New to Winnebago 2017 Vista 29VE

[Spoiledmatt]

We are excited! Picking up a new to us 2017 Winnebago Vista 29VE on Saturday. This will be our 1st Class A RV. We sold our Travel Trailer to upgrade to Class A.

 

[Morich]

Nice to start a new adventure! Congrats!
But then it is also very easy to trip ourself and cause trouble when we deal with new stuff!
One thing that shows up here really often is that folks try to wing it on too many new things and that can cause them all kinds of trouble and disappointment as well as money!

One big thing I notice is the change from trailer to motorized has a steep learning curve as there are far more complex electrical items involved!
The big thing is that a trailer is pretty well down to battery or shore power and keeping one set of batteries working right!
In motorized there is the added complication of the chassis/start battery and how it connects to the coach setup and disconnects at other times.
Be aware that this can lead to confusion and we may let the batteries run down to the point of damage!

I recommend watching them really close for some time until you get a good idea of how some thing work in unexpected ways!
You likely have one or more battery disconnect switches? But the trick is that those switches don't remove ALL the load like we might expect!
So if we store the RV for a few weeks/months and don't provide some way to keep things charged, we may come back to dead batteries which cost us a chunk of money!

Be alert and watch both sets of batteries if not well into how it works. It's a trap waiting to catch you!

It's easier to enjoy the new toys if they don't cost us every time we turn around!!

 

[Spoiledmatt]

Thanks so much for the message and the tips! We will be watching it close for sure the first year. The nice thing is, we have storage with power for it on our lake property that we are at most weekend. So will definitely keep a watch on it and yes I am sure there is going to be a large learning curve.

 

[Morich]

Sounds like a good start on keeping the batteries good. Point to know is that the we kill the converter charging the coach batteries if we turn the cutoff switch off!
Seems kind of natural to cutoff using the power when we store the RV but if we do that, we mess it up because it also cuts off the batteries from the converter charge for them!
That charge will often not get to the chassis./start battery if there is not some provision made to get it over to that one!
A simple strap from coach to chassis battery will do it---but we have to add it in many cases!

 

[Ted Fyden]

we love our 2017 Vista. very comfortable to drive. ours is 28.5 feet long and 12'2'' tall. I put 12'6" in gps just to be sure. Driving around New England I don't trust gps for height to much but I can maneuver around stuff. enjoy