Thoughts and opinions please (small RV content)

https://lexington.craigslist.org/rvs/6065529594.html

So a family friend (a very interesting lady) is a traveling therapist and lands in my area quite often. She has a home "base" up in middle Ohio where most of her possessions reside, but she has set up her Prius as a "camper" of sorts and will camp in my back yard for up to a week at a time.

Sharing her quarters with a very small and a very large dog (!)

She just texted me the link to a Toyota RV that's local. Before I go look at it, what knowledge should I be armed with? I appreciate the 22mpg for traveling but is there a better option out there for similar money? What says the hive on this sunny Sunday afternoon?

IIRC they're extremely slow even by RV standards. They're a bit of a hipstermobile out here and I tend to see them crawling over the Sierra at speeds that hold up big rigs. Nothing wrong with that per se, it's just something to keep in mind.

Is she specifically after a really small RV? There should somewhat larger ones out there for same money without the skinny jeans tax.

Look for signs of water intrusion. It would be amazing if an RV of that age doesn't​ have delamination or a leak.

I'm not sure about the statement that the roof air was recently recharged. Those units are sealed with no ports to add or check refrigerant, so that doesn't make sense to me.

Those things are nice in that they're small, but they're pretty underpowered. Getting to the drivetrain is easier since it has a regular hood.

My mom has owned a couple of Roadtreks. I've been fairly impressed with them and even borrowed one for a two week trip. I prefer the Chevy based ones instead of the Dodge.

I'm more interested in her Prius camper!?

I'd advise her to buy one of the Big Three conversion vans.

Is this for her?

Anyone who has lived in a Prius with 2 dogs probably won't care at all about the terrible acceleration and top end.

HOWEVER, if her reason for driving a Prius is about the environment, there is no way a 1989 Toyota will be a clean machine. It's emissions are probably more than 10X the Prius.

I'd be looking for a Sprinter conversion van- still gets 22 mpg, but a much nicer package.

But THAT is a MUCH different price point!

wae wrote: Getting to the drivetrain is easier since it has a regular hood.

That's a good thing. Working that little V6 like that, you'll learn to do headgaskets in campsites.

She's not mechanical so no "headgaskets at campsites" for her. My thinking is that a small Ford or Chevy class C from around 1996 would be a much better choice. But she is a bit hipster/hippy so offbeat is her style.

And the dogs are a chihuahua mix and a Great Pyranese.

Those things are very popular with the hipsters for sure, but something doesn't add up on this one. Go check it out, especially how the electrical has been done and the water. I bought my 92 class A for $1700 last year....RV's are fairly cheap as long as they're not hipster magnets.

I've found that the Toyota campers are pretty well designed for their size, just lacking in power. Sorta makes up for it in economy but slow and even slower if you attempt to tow something. Several years ago I wanted to swap the camper part over to a V8 Dakota chassis. Thought it a better platform for a small camper. Nowadays I'd look for a Sprinter conversion. I drive by an older one on the Mercedes chassis almost daily so there are older ones out there. This one looks to be from around the time that Mercedes first started selling Sprinter vans here and before it got the Ram/Dodge emblem. It's a Winnebago conversion.

Stampie wrote: My mom has owned a couple of Roadtreks. I've been fairly impressed with them and even borrowed one for a two week trip. I prefer the Chevy based ones instead of the Dodge.

This. My parents are currently somewhere in the Southwest, in their (2nd) Chevy-based Roadtrek. I just drove it, a couple weeks ago, and it was quieter than my '02 Ford E-150 conversion.

when we were looking for an RV we thought a class B van style was what we wanted. Roadtrek or Pleasureway. The biggest problem was the price of them compared to a class C. We ended up getting a Tioga 24' and enjoyed the heck out of it.

I am secretly smitten by the small Toyota RVs, and while I can't speak to their quality, I can say that this is the going price for the larger chassis with the V6. That's based on trolling CL for a while, nothing scientific.

Oooh, I like this a lot (yeah yeah, I know VW....) but the pic looks stock and I think the price is low.

https://lexington.craigslist.org/rvs/6071783819.html