Hello - picking up our 2017 27N Vista LX

[Ted Fyden]

picking up our 2017 27N Vista LX next week. very excited. its in great shape.i am also new to RV lifestyle but live in small space with the same square footage as the RV. me and the Missus want to travel this great country of ours. i am not retired yet(5 more years??) but do get good vacations and living in New England we have lots of opportunity. hope to see you on the road and not the side of it.

 

[Eagle5]

Hi Ted,
The 27N is a generous floor plan, plus being a 2017 model, you have the great 6-speed automatic. Yes, let us not find ourselves on the side of the road ever!
Welcome to the forum.
Eagle5
You picked a fine time to leave me loose wheel

 

[powercat_ras]

I have the 2015 and love it! If you don't like the driving experience you might look into a couple of upgrades to make it drive nicer:

Safe-T-Plus Steering Stabilizer to reduce the OEM steering dead spot
where the RV will drift direction and you are constantly correcting
with the steering wheel. Also will help maintain control if you
have a steer tire blowout.
Cheap Handling Fix to increase sway control, front and rear
SuperSteer Rear Axle TracBar

If you drive it at night and are not satified with the low beam light
output, change the low beam bulbs to Sylvania Silverstar Ultras.

Also, there may be an issue with the rear sway bar bushing brackets having lost fasteners or having broken brackets. You may want to check them and if you have not yet lost any fasteners take them off and put locktite on them. It's a common issue on the Ford F53 that a bracket nut gets loose and falls off then the bracket breaks since its only then secured on one side.

Beware of water entering the basement compartments, with their carpeted
floors even a little water entry wets the carpet and soaks into things.
It's been a battle since my RV was new. In my 27N nothing goes right
on the carpet that can't stand a wet compartment floor.

Beware of the metal hood and grille brackets coming loose from the front
cap, they are just epoxied on and it's a common issue that they come
loose and can even fall off. I have had it happen. I have them
saftey strapped so if they fall off again they hang by saftey strap
and can't fall down and damage something like radiator or
oil cooler, and can't get lost.

Finally, be sure to change the engine oil and filter every 5,000 miles with full synthetic as Ford recommends.

 

[Eagle5]

... additional comment regarding the oil ...
Ford originally recommended the 5W-30 oil for the V-10, but changed it to 5W-20 in about 2001 to get a tenth of a mile more per gallon (a thinner oil requires less parasitic power to flow through the engine and its bearings.) Ford then changed back to the 5W-30 recommendation in 2015 because the 20 weight isn't thick enough to protect the cams and bearings on high mileage engines, or in high-heat conditions. I play it on the safe side and use 0W-40, which flows better in cold weather start-up, and provides more bearing and cam surface protection at operating temperature.
In a multi-viscosity oil, the first number represents the cranking thickness of the oil in cold winter start-up conditions, and the second represents the operational thickness of the oil at 212ºF

• A 0 winter oil at -31ºF has a viscosity of about 6200 cP
• A 5 winter oil at -20ºF has a viscosity of about 6600 cP
• A 20 weight oil at 212ºF has a viscosity of about 7.5 cSt
• A 30 weight oil at 212ºF has a viscosity of about 10.9 cSt
• A 40 weight oil at 212ºF has a viscosity of about 14.4 cSt

The viscosity units are:

• cP = Dynamic Viscosity
• cSt = Kinematic Viscosity (about 15% higher than the cP value with 30 weight oil)

Eagle5

 

[Ted Fyden]

awesome info. we are new and would never think of that. its used so i am gonna print this and bring with when i go for walk thru.Maybe some of this has been done. thanks again

 

[Ted Fyden]

Brought her home today. I fully understand now about front stabilizer and sway. I was contstantly steering. ( not bad or hard but back and forth ) the whole way home. We are gonna look into fixing those items before our two week FLA to TX and home again trip in May. Although after about the 5000 mile mark I may be adjusted to it.

 

[Eagle5]

Hi Ted,
Glad you have the new motorhome in your driveway; safe & sound. Let us know how the steering upgrades go.
Thanks, Eagle5

 

[IOS 3]

Congratulations on the new rig! We owned that exact rig and you will love it. Fantastic floorplan in a very compact footprint. Give yourself some time adjusting to the handling before spending a great deal of time and money chasing incremental improvement. Consider the CHF (Cheap Handling Fix), new shocks as needed, and steering stabilizer as suggested above before anything else. Just saying....

 

[M and M in Paradise]

congratulations. Just one other thing that I did not see mentioned.... be sure to inspect the roof radius on a regular basis and repair as needed. You will find discussions about this topic on this forum.

 

[Ted Fyden]

Stabilizer and sway bar

I want to get a stabilizer and sway bars for my Vista. 27N LX. F53 chassis. I found a shop to put in my parts. I just need help making sure there the correct ones. I went to SafeT website but the menus ( at least the one I looked at) did not list F53 chassis.

 

[M and M in Paradise]

Amazon

 

[creativepart]

A great resource for shopping for parts like this is eTrailer.com. They specialize in this and they can provide personalized support in getting the right parts for your exact motorhome.

Ps. I moved your post in the other forum here. Normally asking a new question in a new thread is a good thing, but this is pretty far along here and should stay here for now. If you want to start a new thread on a new issue then do so, but this issue seems proper for this thread.

 

[creativepart]

I went to SafeT website but the menus ( at least the one I looked at) did not list F53 chassis.

Sure they do. Just enter Ford for the chassis and F53 for the model. Then you’ll select the chassis size/weight for your motorhome.

 

[Ted Fyden]

Thanks for help. I did start a new post in general maint and don’t see it there now. Witch forum did you move it too? Thank you again I appreciate all help

 

[creativepart]

Thanks for help. I did start a new post in general maint and don’t see it there now. Witch forum did you move it too? Thank you again I appreciate all help

It’s right here, two or three posts above. Post #10 above. You don’t need to worry about the forum it’s in. People are reading this one and working with you.

 

[Ted Fyden]

Parts ordered and schedule install after they arrive. Thanks for the help folks.