Last week, my wife and I bought our first Motorhome. We pick it up Tuesday. Its not what we expected to get when we first started kicking around the idea of a motorhome. We bought a 1978 GMC Royale. Its in REALLY nice shape, no rust and mostly original. The one negative to it is that it has the Olds 403 small block instead of the Olds 455 Big Block. Anyway, here are a couple pics...
What made us go this old? We looked ALL summer at motorhomes. Its one of the reasons I haven't been on much. I've been focusing on the motorhome search mostly and just driving my jeep. When we started out looking, we were looking at Class C's. If we wanted to spend 60K+ on a coach, that would have been fine. However, since this is our first camper of any kind, we didn't want to jump in that deep yet. So, we set our budget to about 20 grand. We looked at a bunch of CRAP. I didn't want a constant project and it seems "modern" RV's are constructed from Cardboard, Staples, and pressboard. I saw more leaky roofs than I care to count. Plus, the tow and load carrying capacities were not great. They are not built on heavy duty truck frames, so the house portion of the coach eats up all the GVWR. We started looking at Class A's. We also increased our budget, begrudgingly. We were still looking at crap...still stuff that needed work and the thought of driving a "bus" scared my wife.
We had seen a GMC motorhome on Craigslist at the beginning of our search. I've always liked them so I jokingly said we should get one. That goes against the whole not wanting a project idea...so it was a joke to start. However, as our search changed, the idea of one of these started to make more sense. The are much more van like than a typical Class A, so my wife isn't afraid of them (Big Plus). They are 26 feet long, 8 feet wide and only 9 feet tall. We were going to end up doing work on a coach anyway, so we figured we'd get something cool that we can build value in. There is a HUGE community of fans and supporters for these coaches (like for the wrangler) so parts and knowledge are readily available. Finally, They fit our budget. So...we got real serious.
We found this one about 60 miles away. Its nearly ready to go. Its will need tires (they are from 2004!), the generator doesn't start, it has leaking exhaust manifolds and an oil leak somewhere. That's it for the necessary repairs that I know of right now. We'll see what pops up on the 60 mile drive home. The common rule of thumb for a ready to camp GMC is you'll need 25-30K to get something reliable and livable. We bought it for $15,000 and I figure I'll spend another 2K on tires, the gen set, manifold gaskets, and a full fluid change. Feels like a good deal.
Since this season is just about over, I won't do anything quite yet in terms of a toad, but I DO plan on setting my wrangler up for Toad duty. I'll need to tow 4 down, since the GMC isn't all that powerful...I can't pull a trailer AND the jeep. As it is, I'll need to change out the final drive to a 3.73 or so (from a 3.04). For those of you who do, what am I looking for? I know @bobthetj03 tows.
What made us go this old? We looked ALL summer at motorhomes. Its one of the reasons I haven't been on much. I've been focusing on the motorhome search mostly and just driving my jeep. When we started out looking, we were looking at Class C's. If we wanted to spend 60K+ on a coach, that would have been fine. However, since this is our first camper of any kind, we didn't want to jump in that deep yet. So, we set our budget to about 20 grand. We looked at a bunch of CRAP. I didn't want a constant project and it seems "modern" RV's are constructed from Cardboard, Staples, and pressboard. I saw more leaky roofs than I care to count. Plus, the tow and load carrying capacities were not great. They are not built on heavy duty truck frames, so the house portion of the coach eats up all the GVWR. We started looking at Class A's. We also increased our budget, begrudgingly. We were still looking at crap...still stuff that needed work and the thought of driving a "bus" scared my wife.
We had seen a GMC motorhome on Craigslist at the beginning of our search. I've always liked them so I jokingly said we should get one. That goes against the whole not wanting a project idea...so it was a joke to start. However, as our search changed, the idea of one of these started to make more sense. The are much more van like than a typical Class A, so my wife isn't afraid of them (Big Plus). They are 26 feet long, 8 feet wide and only 9 feet tall. We were going to end up doing work on a coach anyway, so we figured we'd get something cool that we can build value in. There is a HUGE community of fans and supporters for these coaches (like for the wrangler) so parts and knowledge are readily available. Finally, They fit our budget. So...we got real serious.
We found this one about 60 miles away. Its nearly ready to go. Its will need tires (they are from 2004!), the generator doesn't start, it has leaking exhaust manifolds and an oil leak somewhere. That's it for the necessary repairs that I know of right now. We'll see what pops up on the 60 mile drive home. The common rule of thumb for a ready to camp GMC is you'll need 25-30K to get something reliable and livable. We bought it for $15,000 and I figure I'll spend another 2K on tires, the gen set, manifold gaskets, and a full fluid change. Feels like a good deal.
Since this season is just about over, I won't do anything quite yet in terms of a toad, but I DO plan on setting my wrangler up for Toad duty. I'll need to tow 4 down, since the GMC isn't all that powerful...I can't pull a trailer AND the jeep. As it is, I'll need to change out the final drive to a 3.73 or so (from a 3.04). For those of you who do, what am I looking for? I know @bobthetj03 tows.
