Rough ride and dash noise and movement

TJS-THOR

New Member
Joined
Nov 11, 2024
Messages
5
Location
Sault Ste. Marie
Good morning. We just bought a 2015 Thor ACE 29.2 and took it on a 2500km maiden voyage. We have noticed that the ride is very rough, hard hitting on highway joints and bumps, like there is no suspension. We also notice that the dash bounces and rattles a lot when you hit bumps.

My question is two fold.

1) Would changing shocks make for a softer ride or should I look into air bags?

2) Are there bolts or screws to tighten the dash so it moves less and makes less noise?

Thanks in advance as I am new to this.

Ted
 
Shocks can & do go bad but they usually fail by becoming ineffective (no dampening). But they doesn't mean they can't fail by seizing up... Our 2015 ACE has a decent rice on normal roads (we don't tend to go off-roading). First question to answer is what are you running for tire pressures?

The dash is not loose or noisy in our MH so that likely needs some investigating. From what I've seen (not having taking the entire dash apart) much of the "structure" under the ACE dash is plywood and pine blocking glued & screwed together. If a few screws were stripped out or glue joints loose I'd guess the dash would be a wiggly, jiggly mess.
 
Good morning. We just bought a 2015 Thor ACE 29.2 and took it on a 2500km maiden voyage. We have noticed that the ride is very rough, hard hitting on highway joints and bumps, like there is no suspension. We also notice that the dash bounces and rattles a lot when you hit bumps.

My question is two fold.

1) Would changing shocks make for a softer ride or should I look into air bags?

2) Are there bolts or screws to tighten the dash so it moves less and makes less noise?

Thanks in advance as I am new to this.

Ted

As others have said - check the tire pressure - probably 80 - 82 PSI for that MH.

Other than that, you are driving a truck with truck suspension. To carry the weight the suspension has to very stiff. They are much more susceptible to feeling road defects than any car or pickup truck. New shocks and/or air bags would only make this symptom worse.
 
1) Would changing shocks make for a softer ride or should I look into air bags?
Ride quality, yeah it sucks due to the leaf spring suspension. First and most obvious thing to do is make sure the tires are not over-inflated for the load on them. Do NOT inflate to sidewall pressure. Rather, either properly weigh the coach and use the load/inflation table for your tires or, at a minimum, use your placard on the driver's wall for pressure setting to start with. Choice of tires can also impact ride quality to some extent. Opinions will vary.

There are advanced suspension systems that will significantly dampen the harsh ride but they are very expensive. Some folks swear by either Sumo Springs or airbags but I don't have an opinion on either of those for this specific issue. Someone else may chime in on those options and whether or not they were found to be effective and, if so, by how much.

2) Are there bolts or screws to tighten the dash so it moves less and makes less noise?
Open the hood, stick your head in there and look down to the left and right. You should see two steel supports coming out of the chassis' frame what *should* be attached to the inside of the fiberglass cap. Multiple owners, myself included, have found them to be completely unattached, either by the small screws pulling out or the screws were never installed in the first place. If the front cap is not secured to the chassis frame, it will bounce a LOT. Been there, had to redo that on my 29M.
 
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Thanks for the input. I have just checked the tire pressure and it’s at 82psi.

I’ll check the supports under the hood and see if they are intact.

I’ll also crawl underneath to see if the shocks have any sign of leaking. It has been suggest that I change them as they have 90,000 km on them.

Again thank you for the input.

Ted.
 
Leaky shocks make for a softer ride.
You're looking in exaclty the opposite direction.

Drop the tire pressure and drive it around the block.
You'll see when the pressure is too low to drive on.

Other than tires there is no way to soften the ride without spring changes.
You've bought a lumber wagon with a toilet in it.
It rides just like it sounds.
 
We also notice that the dash bounces and rattles a lot when you hit bumps.

2) Are there bolts or screws to tighten the dash so it moves less and makes less noise?

Ted,
We saw the same thing on our 2015 24.1. The screws had either sheared off or were never installed.
These are accessed inside the engine compartment! On the left and right side.
We screwed in metal angle brackets to the plywood under deck, and then secured them to the sides with double self tapping screws in the metal.
You'll see what I mean once you stick your head inside and look how it's made.

I had my wife sit on the dash to press it down. And then used the self tapping screws and a cordless drill. Good Luck
 
After checking the tire pressure and adjusting to the coach's loaded weight, take it on a trip before deciding what to do next. The 'dash' in my Hurricane has always 'moved' when driving on rough roads. I did add front sumos to my coach, but couldn't say with 100% assurance that they made a difference. For me, the biggest improvement has been changing my driving style. A motorhome is a big truck and it rides like a big truck. I now limit the amount of time behind the wheel each day and I stop every 100 miles to let the dogs out. For me, 300 miles is my limit. If I keep it below 300 miles the ride seems a lot nicer.
 
Ruff ride

As stated many time on the forum, have your vehicle weighed, front and back plus total. Finally listened to that advice and found I could set my front tires at 68lb not 75 and my rears at 66lbs not 80. Bound to be a better ride. As for the dash moving, I have a 2019 Axis, had a leak in the windshield somewhere on the drivers side so I removed the two top sections of the dash to check it out. Found the entire plywood dash, across the front of the windshield, which was held up by 5 screws into the fiberglass had totally broken away from the screws. I had noticed a bit of dash bounce but wrote it off to rough roads. Now I know what the rough roads can do. Used some PL adhesive, 10 ceramic screws and and spray foam insulation were GTG. As for the leak, had a pro fill the outside and inside with buttell and no more leak. Prob less wind noise too.
 
Ted,
We saw the same thing on our 2015 24.1. The screws had either sheared off or were never installed.
These are accessed inside the engine compartment! On the left and right side.
We screwed in metal angle brackets to the plywood under deck, and then secured them to the sides with double self tapping screws in the metal.
You'll see what I mean once you stick your head inside and look how it's made.

I had my wife sit on the dash to press it down. And then used the self tapping screws and a cordless drill. Good Luck


Thanks Don. We will be checking this out. We feel the same that the dash is”loose” or “disconnected” as we can visibly see the dash “bounce” when we hit bumps or very rough sections of highway.

Thanks. Ted.
 
Had similar experience with rough ride.I had done the chf to the front stabilizer which stiffens the front end,put it back to the normal position and the ride improved and the handling wasn't any worse.
 
Had similar experience with rough ride.I had done the chf to the front stabilizer which stiffens the front end,put it back to the normal position and the ride improved and the handling wasn't any worse.

Thanks for the reply. I have to ask a dumb question, what is the “chf” to the front stabilizer?

Thanks. Ted.
 
CHF = Cheap Handling Fix. Ford ships the chassis with the sway bars attached to the softest position. You (or your mechanic) can move the attachment link to the second hole for a stiffer sway bar. So a 'cheap' handling fix. I did add a new attachment link to the front bar to keep the bar roughly horizontal. If you just move the original link to the second hole the bar ends up aimed upwards at a slight angle. Horizontal is supposed to be more effective.
 
2014 25.2 Vegas Dash Vibration and Harshness

My 2014 Vegas has a very rough ride. The first thing I did when I got the RV was to change the sway bars and replace the shocks. It helped with the sway going in and out of driveways.
I lowered that air pressure and it helped a little. As for the dash harshness, I installed rubber washers where the steering column was attached to the dash and firewall. I used black 3/4" round washers and punched a hole in them to fit over the bolts and studs. I also used hose washers between anything that had plates. It helped cut down the harshness in the steering wheel. As for the dash rattles, I took out all of the access points to access areas in the dash and used foam between anything touching together. You never get rid of all of them but it kept the wife happier.
 
We have a much heaver rig. Still hitting ruff surfaces was and should have not been ruff and really noisy. Forget pot holes. I know when the suspension hits the rubber bump stop. Put on Koni shocks. It does ride stiffer and knew it would, but quieted the noise down. Even big pot holes do not cause the suspension to hit the rubber bump stop now.
 
Supports

The ride is rough, but seems rougher if the two supports noted above are loose or broken. We've had our 2012 Hurricane 32A fixed/rescrewed three or more times and now the supports actually are broken (according to the autobody shop that's fixing it again). We are considering it a maintenance item now. If you Google belt line issue there are a few YouTube videos that address it. The jumping dashboard and sometimes seeing daylight where the floor meets the wall are classic indicators.

If the darn roads across the country weren't so bad, sigh...2 lane highways take longer than freeways, but seem to be much smoother.
 
You will not like my answer to the rattling dash. Me, owner (24.1 - 2014) the dash rattled like a drawer full of utensils. Forks, knives, etc. I disassemble the entire dash, being able to see the driveway below the steering shaft while seated in drivers seat. The left side of the dash was NOT even connected to the framework of the RV. Quality was nonexistent. Fun to do nope. If your not handy, live with it or sell it. It will not improve your disposition while trying to ignore the rattles as you drive. Oh, you may also collect more new tools while your doing this job as well. $$$


Twenty hours later +/-. Might as well install some sound deadening mat $$ and spray foam $ the holes to stop hot engine air from coming in. I have a story about this within the forum. Look for Bigalthebear authored by
 

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