Prime Time Tracer 274BH-First time owner:)

[spaulsen]

Hi fellow Prime Time travelers!

We have finally made the jump from pop-ups and used class c rv's to purchasing a new PT Tracer 274BH TT. Look forward to following everyone's tips and tricks on the forum to what we are hoping is more enjoyable vacation experiences for the family.

I figured one of the best things I could do is ask what items I should look out for while I've got that 1yr warranty in effect. I'm sure everyone has had that "dam if I just had looked here and noticed it would have been covered" story. Seems like the underbelly of the slide out is important to keep an eye on. Anyone have some other "hidden" things that wouldn't normally come up in a pre/post checklist while camping or doing regular service?

Thanks,
Steve
2019 Tracer 274BH
2017 F150 XLT SuperCrew, 3.5L GTDI V6 Ecoboost, 10speed Auto, 4x4

[tunerfish26]

We also take delivery of a Tracer 274BH tomorrow, so I will be following this post with great curiosity. I'm hoping to discover as much as possible in the first year under warranty.

My wife and I have kicked around the idea of the extended warranty, but it seems that the general consensus is that they are a waste.

Good luck!

[Bama Rambler]

No one really gotcha thing, but keep an eye on all the penetrations through the roof and walls, as well as any penetrations in the underside. Also keep an eye on electrical stuff and especially brakes.

One thing I wish I had done was to have pulled the wheel hubs during the warranty. Not saying that they would have covered the "hubs full of grease" that I found when I did pull them, but they may have.

[spaulsen]

Items likely needing repair/replacement.
• Gap on shower stall to the wall. Its gotten wider since the dry tow run.
• Side door latch not fully engaging the door latch. Can easily pull open in locked position when deadbolt is not engaged.
• Screws for 50amp wall mount are very rusted and seem to be incorrect (recessed screws used on not recessed faceplate)
• Exterior Refigerator does not turn on when connected to shore power. Checked fuse, will pull out to see if its plugged in
• Air conditioning vent in ceiling next to AC unit does not blow out. All other roof vents blow out and have good pressure. May be an issue with duct work.
• Heat vent in bedroom does not have good pressure. All other vents blow out with good positive pressure. May be duct work.

Originally Posted by tunerfish26

We also take delivery of a Tracer 274BH tomorrow, so I will be following this post with great curiosity. I'm hoping to discover as much as possible in the first year under warranty.

My wife and I have kicked around the idea of the extended warranty, but it seems that the general consensus is that they are a waste.

Good luck!

[spaulsen]

Originally Posted by tunerfish26

We also take delivery of a Tracer 274BH tomorrow

Good luck!

Does yours have two grey water tanks? I have two locations for sewer connections. in front of the slide (assuming grey tank) and back of slide (has two pull handles so assuming shower grey and black tank). But online it says these models only have 1 grey and 1 black.

[tunerfish26]

I'll check and let you know tomorrow. I appreciate your list and will definitely look at those things as well as add anything that I come across.

How does yours tow with the F-150? I am going to tow with a 2013 Crewmax Tundra with the 5.7L V8 so also a 1/2 ton pickup.

[spaulsen]

Did a dry test tow of about 400 miles last weekend. We had a family birthday to attend anyway so figured we would give it a go with no pressure on acutally needing to use it. Towed great, WD hitch and sway bars did their job and outside of dropping to 10-12mpg we hardly noticed it was there (we stayed at 65mph).

Still need to run it with cargo and I plan on using 50# bags of corn to get about 900# of weight and then fill the water tank which will add about 400# (although I probably will never travel with more than a 1/3 full on water unless boondocking). Once its all loaded I'll take it back to catscale to get my loaded truck/trailer weights.

Installing airbags even though I'm solid on truck being level and no drop in my rear. Just want to get rid of a little bit of the bounce up and down from unlevel roads and tighten the feel of the ride up a bit.

Originally Posted by tunerfish26

I'll check and let you know tomorrow. I appreciate your list and will definitely look at those things as well as add anything that I come across.

How does yours tow with the F-150? I am going to tow with a 2013 Crewmax Tundra with the 5.7L V8 so also a 1/2 ton pickup.

[JohnD10]

Originally Posted by spaulsen

Did a dry test tow of about 400 miles last weekend. We had a family birthday to attend anyway so figured we would give it a go with no pressure on acutally needing to use it. Towed great, WD hitch and sway bars did their job and outside of dropping to 10-12mpg we hardly noticed it was there (we stayed at 65mph).

Still need to run it with cargo and I plan on using 50# bags of corn to get about 900# of weight and then fill the water tank which will add about 400# (although I probably will never travel with more than a 1/3 full on water unless boondocking). Once its all loaded I'll take it back to catscale to get my loaded truck/trailer weights.

Installing airbags even though I'm solid on truck being level and no drop in my rear. Just want to get rid of a little bit of the bounce up and down from unlevel roads and tighten the feel of the ride up a bit.

Once you get it loaded up you will find it tows differently that it did on this trip.

You'll probably have to readjust the WDH.

[spaulsen]

I'm hoping its going to be minimal. I have about a 4-6" drop on the back end with it towing dry and no drop on the truck rear currently. So it has a slight lean to it. My hope is that I'll get a 2-3" drop which will level bring my trailer rear up a bit. Ford already has about 2" drop in the front just from the trucks natural profile which means it should be pretty much all level out loaded. That's my theory anyway. I could be totally mistaken in my thought process.

RV dealership installed a recurve R3 that pretty simple to adjust. Got 30 days to test it out and if I don't like it I can swap it out for something else.

Originally Posted by JohnD10

Once you get it loaded up you will find it tows differently that it did on this trip.

You'll probably have to readjust the WDH.

[JohnD10]

Originally Posted by spaulsen

I'm hoping its going to be minimal. I have about a 4-6" drop on the back end with it towing dry and no drop on the truck rear currently. So it has a slight lean to it. My hope is that I'll get a 2-3" drop which will level bring my trailer rear up a bit. Ford already has about 2" drop in the front just from the trucks natural profile which means it should be pretty much all level out loaded. That's my theory anyway. I could be totally mistaken in my thought process.

RV dealership installed a recurve R3 that pretty simple to adjust. Got 30 days to test it out and if I don't like it I can swap it out for something else.

If your truck is level now and your trailer is nose high then you’ll need to lower the ball of your hitch.

Otherwise, once you level the trailer out with the load, then your truck will be nose high.

[spaulsen]

Currently my truck front fender is about 2" lower than my truck rear fender with the trailer hooked up and dry weight. I'm thinking I'll get about a 2" rise in my front fender, 2-3" drop in my rear fender and about 3" rise in my trailer rear with about 1200-1300 pounds of cargo added? Wishful thinking? Of course none of it matters until I actually get it all loaded and measured.

Probably will need to drop the WD hitch down one notch...was just pie in the sky hoping it all just lines up and nothing needs to be adjusted because of my master plan...I'm not an expert but I did stay at a holiday inn once, lol...

Originally Posted by JohnD10

If your truck is level now and your trailer is nose high then you’ll need to lower the ball of your hitch.

Otherwise, once you level the trailer out with the load, then your truck will be nose high.

[tunerfish26]

We do have 2 grey tanks. 1 is the kitchen and 1 is the bathroom! I was unaware of that, but glad You told me to look. We didn’t drive it home today, because we decided to add a slide awning and some max air vent covers. Saturday is now the day! The techs at General RV hooked up my WDH, but I will swap out the 800#/8000# bars for 1000#/10000# sway bars.

[spaulsen]

800/8000 yeah I wouldn’t go that light so moving up is a good idea. We are also going to get some max air vent covers, the Rv dealership appreciated the review I left online they called me up and said next time I come in they are going to put them on for free.

Did they happen to tell you the capacity of your grey tanks? I was unable to find online what they are, they just refer to 60gal grey water capacity.

Originally Posted by tunerfish26

We do have 2 grey tanks. 1 is the kitchen and 1 is the bathroom! I was unaware of that, but glad You told me to look. We didn’t drive it home today, because we decided to add a slide awning and some max air vent covers. Saturday is now the day! The techs at General RV hooked up my WDH, but I will swap out the 800#/8000# bars for 1000#/10000# sway bars.

[JohnD10]

Takes like 5-minutes each to install those MaxxAir covers...

I did all three of mine in less than half an hour and saved a fortune!

And I'm not much of a wrench monkey, either!

[rracer5]

Originally Posted by spaulsen

800/8000 yeah I wouldn’t go that light so moving up is a good idea. We are also going to get some max air vent covers, the Rv dealership appreciated the review I left online they called me up and said next time I come in they are going to put them on for free.

Did they happen to tell you the capacity of your grey tanks? I was unable to find online what they are, they just refer to 60gal grey water capacity.

2 30 gal. tanks.

[tunerfish26]

I would normally attempt the maxx air thing myself, but they included the installation while installing a slide cover. The slide cover freaked me out...I'm scared to drill into my brand new camper

We go back Saturday to drive it home and park it in the driveway temporarily to load some stuff, then its off to storage until our first trip in March to Ft. Wilderness at WDW.

[spaulsen]

Whats everyone's thoughts on slide covers? Worthwhile investment? How much did they charge for purchase and installation?

Agree, those vent covers are easy to install, but getting them free and installed means I don't have to go up there and do it...lol.

WDW, man I haven't done that in a decade. Mickey always seems to pick my pocket more than I anticipate. But RV park at WDW may be something to consider. Our younger kids were just babies when we went so they really haven't gotten to experience it yet like the older ones did.

Originally Posted by tunerfish26

I would normally attempt the maxx air thing myself, but they included the installation while installing a slide cover. The slide cover freaked me out...I'm scared to drill into my brand new camper

We go back Saturday to drive it home and park it in the driveway temporarily to load some stuff, then its off to storage until our first trip in March to Ft. Wilderness at WDW.

[tunerfish26]

Originally Posted by spaulsen

Whats everyone's thoughts on slide covers? Worthwhile investment? How much did they charge for purchase and installation?

Agree, those vent covers are easy to install, but getting them free and installed means I don't have to go up there and do it...lol.

WDW, man I haven't done that in a decade. Mickey always seems to pick my pocket more than I anticipate. But RV park at WDW may be something to consider. Our younger kids were just babies when we went so they really haven't gotten to experience it yet like the older ones did.

Same boat...all for whatever will keep me off the roof (other than maintenance).

We did not do a slide cover on our Rpod (the slide was tiny).

Friends of ours travel a lot in their fancy motorhome and they swear by them. Another friend, who we will be camping a lot with, bought the Breeze version of our Floorplan and she had one installed and said it keeps the heat down on the slide (we live in Florida) and then you don't have to get up there to sweep it off before you bring it in after you camp. Probably more a luxury than a necessity. The dealer (advice taken with a grain of salt) did mention a good point that it is something that can add some value to the trailer and make it more desirable if we traded or did private sale.

We love the campgrounds at Disney. Be aware, they are still pretty expensive as campgrounds go. We have Annual Passes and our son (3 months old) gets in for free until he no longer looks like he is 2 years old. He can't do much, but we tend to just walk around with friends and people watch.

If you do decide to do Ft. Wilderness, there is plenty to do there that has nothing to do or cost Park Admission. There is a pool, plenty of trails, or as we did last time, rent a golf cart and look at everyones setup.

[waybeck2018]

We purchased a 2019 Tracer in Sept 2018. We have used it extensively, close to 3000 miles since then, both near by for FROG Rally and over 400 miles twice. Travels well and have experienced no sway, etc with the 4 point Equalizer WDH. Minor issues over that time. Front door lock often does not "catch" but we can use the dead bolt one fine. Rear door had some minor light leaks and two windows came open when traveling two or three times. Outside kitchen roll out came off it's track. We have a great dealer and unit is in for all these warranty items now. None were show stoppers nor did they impact our travels. Looking very forward to March when we start traveling again.

[AbdRahim]

Tracers are nice. I always use slide toppers. Helps keep weather and debris off of the slide roof.