Prospective San Antonio Owner

We're looking forward to a mid-February delivery of a 2013 Landmark San Antonio. Can anyone offer suggestions for most important features/concerns to look for during the set-up/walk through at delivery? We are long time RV owners but this is a first time Heartland purchase. We also plan to become full timers in mid-2013, once the house sells. Does the 88 degree turn radius work well using a short box F-250? I plan on purchasing a 2013 Ford Lariat in January to be ready for delivery. What is the best rear end for towing this big baby?

Hi Doxiecouple,

Congratulations on your San Antonio purchase and welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum. You'll find lots of useful information here along with lots of friendly people who are always willing to share what they know.

You'll want to do a very thorough PDI with the dealer demonstrating everything. You may not have seen the water valve before, so make sure you get a complete demo there. If you have auto leveling, get a demo and try it yourself a couple of times. If your SA comes with remotes for lights and other functions, make sure you get a full demo there. The A/C and Heater controls may be new to you. Check them out thoroughly. Thermostat fan speed should be set to AUTO btw. These aren't things that are likely to have problems, but operating them may be different.

If you have a refrigerator with icemaker or water dispenser, have the dealer show you the water cutoff valve. You may also want to have them take down the basement wall behind the Universal Docking Center (UDC) so you can see the plumbing and water pump. With city water hooked up, and water pump running, you can also check back there to make sure there are no loose water connections.

Check TV reception and surround sound operation with a DVD. If you want TV audio to go through the surround sound, this would be a good time to ask the dealer to make those connections.

If possible, stay at the dealer location for 1 or 2 nights so you have a chance to really use the entire trailer. You're likely to find a few things that can be corrected on the spot without having to leave the trailer and wait for service.


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danemayer, thank you for the excellent suggestions. We especially like the idea of staying at the dealership a few days to "run a sea trial" so to speak. We look forward to the new adventure as Landmark owners.

Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum and Family doxiecouple. You will find lots of information here. Think of joining the Heartland Owners Club and joining in the rallies and meeting and making a lot of new friends.

Enjoy the forum and your new San Antonio.

Jim M

Oh... just happen to think of this,, but to break your new San Antonio in correctly.... you will need to visit San Antonio, Texas.

Doxiecouple are old boating friends (and fellow Dachshund lovers) of ours. Glad to see them making the big step up from their class A to the San Antonio.


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doxiecouple,

I will second everything that danemayer said. Congratulations on your new coach! We have had our 2013 San Antonio for 3 weeks now and just love the new colors. We stayed 3 days at the dealer so we could be instructed on how to run everything and for a very few things to be fixed. We need to go back to have a jack fixed but almost everything else was taken care of while we were there. Can't tell you much about your tow vehicle as ours is just a tad larger.

congratulations doxiecouple on your new "condo on wheels". Hopefully you will be able to join in the rally at Gulf Shores in April with the Heartland Owners Club group. It's a great way to meet other HL owners and see what modifications they have done to their coach. We currently have our BC in the Decatur area and will be there for about 2-3 or maybe 4 years depending on hubby's work schedule.
Enjoy and travel safely.

Welcome from another former boater. We like land cruising even better than Chesapeake Bay cruising!

After a thorough PDI, do a good shakedown cruise near to home port. The PDI is one thing, but nothing like pulling the rig to find out any additional issues you may have before being a full-timer.

I think your going to need more than an F250 to tow that size of rig well. Thats alot of trailer.

Congratulations on your new order of the Landmark. We have an F-250 and have no problem at all with the radius turns. We installed the Curt manual slide hitch and have never had to adjust it once and we have made some pretty tight turns.

That being said, I would double think the F-250. I know for a fact that the Landmark's dry weight is almost 1000 lbs. more than our BigHorn. If we were starting out with buying a new truck, we would definitely get the F-350 or F-450. Whatever we could squeeze out of the budget. In our case we already had the F-250 and no budget at all for any other truck (if we did, we'd get Jim Beletti's truck) .

We have added a lot of upgrades to the truck to make it more like the F-350, but we just have to really watch what we load in to it. We have been full-timing for six months now, but we are staying close to our storage, so if something comes in the RV, something else goes out. When we take a trip, more will be unloaded. We would love to have the towing capability of not worrying so much about every little weight that we wouldn't have with the other trucks.

Since you are going full-time and you will be entirely with your rig set-up, I would spend more time investigating the truck specs. I'm sure you can get a lot of humble thoughts from others in this forum.

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Just my 2 cents ..... but rethink the F250 short bed. You have a really big 5er, your gonna need more truck especially if you plan on crossing any mountain ranges. I highly recommend the F350 DRW. I wouldn't pull our Cyclone with anything less. We weigh in around 18k + and even with the F350 we can only pull up hill at about 40 mph. The DRW really help the TV feel more stable and help support all that weight on the pin. Even with the DRW we still had to ad an air bag assist system. And as for the shortbed, if this is the first 5er towing experience your much better off with a long bed it's much easier to manuver. Do your research, figure the numbers and buy more truck then you think you will need. Better to have extra power and towing capacity then have a payment and be unhappy with the performance of the TV.

back2nature said:

...In our case we already had the F-250 and no budget at all for any other truck (if we did, we'd get Jim Beletti's truck) ...

Click to expand...

Hands off my Butterfinger man!

But you can get your own here

jbeletti said:

Hands off my Butterfinger man!

But you can get your own here

Click to expand...

One can dream.

Thanks very much for the feed back. We have considered an F-350 and have actually test driven one. Still deciding and investigating. Glad I am not rushed into a decision since delivery is not until mid-February. Thanks again for the feedback.

We have the Gulf Shores Rally on our calendar and if Heartland delivers on schedule as indicated we will be there! Maybe boatto5er will come down from VA also. We look forward to meeting everyone.

Didn't check the weight versus our Augusta but if it is similar then a F350 LB SRW with the 20" wheel and extra GVW package will handle it just fine and legally as well. You will go up mountains and anywhere else you want to travel with no handling issues of any kind.