Sunline 5th wheel on Craigslist

[ihsolutions]

Found this 2003 5th wheel on CL:

http://chicago.craigslist.org/nwc/rvs/1264717355.html

The more I look around, the fewer of these 5th wheels there seems to be. I'm curious if anyone knows how many units were produced in the 2003-2005 model year run?

[Capt Skup]

I have often wondered the same thing. On a warranty visit to the Sunline factory, I did see about 5 other fivers there. This was while they were still in production. Here is a odd situation. My F-281SR was advertised as a 2003 model, it was built in early 2002. Some of my documents say 2003, some say it is a 2002 model. If I go to Kelly blue book or another pricing guide, production years of Sunline fivers are only listed as 2003,2004,2005. I have never seen another Sunline fiver at a campground were were visiting, did see one(new, unsold) at a dealer in Manassas couple of years ago. We bought ours at Recreation World RV in Annapolis. When they sold rvs, last I heard they only rent now, they had many Sunline travel trailers but ours was the only fifth wheel of the brand. I think Sunline priced their fivers a bit too high for the existing market at the time, our trailer's MSRP was over $43,000. Quite a bit for a 30 foot single slide trailer.

[ihsolutions]

My Sunline 5th wheel is a 2005 model, but was delivered to the dealer in June 2004, and "produced" in April 2004 according to the label on the side of the coach. So, it's 5 years old now and I just took "new" delivery.

There are a fair amount of design flaws in my opinion, but I attribute that to a lack of experience that Sunline had in building 5th wheels. Which is why I asked the question, how many did they build? If there were only a few dozen, that would explain some of the mistakes in design. However if there were hundreds I would suspect some of those things would have come to light in warranty repair, and therefore caused design changes.

I'm referring primarily to issues with construction of the slideouts.

[Capt Skup]

Only issue I have had with our single slideout(dinette and couch), and one that the tech at Sunline noticed was wood trim at the top(the long horizontal section) appeared to sag in the middle. Sunline took it upon themselves to completely replace the stiffners, actually doubling the thickness. The slide works well and seals completely. I have the two rods that are supposed to be installed for travel but rarely use them. We have put a lot of miles on the camper with no issues. Factory also replaced the fabric of the slide awning for me free, too. I think I may have an issue with worn bushings on the right side suspensiion, seems that the front axle, right side may be moving backward a bit. Probably from the tight turns I make backing the trailer into our driveway. I do like the fact that Sunline installed 7,000lb axles and Load Range "E" 16 inch tires on our trailer even though it grosses at 12k. Many trailers in this size are running with 15 inch "D"s and 5,000lbs axles.
One area I want to tell you to watch for, is where your outside 120ac receptacle is. The sealing of it is not adequate. The foam seal fails, allowing water to enter. I have a small area under the receptacle where delamination has started. I will attempt to fix it using Gorilla glue, from access with the cover plate removed.