I know GD is known for their CS but has anyone noticed a decline in build quality?

As a Grand Design owner myself I've been pretty happy with my 2015 Reflection 317RST. I've had my share of leaks and repairs I've had to shake down over the course of time but the build quality has been pretty good. I've owned 4 RV's in the past from Forest River Salem's to a Keystone Cougar and none of those held up like my Reflection.

Our 4 daughters were growing up and more time was being spent in the living area. Bunkhouses seemed like a waste of space so we switched to a rear living in 2015. Fast forward and now we have grand children and a couple of our adult children still enjoy camping with us. On top of that we now go RV'ing with our friends and usually have another couple that stay with us. I really thought in 2020 it would be just my wife and I which is why we went with a rear living.


The floorplans available now are pretty sweet across all manufacturers compared to 2015 but we'd like to stay with Grand Design. We've been trying to find a 2020 reflection 367BHS in pebble for the last 2 months with no success. My wife and I decided to lower our expectations and settle for the cappuccino which are the earlier 2020 builds. We found 2 in stock at Colerain RV but where 2 hours away, one 2 hours north of us and the other 2 hours south of us. I convinced my wife we're going to have to do some traveling to find what we want. A two hour drive is no big deal except when you get there only to find issues.

The first one we looked at in Columbus, Oh had trim sagging and just looked dull and faded. It was when I climbed on the roof, I discovered the dicor on the rear corners to have 1" by 1/8" gap which means snow and rain has been leaking down the back corners of the roof. The second one is in Lexington, Ky which we thought was going to be the one! It was dirty but at least didn't have a dull look to it. No sagging trim, but the bedroom thermostat was just hanging by it's wires and missing bedroom door ****. Those small things are cosmetic and not a show stopper. I asked that the unit be plugged into shore power so I can inspect/operate everything before I decided to make the purchase. When I tried to operate the self leveling system it had a "Error LR Jack" on the display". My goal was to hook up my 2018 F350 SRW to check bed clearance, but I couldn't even get the jacks to raise enough to hook up. The front jacks would move a little and the display started dimming and the jacks quit moving up or down. Ok that can be fixed. I decided to move on and perform the roof inspection only to find the same thing! Not only is the rear corners of the roof been leaking but the TPO material on the driver side was separating from the roof. I don't know if water had penetrated and caused this separation or the TPO wasn't installed correctly.

I showed pictures of the roof to the local sales person at the dealership and he said he doesn't know what's going on with Grand Design lately, but they've been seeing quality issues lately. I called my local sales lady at Colerain RV and told her I'm getting frustrated driving around to look at these units just to find leaky roofs. Of course she said Colerain will probably send them back to GD, but I bet they just glob dicor over those corners and sell them to the next person.


I get it, roofs need attention and IMO these dealers need to spot seal these roofs. They don't expect buyers like me to climb up there and inspect the seams. On the other had is GD getting stingy with the materials they're using during the build process. When I purchased my GD in 2015, the dicor was applied very thick. If their really getting stingy on dicor what else are they scaling back? I've also been looking at Jayco Eagles that have been on the lot just as long and have not seen any sagging trim much less leaking roofs.

We were really hoping to have our new 367BHS by our Beach trip in June but it's not looking very promising .

 

I haven't seen what you are seeing, both our Grand Designs have been pretty good. Have they had issues, yes. Major issues, no.
I would wait for the Pebble, they made changes and upgrades to the White and Pebble units, at least on our 2020 303RLS.
Good luck finding whatever you are looking for.

 

That separation issue looks similar to the problem I'm having where the cargo door frame attaches to the trailer on my 2006 toy hauler (non-GD of course). From your pictures, that's more than an issue of not getting enough sealant on the seam.

 

Why not just order a new one in? My dealer had the new 2020.5 in stock back in November of 19. I ordered my 2020.5 in February, used it first time last weekend. Had to replace bathroom faucet that was leaking, and had to recaulk the shower door track. Both are failures by BOTH GD and my dealer in my opinion, should have been caught at QC and PDI. The shower leaks are well known on the 367, GD has not addressed it, I read enough on it that I took a tube of caulk with me to fix it. The shower tracks still leak some if splashed with a large volume of water, have a possible solution on it's way for that.

I've tried to keep my expectations low. We love the floorplan so much over our old 2015 Puma. But so far the Puma that cost 23k less also had less issues................and we're only 2 nights in. Did I mention the mattress is unbearable?

 

We bought our 377 MBS Grand Design in March of '18. We had the usual pieces of molding falling down just like any other camper builder. The worse part was when I brought the camper into the dealer for its first annual checkup. I told them to check the large living area slide that is hydraulic because it was coming in a little crooked. They said they checked it and by looking at their crappy job of putting the trim back I crossed my fingers. First trip pulling the slide back in it got sideways and broke a weld and got stuck at the campground for 2 more nights. Got a mobile tech to come out and help get the slide back in and I brought it to their shop and had it repaired. It's been fine ever since and brought it back for an annual checkup again...this smaller shop makes the large dealer I bought it from look like their techs just came out of a rehab clinic. Camper has been fine since and I got in the habit of doing a walk around and checking everything before and after a trip. One of my son in laws is a welder and jack of all trades and if I buy him a sack of crawfish or oysters he will come over and fix just about everything I can find. We had a '15 Keystone Fuzion that was the same way lots of small problems that dealer couldn't fix right or didn't want to. Keystone was zero help whereas Grand Design will get back to you if you send them pictures of what the problem is. Across the industry all the manufacture's are having the same quality control problems.


Day we bought the camper

 

Grand Design was sold to Winnebago about the first of the year 2017. I suppose a new owner could make a difference.

 

The pictures appear that the edge trim has warped and pulled away from the end. There was a bead of sealant laid down, but it's been pulled apart.

The camper industry consolidated so much during the last recession that just a few companies own all the brands. They learned how to build quicker and with lesser quality. The color combos and trims were changed to try to hide the quality issues.

There is one thing for sure with any new camper. There are leaks. Any new camper needs to be brought home and resealed from roof to bottom, including window, door, and corner seams.

I used to buy and resell campers, and they are definitely not made to last without the owner doing a decent amount of work before ever using it.

I bought one the factory had not connected the tub drain up. It was a rear bath, and the whole rear was rotted out. It was a metal side so I was able to pull it apart and replace the whole bath before doing a complete top to bottom reseal.

The lack of quality in everything we buy is really disgusting.

 

Camper manufacturer: We install R-18 in the ceiling.
Me: Not on mine you didn't! The lack of any insulation in areas of the ceiling tell me you're full of it.

My next trailer will likely be from a smaller manufacturer. However, it worries me that the local dealer for one of the prospects doesn't have an enclosed building that the trailer could be repaired in.

 

It could have been Thor...

 

It is not any worse now than it was decades ago. RVs are not and never have been built based on quality and buy-outs are done to increase profits, not to improve quality. My opinion based on fixing or trying to fix RVs of all persuasions. But, they still are great fun, if you can tolerate the inconvenience of continual repairs.

Steve

 

Being handy comes in, well, handy when owning an RV.

My dad is handy. He can make anything run and it will look like crap. His 3/4 ton Chevy diesel pickup truck looks like it was loaned out to the demolition derby. He bought one of those 70's GMC motorhomes last year. He has MS and had a stroke last year. With him driving it, the motorhome will look like his truck within 2 months, assuming it doesn't break down on the side of the road before then. He paid $10k for it. Within a year it might not even be worth $2k.

It's a good thing I learned my dedication to maintenance from my grandfather.

 

We've had 4 HitchHicker trailers all new, the first was a 1987 HH II and it never went back to the dealer, 2nd was a 1998 HH II and it never went back to the dealer, 3rd was a 2001 HH Priemer and it never went back to the dealer but we didn't have it long because the floorplan didn't work out for us and our present trailer 2003 HH Priemer that's 17 years old and way over 100K on it and still going strong and was back to a dealership one time for a roof problem when it was 4 years old and out of warranty but they covered 2/3 of the cost for a new roof. Our present trailer has had a lot of service and repairs over the years but it's also a old well used trailer, from 2006 its been lived in for at least 7 months out the year. They don't build them anymore because people wouldn't pay the price for well built quality trailer.

Denny

 

We purchased our Hitchhiker Discover America fifth-wheel in December 2011 and have been traveling and living in it full-time ever since. Ours has never been in the shop or back to the dealer. I have taken care of normal maintenance, replaced tires, etc. but nothing beyond that. But as Denny pointed out above, that level of quality costs more than what mass-produced similar-looking trailers cost. And for that reason, most consumers didn't choose to pay 10 - 20 % more for a Hitchhiker. The result was that we saw Nu-Wa (Hitchhiker), Excel, and Carriage all go under in the last recession. Unfortunately, that class of trailer seems to have largely disappeared from the market.

You can get very high end trailers from companies like New Horizons and Spacecraft, and perhaps DRV Mobile Suites though even that brand has been bought up and is seeing quality issues. Those trailers are well north of $100,000 and quite heavy. Van Leigh Vilano has been mentioned as having a similar build level as Hitchhiker, and can be purchased for a bit less than $100,000. It will be interesting to see if they prosper, or if other companies step into that niche.

 

I agree with comments regarding the relationship between cost and construction. i think you do get a better box for more dollars. However, while less expensive RVs require more maintenance, many of them often give good service when maintained. Much of what I have worked on historically were problems that could have been avoided as long as things are repaired when there is first a problem rather than waiting. I suspect a good many folks have a hard time justifying six figure discretionary purchases which might see on a few weeks of use each year.

I always had a love affair with Hitchhiker because their tech support was second to none. For the big manufacturers now I think my last contact three weeks ago is typical. I am still waiting for the response that never came. Fortunately I figured it out on my own. if Hitchhiker missed me on their first try they stayed on it until they found me. But yeah, those big guys are heavy!

Steve

 

Up until last year I was able to call Kansas RV Center (formerly Nu-Wa) and they still had the build sheet on my Hitchhiker. If I needed weather stripping or a drawer glide I would give them my serial number and they would look the part up and generally had it in stock. But when I called this year about a slide seal they told me that they no longer maintained the old records for the Hitchhikers and have stopped selling parts mail-order. Oh well, it was a good run...