Picking up new RV Monday the 20th

Good morning everyone,

My wife and I are driving from Florida to Ohio to pick up our Heartland North Trail 26LRSS. We are nervous as this will be our first "real" RV. We have had pop ups but those are more like a tent.
We have received an awesome PDI checklist from this site and will be joining as members once we hand over the cashiers check to the dealer.

Here is our question. If there are issues during the PDI that cannot be resolved immediately can we refuse to take possession? We are guessing yes but are not sure about Ohio business law. We really want everything to go smooth but realize that in life expectation is often greater than the realization. We have a place to go for a few days if necessary to let them have time to fix things.

We have looked at as many things on this site to look for during the walk through and inspection and think we are prepared. Our salesman assures us that it is good to go. Just being a worry wart I think.


Any input will be appreciated.

Thanks,

Ray and Lynda Schilke
 

Pizzadigger

Active Member
do what the wife and I did, We insisted on doing the PDI before the check left our hands. Don't like what you see don't buy till they agree to fix everything. Also you might want to stay near the dealer for a few days to find any additional bugs that might show up while staying in and using everything. ENJOY!
 

danemayer

Well-known member
Don't sign the acceptance letter (that says everything is OK) and don't pay until everything is to your satisfaction. The dealer will be highly motivated to quickly address any issues so he can complete the transaction.

If parts have to be ordered, I would ask the sales manager AND service manager (together) for a commitment that the dealership will prioritize the work so when the parts arrive they will take care of it while you wait.
 

Oregon_Camper

Well-known member
do what the wife and I did, We insisted on doing the PDI before the check left our hands. Don't like what you see don't buy till they agree to fix everything.

Couldn't agree more!! Our dealer did their PDI, and after do my PDI (took 4.5 hours) I came back with ~20 things I needed repaired.
 

Kbvols

Well-known member
Ah ok. I have heard of them and have never heard anything negative. Hopefully all will go well. Like others have said do a good PDI if you have some time spend a day locally in the unit to give it a good test. Best of luck and safe travels!
 
Hi Everyone.
I am Ray and my wife is Lynda and we picked up our 2016 North Trail 26lrss April 20th 2015. We have had 11 nights camping and pulled it 2087 miles so far. We live in Florida but bought from RV Nation in Ohio to save a substantial amount of money. What a great new toy and way of life. We just signed up to be full members and are glad to be part of this site and club. We gained a lot of info on here and also met Fred, another member, who calmed us in our purchase from an out of state dealer.

We appreciate the shared knowledge on the site and hope to attend rallies and events in the future.

We are pulling with a 2015 Ram 1500 Quad cab hemi with a 3:92 rear and contrary to some info here the North Trail pulls like a dream with a gasser. 10 MPG up and down the Smokey Mountains and in Florida around 14MPG (it is flat here). We are using the Blue Ox WD anti sway hitch and are really impressed with it. We had the opportunity to tow in severe cross winds (30 MPH with gusts of 50), snow flurries in Michigan, Mountains, rain, and boring Florida roads thus far. The truck and hitch behaved very nicely.

We are tickled with the travel trailer and love the design and light weight. If anyone is wondering about the towability of this model with a light truck send me a message. We look forward to meeting many more members.

The purchase and PDI went perfect with RV Nation and they even let us stay in their lot over night to ensure we were happy with the Trailer. We had a couple minor issues that showed up over the 2 week trip home but nothing that upset us nor the fault of the dealer. A couple missing screws and a septic drain pull that fell off during our long travel home. The new pull is on the way from the dealer and I spent 80 cents on the 2 screws that needed replacing. All in all the trip to Ohio was WELL WORTH OUR TIME AND MONEY!

Glad to be Members : )


Ray and Lynda Schilke
North Trail 26lrss
2015 Ram 1500 Quad Cab with Hemi and 3:92
2 Yorkies
 

JohnD

Moved on to the next thing...
Welcome to the club, Ray!

Try to make it to one of the Heartland Owner's Club Rallies if you can . . . they are a blast!

You will love your North Trail . . . they are great trailers!

Ironically . . . we lost one of our drain handles on our first trip as well.

I make it point to check them to make sure they aren't loose before each trip . . . they do work their way loose when on the road!
 
JohnD
That handle really was a weird thing. I guess they don't use loc tite. We left Fort Mountain in Georgia at 4 in the morning to go home to SW Florida and went to the dump station. Being new to the camping life I just stared at the single handle preparing to drain the tanks. I was sure that there used to be 2 pulls but thought that lack of sleep was making me loopy lol. Lynda and I looked for some time before I saw the threads just sitting there without the pull. It was at first a little frustrating until I figured out to just unscrew the handle still there and use it on both. I guess there is a lot to figure out as you travel. Maybe more reading here will help head off some of the little things : )

Ray
 

JohnD

Moved on to the next thing...
JohnD
That handle really was a weird thing. I guess they don't use loc tite. We left Fort Mountain in Georgia at 4 in the morning to go home to SW Florida and went to the dump station. Being new to the camping life I just stared at the single handle preparing to drain the tanks. I was sure that there used to be 2 pulls but thought that lack of sleep was making me loopy lol. Lynda and I looked for some time before I saw the threads just sitting there without the pull. It was at first a little frustrating until I figured out to just unscrew the handle still there and use it on both. I guess there is a lot to figure out as you travel. Maybe more reading here will help head off some of the little things : )

Ray

Yup!

Big learning curve . . .

Seems that every time we take the trailer out we learn something new!

Our Trail Runner is our second RV . . . our first was an old 1978 Coachman travel trailer . . . and hardly anything worked in it.

We called it our 'Tent On Wheels' and like boat owners do, we named it 'Trailer Trash', although Cathy wouldn't let me have that painted on the back.

So buying a brand new trailer where everything works was an all new experience!

We will be attending an Owners Club Campout in two weeks here in Colorado . . . can't wait to get rolling again!
 
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