and unfortunately Forest River discontinued it so our only choices were dealer stock and there weren't too many of those around. We ended up against my better judgement purchasing it back in October and having Couch's hold it for us till Spring. So basically we have owned it and been making payments on it since then. As Happy Prospector pointed out, Lesson learned. Will pass next time and sign nothing till we are 100% happy. Still, love the floor plan. We kept wondering why no other mfg makes a toyhauler with a front living room and a murphy bed in the garage? Perfect for a couple with 1 Harley and plans to full time. Thanks to you all for your feedback.

You will also learn that you can fix items on your rig better than most dealers.  The dealers are there to make money and many of them are willing to take short cuts.  Even when my trailer was under warranty, I ended up fixing most items myself.  Every time I took my trailer to fix an issue to the dealer, I ended up with more problems.  So, I use forums like this to get input and then fix issues properly.  Welcome to RV ownership!

keith c said:

You will also learn that you can fix items on your rig better than most dealers.  The dealers are there to make money and many of them are willing to take short cuts.  Even when my trailer was under warranty, I ended up fixing most items myself.  Every time I took my trailer to fix an issue to the dealer, I ended up with more problems.  So, I use forums like this to get input and then fix issues properly.  Welcome to RV ownership!

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Saved me the trouble of typing it. 

Frizlefrak said:

Saved me the trouble of typing it.

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