routlaw

I had been predicting this would happen within a few years, the rapid slow down of the RV craze that took off like a rocket ship to mars during the pandemic and sure enough as Barron's reports it is here. I am providing a link, but not sure if everyone will be able to read it without a subscription. Anyway thought this would interest many on the forum. Thanks https://www.barrons.com/articles/winnebago-stock-earnings-rv-demand-612e3756?mod=hp_DAY_3

Wow! Each to his or her own but for the life of me I have never understood the allure of truck campers in the first place. So here is a RAM 3500 dually that collapses under the weight of its payload, but with a significantly smaller truck and RV trailer not only could an individual have more room but also easier traveling. A few years ago I was up in Glacier NP late May early June, god awful weather too, and the couple across from me had a similar setup but with a Ford F350 dually and FG Bigfoot on the truck bed. He had already blown one setup and now had a new F350 to make the haul at the cost of around $90K if I remember correctly. He was enamored by my relatively lightweight setup and ease of use. Came over every day to inspect the Oliver et al even as I was hitching up solo with relative ease. He was green with envy not only for the additional room but the ease of setup and take down. Oh and he was also pulling a small vehicle in tow, Fiat or Mini Cooper one or the other. Go figure.

Wow! Thats some markup and final price of admission. Good luck.

Lot of good replies on this subject, but I will throw in one more not often discussed. Winter camping and cold weather is relative, we have many owners here who live in the deep south or there about and having grown up down there myself I can tell you with no uncertainty winter camping down there is a lot a different than winter camping in places like Montana where I now live. I don't consider the Oliver a 4 season camper in Montana winters unless you hit on a very mild spell and even then you'll run the furnace nearly non stop. Its highly unlikely you'll have running water under those conditions either. Otherwise its a great camper but as others have stated there is a lot of maintenance to do with any of these RV's not just an Oliver. Good luck with your decision.

Not sure what brand Oliver is running with now, but we did opt for the rear view camera on our 2015 model and used it although the image quality was next to worthless especially at night. The monitor was a oversized gangly mess of wires too. After a couple of years someone broke into our truck and stoled the monitor for what reason I’ll never know. This forced me to purchase another rear view camera system, a Furion, and install which is better but not by huge margins. At least the monitor only has one wire that being the 12V hookup wire. Most likely there are much better systems on the market and probably for much less than $850. Bottom line is we really like have the camera and recommend having one but make sure you are getting what your’e paying for at the price of admission Oliver is charging.

Ouch, not good hitting deer especially while towing. Couple of thoughts regarding hitching, have you raised the TV enough after connecting the hitch mount to trailer so that the tension is eliminated? If not you’ll never get it connected because essentially you have your weight distribution fully engaged. Also uneven or out of level ground will exacerbate this situation based upon my experience. Keep us posted on how things go.

Thanks @Dave and Kimberly , the Kayaks are Old Town Cayuga (rotomold) 13 footers so they cut through the water nicely still do not hold a candle to a well made FG or Kevlar. We were once out with some people who had a 17 foot tandem FG very thin, narrow, sleek and light weight. The couple would flawlessly perform 3-4 strokes and they were gone. It was quite amazing to watch.

Good story @SeaDawg, lover to hear those things.

From what I understand there is a lot to complain about with all of the Airstreams too. On more than one occasion we have had AS owners come to us asking about the Oliver and also with a laundry list as long as your arm on the issues they have had with their AS. Base Camp excluded I do like the look and design of the AS trailers though, especially the interiors.

Wow, over $63K for that at a starting point. I was in one of those many years ago, was not impressed then but at this price of admission yeah the Elite I seems like a far better deal.

I concur on John Davies comments about the 1-UP Bike racks, we have one. All other racks on the market look like toys compared to the 1-Up. There really isn't any comparison IMHO. Very heavy duty and also a bit heavy too but works well, easy to use. Very well engineered.

Just returned from a trip up to the Seely-Swan River Valley and Flathead Valley here in Montana. Had a great trip, no problem getting campsites without RSVP's but each campground did fill up all but one night. We Kayaked 4 of the local lakes, rode our bikes on a 28 mile loop within Flathead Valley and did a few hikes in the area the most grueling being up to Strawberry Lake in the Flathead NF, steep switchbacks would be an understatement. Below are a few iPhone snapshots from the trip. Thanks for looking. Campsite at Harpers Lake Kayaking on Harpers Lake Hike to Morrell Falls kayaking Holland Lake View of Swan Lake Kayaking Swan Lake at the National Wildlife Refugee Strawberry Lake, Flathead NF Kayaking Echo Lake, Swan Range in the background

This doesn't surprise me, heck the Rivian barely made it 100 miles but its a considerably smaller and presumably a lighter truck. The article states the F150 gas powered can tow 14,000 lbs. I don't know anyone who would do this other than a quick tow across town. No one in their right mind would use a 1/2 ton truck to tow this much weight on a regular and consistent basis. All this isn't to say that EV trucks might not have some use and value but towing isn't one of them and probably will not be for a long time if ever. We can hope but I don't expect to see it in my lifetime.

Get a can of silicone spray lubricant it should help mitigate this issue.

Yeah they mentioned the Garmin App Garmin Tread includes their data, but that app certainly doesn’t receive much love unfortunately. Hopefully someone will take up the mantle and keep it going.

This has been my go to app for finding public campgrounds over the years but as of July 2nd the guys decided to toss in the towel and end the endeavor sad to say. They still have a Facebook page sort of explaining their reasons for their hiatus. For those who have downloaded the app you can continue to use, but it will no longer be updated so accuracy going forward will be sketchy. I also use Free Roam but still prefer UPC app. If you folks know of something comparable would love to hear about it, but found nothing that compared in the App Store (Apple) yesterday that I did not have already.

Another vote for bad idea. Early on I considered it with our road bikes but the chances of damage to both bike and Ollie interior were just too great. Think of emergency maneuvers, very rough back country roads or FS roads etc. As someone else pointed out there is nothing to tie the bikes down to unless you permanently mounted Yakima quick release clamps to the floor, but who wants to do that. This is another reason for owning a truck to carry bikes, either that or a heavy duty van with enough towing capability.

Referring back to the OP, I couldn't agree more. I am of the persuasion one cannot have enough tow vehicle, well within reason but like @Trainman have all too often seen people with poorly setup outfits from undersized tow vehicles to the actual hitching of the trailer, ie nose pointing extremely down or vice versa back down nose up. I would also bet dollars to donuts a large percentage of people towing campers are completely unaware of their towing/load capacity with and without weight distribution hitches. Regardless it never ceases to amaze me how people want to utilize the least amount of tow vehicle they can get away with for their respective camper vs a safely adequate or even overkill tow vehicle. Several years ago on the Fiberglass RV forum this same subject came up which resulted in somewhat heated debates at times. Apparently there is a Canadian company who regularly outfits small TV's with larger trailers claiming if done correctly the smaller TV is much safer and had videos to illustrate their POV. One video illustrated a Mini Cooper pulling an Airstream and not the Basecamp model either, I'm not making this up. A couple of years later my wife and I were camping down below Moab on some BLM land close to another couple with Tacoma pulling a 25 Flying Cloud Airstream, again I'm not making this up. They were full timers to boot, although this was their first year at it. Very nice people, we enjoyed chatting with them but have often thought of them and their setup wondering if anything has changed. At one point in the conversation the lady said they tend to do 45 mph while traveling. Curiously the fellow made a somewhat bold statement claiming Tacoma's were all superior to Tundras. Odd even to this day Tacoma's still have drum brakes (the last time I checked) on their rear wheels vs disc brakes. Part II of towing is also being able to stop, sometimes in emergency situations. In an effort to be polite we made no response or comments. Perhaps this begs the question though, should there be more stringent traffic or DOT laws that govern and police towing safety guidelines? It certainly appears to be that way with commercial transportation. Thanks

For those who are still planning a trip to SW Montana below is a link from the Yellowstone National Park website. You might find this helpful. As I understand it, they are still assessing the road and bridge damages which appear to be extensive depending on locations within the park. The northern section will be completely closed off for an extensive amount of time. The small town of Gardiner will obviously share the brunt of the economics of this situation. Understand too there is still some awesome country to see, experience and explore in and around SW Montana yet outside of Yellowstone. Last year there was 4.86 million visitors to YNP, I can't imagine what that many visitors this year with only half the park open would be like. Crowded would be an understatement. Good luck finding a camp spot. Additionally the Livingston Hospital was evacuated a few days ago due to flooding. Not sure whose idea it was to build a hospital close to a a free flowing river but its there apparently. By now I've seen at least two complete houses flowing down rivers one on the Yellowstone the other on the Stillwater River to the east which flows out of the Beartooth Mountains. Its entirely possible other streams and tributaries (such as the Boulder both west and main) have also had extensive flooding which we have not heard about yet. As of yesterday it was my understanding the Billings Municipal water works was shut down as well. True the rivers are receding to some degree but the damage as far more widespread than just YNP. Hopefully this will help to some degree for planning carefully and cautiously. https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/news/220613.htm

As long as the subject is on tires, did you replace with 10 ply like the originals or just go with 4 ply all terrain?

Agreed, seems a bit early to me as well. Not the best year to visit YNP in the first place. Of course this could change if it keeps raining but the real worry is the flip flop in temps on Thursday which will release a torrent of more water out of the mountains.

It has been raining around here for days and weeks. Yankee Jim Canyon is now completely flooded or nearly so some parts of the road are gone. The road up to Mammoth is washed away in large parts, Tom Miner bridge completely gone and washed away. Rock Creek is flooding Red Lodge as we speak. The Gallatin River is close to breaching its banks in parts, its very full and running fast. Its my understanding Gardiner is completely cut off from the outside world at this point unless you have a helicopter. Paradise Valley from the north is partly flooded and I suspect it will only be time before Livingston will be partly under water too. It might get worse because it supposed to hit 87º on Thursday which means a huge amount of water will be coming out of these mountains at those temps. SW Montana today has been in the 40's to 50's but when a flip flop in weather like this occurs, its Katy bar the door with possible flood conditions. Snow Pack in the mountains this year has been either way above normal or above normal depending on the mountains range. I would not advise anyone to travel to this area for the next few days maybe weeks. Those roads in and around the park will take a very long time to repair given their damage and getting worse by the hour.

Still using my 4 pack T-105's here too. A couple of months ago in another thread I had thought mine were on their way out, turns out the culprit was my Blue Sky Solar Controller which had a broken leg on the inductor (coil) and thus was not charging correctly and for reasons I'll never know provided information to the IPN Remote that stated all was normal. After the repairs my Trojan battery pack seems to be back to normal even after 7 years of storage in Montana winters. Turned the solar off two weeks or so ago and batteries maintained a charge of 12.8 volts, down .05 volts from the first day of disconnect. Can't complain about that. However I have convinced myself LiFePO4 batteries are in my future. It would be nice to shed a couple hundred pounds plus not having to deal with maintenance of lead acid.

And they are still recommending 120 ft lbs of torque. This really needs to be changed.

We don't use a microwave in our house so of course opted out of one for the Oliver too. We have made great use of the area for coffee and tea storage stuff. I'll try and post a few photos later today if I get the time.