ron.dittmer
North-East Illinois
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Joined: 02/26/2007
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Travelin2 wrote:Three things carry a lot of weight in our decision. First we would like to stay 25 ft or less. Have a dedicated bed and a booth dinette. The search continues. You sound like us 10 years ago. To avoid a very long winded list of reasons, I will just say that our PC-2350 fit the bill quite well. Click on my signature below to see many pictures of it. It was important to us to be under 25 feet long and 10 foot tall to fit in our garage, sleep together on a main floor bed for two, a good dinette, and all the "practical use" amenities of the big class Cs. Not novelty features like a fridge that won't hold much of anything, a sink you can't do dishes in, run out of water too quickly, take a shower with a toilet in between your legs, things like that.
May I suggest considering shopping the internet more intensely with the notion of flying out to buy what you want at the right price.
2007 Phoenix Cruiser model 2350, with 2006 Jeep Liberty in-tow
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Travelin2
SW Florida
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Joined: 09/04/2006
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j-d wrote:The Diesel added a lot to the original cost. It may actually deduct from the resale, since 6.0 was problematic. But, in addition to whatever the mechanics might be, and maybe the noise, two factors we haven't discussed, remain:
1. It was de-tuned in the E-Series, so you don't get the high performance the pickup is known for
2. It takes the Front Axle right to rated capacity, limiting weight carrying and weight distribution opportunities.
Now for what I really wanted to say in this reply, and I'll SHOUT:
YOU HAVE ESTABLISHED THE FEATURES YOU WANT, LIKE THAT BED. DON'T COMPROMISE AND GET SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T MEET YOUR NEED JUST BECAUSE IT'S CLOSE BY OR AVAILABLE NOW.
Thanks for "shouting" that out to us. It's odd that you say that because last night my wife and I found some good deals on rigs on the internet that did not have those main features and we found ourselves saying "well we could live with that". Then this morning I see your post. Thanks for bringing us back into focus.
John & Gloria
South West, Florida
2009 Leisure Travel Serenity
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Travelin2
SW Florida
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ron.dittmer wrote:Travelin2 wrote:Three things carry a lot of weight in our decision. First we would like to stay 25 ft or less. Have a dedicated bed and a booth dinette. The search continues. You sound like us 10 years ago. To avoid a very long winded list of reasons, I will just say that our PC-2350 fit the bill quite well. Click on my signature below to see many pictures of it. It was important to us to be under 25 feet long and 10 foot tall to fit in our garage, sleep together on a main floor bed for two, a good dinette, and all the "practical use" amenities of the big class Cs. Not novelty features like a fridge that won't hold much of anything, a sink you can't do dishes in, run out of water too quickly, take a shower with a toilet in between your legs, things like that.
May I suggest considering shopping the internet more intensely with the notion of flying out to buy what you want at the right price.
Ron, I looked through your picture album and you are right, that is just what we are looking for. It's a beautiful rig. Quite crafty the way you mounted the coffee maker out of the way. I am going to take your advice and widen our search area.
I widened an internet search to 300 miles and found a very nice rig similar to your layout. It is a Winnebago Aspect 26A with full body paint and Alcoa aluminum wheels. Beautiful rig. It's a 2007 for $35K. What's you thoughts on that model and the value? It's a foot longer than we intended but we have a 50ft boat shed so not a problem at home. Would the extra 3ft have seriously affected your use while on the road?
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pnichols
The Other California
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Joined: 04/26/2005
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John,
Here's the 2007 Aspect brochure: https://winnebagoind.com/resources/brochure/2007/07-Aspect-bro.pdf
Note that it's overhead cab area is not the usual Class C motorhome full size bed/storage area, but the Class B+ motorhome style of entertainment overhead cab area.
That type of overhead cab area makes for a more streamlined look and may provide a slightly improved gas mileage. However, I actually sleep up in our Winnebago Itasca's larger Class C style of overhead cab area in it's full size queen bed. Since this Class C style of overhead cab area runs the full width of the motorhome ... it's about a foot wider (6 inches at the foot and 6 inches at the head) than what is needed for the length of the queen bed. I store two foldup outside chairs, a foldup outside table, and many other items in these foot/head areas while at the same time sleeping in the queen bed up there. The queen bed portion of the area up there is in two lengthwise halves so that you just push one half up unto the other half when traveling so as to provide headroom above the driver and passenger. This allows the driver and passenger to be able to stand up when getting out-of/into the front cab seats withouut having to bend over. So what you get is another bed and more storage - but with entertainment equipment being mounted and stored some other place in the coach.
Note also that the 2007 Aspect 26A has slides. Some folks do not want slides in their ClassB+/C motorhomes for several reasons. But in the case of the Aspect 26A slide motorhome you get a narrower motorhome (95 inches) when traveling, but of course additional room when camped with the slides out. I wouldn't recommend buying any slide motorhome where: A) You couldn't use crucial conveniences in the coach with the slides in and, B) You couldn't tilt back the driver's seat and passenger's seat with the slides in.
* This post was
edited 01/19/17 02:00pm by pnichols *
2005 E450 Itasca 24V Class C
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ron.dittmer
North-East Illinois
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Be watchful of a booth dinette inside a slide-out. I don't know about the Aspect, but many manufacturers push the booths closer together to fit them inside a slide-out. The end result is a smaller table and not enough leg room. A no-slide booth dinette will typically have more wall space to work with to spread the booths farther apart. Not only a bigger table and more leg room, but also a longer bed when converted so. For reference, our dinette converted into a bed measures 5'-11" long.
As far as over-all length increase to 26'-7", I don't see it being a big deal. The issue is parking the rig at home of which you say you can accommodate. The wheel base to rear over-hang ratio might be an issue with handling like we had with our PC until I had some suspension upgrades done to make it all better.
BTW, the coffee maker in the cabinet door was a factory feature of the era. It had its challenge making coffee and getting the coffee out of it. Like most PC owners who had it, we eventually removed it to utilize the space inside that cabinet better, and going with a smaller sized conventional coffee maker to place on the counter.
* This post was
edited 01/19/17 04:46pm by ron.dittmer *
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Pops
Boone, NC
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Joined: 07/05/2002
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We had a 2007 Aspect 26A from 2010 to 2016, Loved It. Some folks don't like the semi-round booth instead of a dinette, but it served us perfect. It made into a 80x50(?)bed which was bigger than the queen-short bed. It drove great, without any up grades, had space behind the driver's seat for tilt or small storage. Bought with 7,000 miles on it, sold with 39,000 miles on it. In 30,000 miles, we never had a problem without reservations staying at Nat Pk, St Pk, commercial sites, anywhere. The 26A I could average 10+ mpg on flat land at 55-60, on my 2012 28T can only get 9+mpg. 26A is 27' long, 1 slide, 28T is almost 30' long, 2 slides. (think that is the difference in mpg). Still glad we upgraded to the 28T.
Best advice, Look for the floor plan that you like first, then the others to sway your decision.
2012 Itasca Cambria 28T
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John S.
Valley of Virginia
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Joined: 03/22/2002
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I had a 07 24 foot rear Bath Born Free and that thing was bulletproof. One repair to the house in 9 years of ownership and two repairs to the engine. It was the coils and plugs and they were expensive. But they were a maaintanence iitem too. So no real problems in 9 years. Had a built for two 22 foot befor that but too small. I just sold my aforetravel and born free to buy a new road y'all Splendor on the dodge 5500 chassis.
John
2015 Born Free Royal Splendor on a Ford 550
2018 Rubicon
Boo Boo a Mi Kie
42' 36' & 34 Foretravels sold
2007 Born free 24 sold
2001 Wrangler sold
2012 Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland sold
Susie Dolly, Lolly &Doodle (CKC) now in our hearts and thoughts
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John S.
Valley of Virginia
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The 26 foot born free has a dedicated rear bed. I sold my 24 foot rear bath and will be buying a 26 foot version with the dedicated rear bath. The only difference in going above 24 feet in traveling is you will not fit into a pull in parking space. A 24 foot coach is about the size of my long bed crew cab dually. I am not going with slides as they eat up storage inside in exchange for a bit of floor room. The bed side is a big difference though but simplicity and weight and just ease of use, I decided no slides in this next one. I think if you want a bed on Born Free you need to step up to 26 foot or they did makk 22 footer with two twin beds/sofas that had a medical bed head lifting ability to raise up the head of the bed 18 inches. I had one and it was interesting but it was a wet bath and we found we loved the Born Free so much we wanted to go laces in it more and more so we upgraded to 24 foot.
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Travelin2
SW Florida
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We are in a bit of a soul searching mode. Finding the dedicated main level bed, a shower without the tub, and good seating/eating/food prep area is tricky. The Phoenix Cruisers are hard to find used. The Born Free I haven't seen without having to climb to the top bed. The Coach House (built in the town we live in) is so overpriced for us that we stopped looking at them.(kinda) The Winnebago/Cambria line is more assembly line construction but there seems to be more used ones out there that we can cash out. The post by "Pops",above, gives me confidence that the Winnebago may be our answer. We did own a class A by Winnebago several years ago and liked it.(just too big to go where we want to go). Thanks for all the input. Each persons view seems to spark some additional considerations.
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ol' yeller
Redmond, WA
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Joined: 01/09/2003
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We have a 2008 Aspect 26A and love it. There is gobs of room behind the driver's seat so you can recline the seat for comfort while driving. The shaped dinette is very comfortable to sit at as well as sleep on. The quality of construction is well above average. having side windows in the slideout brings in a lot of light.
Here are a few shortcomings. Look for clearcoat peeling, especially along the radius where the sides meet the roof and the front cap. Also the bathroom is very tight for anyone who is not tiny. We decided to overlook those issues to get everything else we wanted. No regrets yet after 2 years. Ours has 44 K miles on it.
I am NOT a mechanic although I do play one in my garage!
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