When I was shopping for a motorhome I visited the big annual RV Show at the Pomona Fairgrounds in California. While there, I had the pleasure of visiting many different manufacturers displays with the latest coaches.
The other benefit is meeting the transient salesmen that tend to stay in the RV business, even if they don't stay with the same manufacturer.
I met a sales guy while walking through a similar floorplan, (bath and a 1/2) Winnebago, as the 34E Thor I was actually interested in. I mentioned that the Vista was really nice, but the Thor was being offered for MANY less dollars. He went into the standard Winnebago salesman pitch about the steel safety cage, custom tanks, and part number stickers on everything.
His sales pitch was wearing me down and I mentioned that the Thor coach at the show had a cracked windshield, and the Winnebago appeared to be much better.
He was straightforward and explained to me that he had worked at Thor for years, and was familiar with the windshield stress cracks, (and windshields popping out while still new). And, he mentioned it was an occasional issue for Winnebago as well.
He explained that it has to do with the fiberglass endcap, how the window is mounted with adhesive like in an automobile, clearances, tolerances, and flexing of the frame and the endcap during leveling, and road travel.
Essentially, the frame and/or endcap make contact with the fragile windshield where it's not ideally supposed to, and it cracks, (or pops out). It happens more with the big single piece windshields, than it ever did with the split models.
He then walked me over to a Winnebago right there at the show with a similar windshield stress crack.
I ended up purchasing the Thor!
Thor Forums
