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Change Coach Question
#1

Bear with me for a few minutes. This is our first RV (coach, rig, not sure how to call it yet) and we are really happy with it.

We drove around 18.000 miles this year and we haven't had any major issues with it. Before buying it we were really concerned with a 8V92 engine being old but I think that we were very lucky as the engine is amazing, we ran it thru really cold and really, really hot outside temps  and it kept up perfectly fine (one of the inclines was very steep, the steepest that we climbed yet with 110 degrees outside and  every single truck was going just 5 miles faster than us, this happened a few weeks ago at California going from Palms Springs to Yosemite Valley thru Mojave. At one point we disconnected the Jeep that we tow just in case (water temp was a hairlines over 190, analogue gauge read but still)

As comfortable and functional as it is inside I would like to remodel the interior badly but my wife says that it might be better to just buy a newer model with slides, so the complicated question that we have is what were the factors that you had in mind when you upgraded from a non-slide to a slide RV and why? 

I feel that we have everything we need with this coach so it has been difficult for us to keep discussing it with any more arguments than to avoid the interior remodel. I still have in my head that slides might one more thing that might break but I never had any real experience with it.

I'm under the impression that Series 60 engine won't give us a lot more in the area of taking care of overheating (other than more way to control it electronically), is this right?

Juan

1988 40ft Newell Classic
8V92 TA Mechanic
Allison 740 (4 speed)
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#2

a few thoughts. and i will pm you my phone number

i went from a 8v92 1990 38 foot newell to my 02 4 foot 2 slide newell about or years ago. i loved the 90 and did a total remodel inside on it. i gutted it down to the bare walls and floors, leaving the cabinets in place. it was a labor of love and was recently featured in motorhome magazine.

i love my 02 as well. much more comfortable to live in for extended times with more room. for me the best benefit was ceilings that were nearly a foot taller.

the 02 is about a zillion more times complicated. i am exaggerating a little...ha

you are welcome to come help me change my slide seal. the older hwh slides are a bit finicky. the newer valid slides less so. most everyone i know holds their breath putting their slides in and out....

the 8v92 is ALOT more prone to damage from overheating than the series 60. and by the way i would be surprised that your coach only got up to 190 degrees on a 110 degree day going up steep inclines. those analog gauges are highly in accurate. the series 60 has a better radiator/cooling system and will protect itself better when trouble comes.

but i put alot of miles on my 90. i also had to have a head replaced on it.

putting the money into a remodel must be for enjoyment sake as you will not get the money out of it when you sell it.

if you have someone do it, it will be pricey. i did mine myself.

tom

2002 45'8" Newell Coach 608  Series 60 DDEC4/Allison World 6 Speed HD4000MH

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#3

Unless you are willing to spend the bucks for a late model coach, you will likely remodel th one you buy. I have done a great deal to the interior of our 98 to make it look relatively current . It was a labor of love as you have noted. You will get more interior room while parked with slides but they add a ton of complexity and potential failure. The series 60 is less likely to have overheating problems that lead to more serious engine overhauls. That being said the 8V and 6V engines logged millions of miles in OTR trucks. You just need to know how to drive them and what danger signs to monitor.

Other things to consider are what are your future plans for travel. For example, we are out for months at a time, Rhonda would not be without a stacked washer and dryer. I like the residential fridge because I cook a lot.



Danny
1991 #277
[/quote]

Richard and Rhonda Entrekin
99 Newell, 512
Maverick Hybrid Toad
Inverness, FL (when we're home Cool )
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#4

Thanks Tom,

This is exactly my situation, when I got the RV I wanted to tore it down and start from scratch but ended up doing 1/4 of what I wanted to do to it and ended up rebuilding it like it was before so we could travel. 

On our last trip I decided to take some of the remodels as my hobby on the weekends (we've set it up a time and everything already), but my wife keeps saying, with a good reason, let's make a decision first and then you can work on it if we decide to keep it.

The height of the interior of the RV is important to me as my 6'2" fit on the shower just fine, I would LOVE to modify the roof in that area of the coach to make it square and add a skylight right on top of the shower, one can only dream!

I know that there will no more complications with a newer model but I also love to fiddle with electronics on vehicles. I previously had a car that had almost 200 computers in it and you could program and change pretty much anything you wanted and of course I did, sometimes with not good results but you can bet that I had a ton of fun in the process, I learned how to send messages over CAN, which I'm pretty sure there will be some CAN bus on a newer Newell (some of those black boxes communicate with another computer somewhere else, the way they do it is using buses, the automative ones use CAN so I don't think Newell reinvented the wheel there, could be wrong though. anyway I digressed.

The idea behind remodeling the interior of my 1988 Newell is not to get a cent out of it but just to enjoy it while we use it, but to be honest that is not entirely true because we are enjoying it right now while it is in it's current state.

In regards to the temp on my RV I really want to start creating my digital dashboard because I haven't seen bad temps on this thing yet, and the radiator in the back is as clean as you can get, the previous owner did an amazing job at keeping the cooling system in very good shape and you can tell. We spent a day and a half in Needles, CA and we left with 118* but later on the day they were expecting 125* and it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be on the RV on some of the hill climbs (wasn't towing at the time, we just drove separate vehicles). Of course, I keep saying this and might ending up eating all my words if one day this engine just gives up because of all those hot days but until then I enjoy it like crazy! Smile

Thank you very much for your input, this just confirms what I though already but a nudge in the right direction sometimes helps a lot!

1988 40ft Newell Classic
8V92 TA Mechanic
Allison 740 (4 speed)
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#5

We are willing to spend the money, there is no way around that to go with a newer model, that's not the issue, the main issue is that in my mind we will be spending a LOT of money (like you all guys did at some point or another) and I won't get the same benefits in return. Granted, newer engine, new toys but also new things that can break and I'm pretty sure not matter what year model we get there will be something I will want to modify to meet my taste/needs.

We realized how important were the washer and drier on our last trip (the first one that took more than a week, almost 4 weeks). We still have a Dometic fridge (gas,12v/110v) but we realized that is not great for long trips if you have it full, might need some service but a couple of times the freezer just wasn't strong enough.

If you ask my wife she will have left me already and started full timing! but I'm still active and even when I can work from anywhere on this last trip I realized that a satellite connection will be a must, for some locations, and even using those connections the speeds that you can get are not good enough for remote working (or so it seems). 

On the cooking note we were surprised on how we were able to do pretty much anything we wanted in there! The fact that we have gas is a blessing for us, we love cooking with gas that much that when we don't have it we go outside, pull the grill from the bay and cook on the grill. 


thanks for your feedback

1988 40ft Newell Classic
8V92 TA Mechanic
Allison 740 (4 speed)
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#6

You got me curious with the article on MotorHome Magazine and went a took a peek at it   Tongue

Really nice article, you guys must be really proud of seeing your "old" baby listed as the pride of another couple. Also, from the few posted pictures, the interior looks very similar to our 1988 RV!


And of course here comes a question! 

Are the roof ACs the original ones with a different grill?

I've been playing with the idea of buying one of these https://www.campingworld.com/ceiling-assembly and see if it works, by the way they look pretty much the same assemblies! hope they are, ours are very aged and have been painted but still need to be changed or maybe wait until we need to change the roof acs, which by the way we thought that the way we used them on this last trip they were going to be out! but nope, they are still kicking.

1988 40ft Newell Classic
8V92 TA Mechanic
Allison 740 (4 speed)
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#7

i put new ac's on it. and added a third one in the center. it was a cold weather coach as it had 3 propane furnaces, and 3 electric heaters and the ac's were heatpumps.

tom

2002 45'8" Newell Coach 608  Series 60 DDEC4/Allison World 6 Speed HD4000MH

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#8

@"Floridian", I have an '86 that the 8V92 seized up in. My goddaughters boy friend was a member of a group of engineering students at the local university that were trying to set the land speed record for bio-diesel at Bonneville Speed Week. I loaned him my coach and it seized up on his way back. Instead of trying to repair the 8V92, I bought a 2000 Denver transit coach with a little over 200k with a Cummins ISM and ZF transmission as a donor coach. After the purchase I bought a Cummins Insite Inline 5 Data Link adapter with software. I discovered that the mileage on the speedometer wasn't actual mileage, it actually had over 800k. There are two rebuild kits from Cummins, one for up to 370hp, the other for up to 500hp. I bought the up to 500hp kit and had the motor rebuilt. With the ECM and CanBus, I will attempt to use Torque Pro and an Android tablet for my digital dash, they currently have a J1939 interface in beta. If that doesn't work I'll probably go with Silver Leaf.
As far as the air conditioners go, I had mine plugged into my house 240v during the summer and my electrical bill skyrocketed. I will be looking to replace my rooftops with energy efficient models.

Jon & Chris Everton
1986 40' Dog House #86
450 hp ISM 5 spd ZF Ecomat 2
2004 Range Rover L322 Toad
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#9

I have repeated learned that in regards to motorhomes, if not life in general, that comparison is the enemy of contentment. I can always find features on another coach that I would love to have on mine. But then, that coach lacks things I like about mine so I end up less satisfied about both. Maybe some calculation using quantum mechanics could figure the optimal coach for me, at least until I saw another coach. My sense of satisfaction, high and low, is always impermenant. If we pay attention to our mind, a motorhome will teach us a lot about how life really works.

WHOA, dude, chill man Smile

Jon Kabbe
1993 coach 337 with Civic towed
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#10

the coach i currently own (meaning whichever one i have at the tIme) is my favorite. its usually not as nice as someone elses, or could use some work, but its mine, paid for and my current favorite. as wally would say, thats my two cents worth and i am stickin to it

tom

2002 45'8" Newell Coach 608  Series 60 DDEC4/Allison World 6 Speed HD4000MH

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