CWO said:
Hello everyone, my wife and I are fairly new to RVing and now looking to stop renting and buy our own RV. I've been nosing around the forum but not participated and I've read a lot of the comments about all RVs having issues and the priority being satisfaction with floor plan. We are torn between a Class A and B for a number of reasons but mainly two considerations: I'm a 100% disabled retired Marine Chief Warrant Officer and I have chronic back pain and management issues that limits how much maintenance and setup/breakdown I can do so most of it falls to my wife and also the difficulty of using a class A for local site seeing once we reach a destination. Class A driver seats tend to be more comfortable and we enjoy the space. But a class C is easier to park and maneuver at local site seeing spots. We found a good deal on a class c 2018 Thor Synergy with Summit package and we like it a lot but...almost everything I read, and quite a few dealers, have nothing positive to say about Thor RVs. We also found a very nice used class A 2017 Fleetwood 34S Storm that we really like (especially the combo washer/dryer!). So I appreciate the collective wisdom of the forum in providing us with your experience and recommendations to help us move forward. Thanks to all!
We're new too. We spent almost a year looking around, watching YouTube videos before we even went to see an RV in person. One of the first things I noticed was you don't see many used Winnebagos around and you do see a lot of used Thors around. Once we introduced ourselves to RVs in person it was obvious why used Thors are everywhere. They're on the low end of quality and Winnebagos are the high end of quality. Winnebago owners keep them (forever), Thor owners are much more eager to move up after a few years.
Class A vs Class C: You still have the cockpit forward. But on a Class C you have a bed that we thought was a waste of space. We weren't gonna sleep up there, we can't even climb up there (we're not disabled, just old). Maybe I could store a couple of rifles and a shotgun up there? I dunno. With a Class A you always get more storage above the cockpit (on mine I have 2 small cabinets, 2 regular cabinets, and 1 huge cabinet (after I remove that useless TV)). So more storage was a plus.
Driving a Class C wasn't impressive. Not really any different than driving a big pickup truck. Driving a Class A is
WAAAY different. It's Boss-like. It's
YOUR road now. Massive visibility. But it's very comfortable to drive. Our older Winnebago drives beautifully but it does take a bit more time to come to a complete stop. (About a day and a half, just kidding.) After 3 weekend trips I can say we'll never own a Class C.
Fleetwood is a high-quality rig. We almost bought one. It was 35' with a washer/dryer. But we're weekend warriors right now so the washer/dryer didn't mean anything to us. MAKE SURE YOU HIRE AN INSPECTION BEFORE YOU BUY.
I'm including a pic from last weekend to emphasize that massive visibility.
Good luck, thanks for your service.
(USN, Gulf of Tonkin Yacht Club, Volunteered.)