Happy Alante Owner

[HJ Rosch]

I have heard a lot of "issues" with various motor homes and want to drop a note as to how happy I am with my 2018 Alante and with my Camping World dealer in Draper Utah. We have done three trips; a 7 day "shakedown" with about 10 non-serious items to be fixed, a 10 day that ended with 2 minor fixes and we just returned from a 33 day, 4,000+ mile, 16 campground trip with no problems to be fixed. I am pretty handy and do a lot of stuff myself; sway bar adjustments, steering stabilizer, different kitchen and bath sink faucets, water softener, water inlet filter before the softener, TV in bedroom, etc.. I also understand that I am driving 9 tons of house down the road and it drives and rides differently than a car. We were in horrendous rain storms in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois with zero leaks (this surprised me as they were severe). We drove hundreds of miles on I-90 and I-80 in cross winds, head winds, tail winds and 18 wheelers. We pulled a toad the whole way and stayed in pull thru and back in sites so had to remove and hook up the toad several times. We have over 9,000 miles in the last 5 months and have used all features; A/C, furnace, stove, microwave, water, dumping, GPS, awning .... and all worked great. I hope I am not the only one with a "good" unit but we are very happy with our Jayco. Planning a 5K trip in January and then off to Alaska next summer when it's still under warranty

[woodwardmpd]

Good to hear. What floor plan do you have?

What stabilizing upgrades did you do? Looks like you adjusted the stabilizing/sway bar and added steering bar but wanted to confirm.

We are a fan of the Alante 29S but have heard the same stories about how poorly they handle or how easily they are pushed around the road without additional upgrades.

[GMA385]

Glad to hear you are happy with your Alante! We too are very satisfied with our Precept. Like you stated there have been issues, many that I have corrected myself and our dealer just completed the last of the issues I couldn't fix. We have one more trip planned this fall to a CG near Letchworth State park then I will have to winterize and store it before November This will be the last time tho as DW will be retired by this time next year and we will turn into snowbirds! Enjoy the time you spend in your MH and safe travels!

[Road125]

We receive our 2019 Alante 29S one month ago, we travel 1000 miles with it and spend 10 days in campground .We also use all the equipment onboard with no major problem, except for the shower bottom rail that leaked which I fixed with silicone.When we receive the moyorhome we ask the dealer to install a Roadmaster steering Stabilizer, so on the highway it was not that bad with all the truck. We love the 12cubic feet fridg and the outside. Kitchen and TV. So yes we are happy with our purchase

[HJ Rosch]

I am going to see if I can post photos of the handling fixes I did. But, if you go to CHF posts you will find many references to this. I have an Alante 31V, 2018 with the Ford F53 18,000 pound chassis. They have front and rear sway bars with two link mounting holes in both the front and back bars. Mine came with the links mounted in the front holes giving it the "softest" ride and most sway. I mounted the links in the rear holes and got instant better sway control. But I noticed the geometry on the front bars was not the greatest and found Tjay (74tgould@cox.net) on another site who makes adapter plates for the front that make things better. I was going to have Roadmaster install new after market sway bars for about $1200.00 but after doing this free fix (actually I had to purchase a torque wrench for $70.00) I did not do new sway bars. I did install a Roadmaster steering stabilizer. One caution to the steering stabilizer, its mounting plate attaches to the main front spring mount that then needs to be re-torqued to over 200 ft/lbs. I did not want to buy another torque wrench so i tightened the nuts "really tight" and then took my coach to our local Ford shop and had them torque the nuts to the proper specs.

[KenAK]

Also happy Alante owner. No major issues in 12000 miles over 9 months, inducing 5000 miles in 3 weeks that we just got home from. 2017 Alante 31V we have installed roadmaster steering stabilizer, I did the CHF front and rear and had rear ladder installed at camping world. I have been able to fix or repair all issues myself except an issue with water heater not lighting (dealer made adjustments and it works fine now).

[Allen_C]

We too like or Alante 31v. It's a 2016 and now about 22 months old. We've had numerous things that our responsive dealer has repaired under warranty, most of which have been cosmetic except a water leak in the bedroom slide that got the bed damp. Without our knowledge mold formed on the mattress too so Jayco covered the repair and replaced the mattress.

I've done the CHF and it made a huge difference in the handling. So many things are minor and can be fixed yourself with little effort or time involved. I've also installed 2 residential 24v solar panels, an mppt charge controller and 2 more 12v deep cycle batteries, so we plan to keep this rig for several years!

[HJ Rosch]

I am curious about multiple batteries. We still have only the one 12v from the factory. We have spent 50 days on the road and do not boondock so keeping it charged has not been a problem. We are planning a two month trip to Alaska next summer and am considering adding a battery but probably not solar. What is the conventional wisdom on this? Even if we have to boondock a night or two through Canada I think we can get by as is or just with one more battery. What does everyone think?

[longleen]

We added another 12V battery to our 31P and spent 5 days in Panguitch Lake Utah dry camping. Ran TV with DVD player, outside lights for an hour or so and water pump, no air conditioner necessary, Ran generator for 1/2 to 1 hour a day with no problems. Daughters RV had small champion inverter generator and they made the coffee in the morning. Looking into solar and small inverter generator at The RV show next week. Battery was a duplicate of what was already in RV.