Considering a North Trail 32 BUDS

jgaber

Member
My wife and I had a 2011 Zinger ZT30KB, which is a bunkhouse with the outside kitchen. We recently had some really bad floods and our camper became a houseboat. Not exactly what we had in mind when we purchased it a few months ago. We want to replace it and have been looking at campers all week. We have narrowed our search down between a 2011 North Trail 32 BUDS and a 2012 Salem Hemisphere. Salem is a name I have heard for years and I have seen many of their campers in county parks in our area. I have never seen a Heartland North Trail; at least that I can recall. I am looking for some advise from the forum. Are most of you happy with your North Trail purchases? I have only found 1 dealer in our whole area. Are dealers hard to find? I greatly appreciate any advise the group has to offer on the North Trail units.
 

jimtoo

Moderator
Hi jgaber,

Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum and hopefully to the family. We have a great bunch of people here with lots of information and all willing to share their knowledge if needed.

Well,, I don't like to hear about anybodies trailer getting used as a houseboat. But the Heartland Family is here to help if we can. The North Trail is one of the most popular units in the Heartland Line. The customer service is second to none with factory support. Have you checked Heartland RVs web site? There is a dealer locator available on the site.

We should get more help from the other North Trail owners also.

Enjoy the forum.

Jim M
 

olyfire

Active Member
We've had our 32 BUDS for 16 months. We too had not heard of Heartland when we found North Trails.
We are presently camping in ours on the edge of Puget Sound looking at a beautiful evening over the water.
When we first bought our unit we had some problems as many new units do. The best thing about Heartland is they are excellent to work with and their customer service is absolutely first class. Our dealer has fixed everything and we really enjoy this unit. The outside kitchen is great. We have 8 grandchildren and most weeks, we are out with some of them.
We were down South this past spring when we had a couple of Warranty issues come up. I checked with customer service to see if we could wait until we got back home to have the issues taken care of, that would have put us past our warranty. They gave us the OK and all was fixed after our arrival home. I felt like that was great service.

I don't think you would regret your decision to buy a North Trail 32 BUDS. Also this forum is great, I have had a number of questions answered here.
 

jgaber

Member
I have read a lot about the great customer support. The dealer also told us that of all the brands he sells, the Heartland customer service group is hands down the best. This makes me feel good and nervous at the same time. Customer service at most businesses now a days is terrible. It is nice to hear someone actually still appreciates the people that pay their salaries; the customer. What makes me nervous is the number of people that have had warranty problems and have actually had to use the customer service department. My closest dealer is over 100 miles away. It is no cheap adventure to run down there, not to mention the time it takes to do that.

Our last camper was very much an entry level camper. We didn't know if we were going to use it so we didn't want to jump into something nice like these North Trails right out of the chute. We got it last fall and used it a lot which is why we've now decided to get something better instead of replacing it with like quality. That said, the only problem we had was with the awning not locking in. We had it back to the dealer twice and they never could get it to work right. I am really liking the electric awning option.


So for the warranty problems, can you tell me what kinds of things those were? Oh, and by the way, thanks for taking the time to reply to my posts. This is a big decision for us and neither my wife or I have gotten much sleep this week as we mull over our decision.
 

pegmikef

Well-known member
I have had a North Trail (26 LRSS) since December 2010 and have pulled it close to 6000 miles camping in all kinds of terrain and have had very few issues with it. Since I have no local dealer here in San Angelo, and the issues were minor (e.g.,reinstall a few cabinet hinges, fix one of the shades,etc.), I have been able to fix them myself. All of the appliances and other devices have worked as they should. I did add some shock hinges to the under bed storage and made some other minor upgrades such as a vortex fan in the bathroom and added a 12 volt outlet for use when boondocking. The is my second Heartland rig and in spite of some horror stories (they being the exception) I have read, I have been completely satisfied with both rigs and feel that they are an excellent value for the cost.
 

Marge

All who wander are not lost.
I think the best thing is to read the posts on the forum. Some of us have problems and others don't seem to.

Whatever you decide on, before you buy it, make sure and go over it with a fine tooth comb, look underneath, crawl around, try everything. Make note of how well finished the product is, are all the screws in, are there gaps in the trim, is the trailer chaulked well. Look behind and under places to see if there is any evidence of leakage, especially around slide-outs. How rusty are the frame and the steps.

If you are far from the dealer see if you can stay overnight in it before you take it home and use everything, even if they show you in the PDI, things are still going to go wrong and break. This is true no matter what brand you buy.
 

olyfire

Active Member
The worse problem we had was the slide mechanism bent itself to the point it would not work. Heartland sent the entire mechanism to the dealer who got right on it and did a complete replacement. Other small problems was a leak in the bathtub fixture, easy fix, and the exterior TV antenna would not rotate. The interior part of the antenna was missing and again replaced by the dealer.
This is our fourth RV and it seem like each has it's share of problems. What we appreciate about Heartland is they really back the customer.
In reality our dealer was really bad. Their service department was a joke. We felt like part of the problem was the dealer didn't go through anything before deliver. We had to fight just to get the few things at our pre-delivery fixed. The great thing about Heartland was they allowed us to go to another dealer that we knew to be a class act dealer. This other dealer did not carry Heartland but agreed to take care of our unit. This other dealer said we may have to pay for the repairs until Heartland paid them. This was not necessary as Heartland paid very quickly.
We diffidently would buy another Heartland product but hope this one will last for many years.
Hope this helps with you decision. If you have any other questions feel free to email or ask on the forum.
 
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irvin56

Well-known member
we have a 31QBS. we are about to finish the 4th yr camping with it. We had some issues in the first yr. Between dealer and heartland, it was handled at the end of my first yr. (I did not want to loose Campin days). over all this time nothing major has happened and we are very pleased with them. I also never heard of them, but once I found this forum and the heartland RVs web site, that convinced me of the unit and how they stand behind the products they make. I am not planning on getting rid of this unit for yrs.( I kept my last one for 17 yrs) I will and would definatly look at another line of their product when I do upgrade.
good luck on whatever you choose. Irvin
 

OhioJay

Active Member
Just last week, in Sandusky Ohio, we saw our first North Trail "in the field". Before that, I had seen one on the move through Columbus. I understand your not having heard of or seen Heartland before.

We have a 32QBSS and love it. Problems have been very few. Our oven didn't work, but customer service talked me through a simple repair over the phone. Four or five screws, and pushing together a wiring harness and it was fixed. There were a few very minor things I was able to fix on my own (simple, common sense things).

This forum is a major asset, and many people are ready to help. We are very happy with our purchase, and it would take something extraordinary to get us away from Heartland. Best of luck.
 
M

Mcreech

Guest
The North Trail has been around since July 2007. We have built around 12k units over that time frame and currently the Number 1 selling TT in the state of CO. number 2 in AZ, top 5 in FL, top 8 in TX. It takes some time to establish dealers since we are somewhat the new kids on the block. But when the NT is compared with other Brands, the NT usually come out ahead. We just put more features in the unit then the other guys.... I hope this helps
 
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