Looking to buy a heartland north trail 2010... Concerns and advice please..

[schustc]

We have come across a 2010 north trail and are considering buying it. I have been researching trailers for months as well as reviewing our towing capacity. We have a ford f150 super crew. On paper we are fine but if anyone is towing this brand with an f150 I would love to hear your experiences. The unit has a unloaded vehicle weight of 5500 or 5600 pounds our truck is rated to 7700. That said I have concerns about leaks and have read a lot and on the heartland there appears to be more than the average leak problem. The unit we are looking at has had a serious leak that the dealer just fixed. Had to take the whole front wall off and replace it inside and out and reseal. I went through it today and found a leak in the bathroom. Black liquid Had poured from the ceiling light all over the counter and dried. They are inspecting to see if it is a new leak or left over from the old since it was not fresh. I am afraid it is just the beginning. I am concerned about delamination too. All fiberglass worries me .. Will it really stand the test of time like aluminum and wood? The whole front of the unit is not bonded it looks like. The salesman told me That heartland loose lays the fiberglass and it can be pushed on etc. I had heard they vacuum seal it but maybe that is only newer models. Anyone have thoughts on this and if their heartland north trail is holding up over time?? Thank you!

 

[Manzan]

Ignore the dry weight and check the gross weight. It should be below what your truck is rated. It is very easy to overload a trailer. What model are you looking at?

 

[schustc]

[h=1]North Trail 28BHS I am not terribly sure what the Gross is - it's used and I can't find the info on line. just what the dealer had told me so far. I was figuring if we stayed about 2000 lbs under our max tow rating by dry weight, we'd have plenty of wiggle room.. ?[/h]

 

[TravelTiger]

We had a 2008 that we traded in 2010. I recall some NorthTrail owners, including us, having problems with delamination at the front cap. Under warranty, ours was completely replaced. Others had diamond plate added to the bottom 3rd for their Heartland authorized repair. I seem to recall also seeing complaints about horizontal indents across the front cap, but these were deemed "cosmetic" and not structural issues. However, the caulking maintenance is critical because of that curved front end. If you have the VIN, you could call Heartland and find out if any work was authorized by them.

The NorthTraIl is a great trailer. We loved ours.


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[Bob&Patty]

Their is a sticker on the left side at the front that will tell you GVWR. Being a 2010 there might be one (YELLOW) on the entry door jam. No matter what trailer you buy...the empty weight is a non-factor. Only the GVW is what matters.

 

[Shortest Straw]

It looks like the dry weight is about 5000 and GVW is 6900 lbs for that unit.

http://www.roamingtimes.com/rvreports/4/heartland-north-trail-travel-trailer-floorplans.html

Curb weight of your pick up is about 4900 lbs. If you are going to pull that rig with the pick up you have now I would recommend getting a very good anti sway/leveling hitch. I am guessing that you will have more issues stopping than you will going down the road. I tried pulling mine with my dads F150 once. Once.

As far as the leaks, we bought a rig years ago with the same issues and dealer fixes that you are talking about. The better half and I used that rig for 6 years. If you do purchase it after the repairs, do your inspections and keep up the maintenance and you may not ever have another issue.

 

[pegmikef]

I had a 2012 North Trail 26LRSS and seem to recall fully loaded and two Trojan 105 batteries it weighed around 8500 pounds. That included tow Honda generators (55 pounds each) that I carried on the pull out rack. I initially towed it with an F150 supercrew and it was ok, but I personally thought it lacked great stability and braking capability and felt somewhat under powered so I moved up to an F250 6.7 crew cab.Much better. I forgot to mention the poor gas mileage with the gasser. As to the trailer itself, I put around 20K miles on it and had no major issues except the "blow" max tires that came with it. The minor things I dealt with were resetting some of the cabinet door hinges and restringing three of the accordian shades. I did install pneumatic shock hinges in the underbed storage area. It was a sound trailer. The front cap problems were in earlier models I think. As Erika said, maintenance is critical.