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Old 05-07-2016, 12:07 PM   #1
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Rockwood 2906ws

Seems we're one of the first folks to buy the new model Rockwood Ultra Lite 2906WS; we bought a 2016 model in January. Thought we'd share what we're finding so far, just in case someone else is thinking of buying one.

The one we bought was loaded with most of the options Rockwood offered, in the Biltmore color scheme.

PRO: Power tongue jack, with light.

PRO: This one came with a pair of 30 lb tanks.

PRO: Street side compartment holds water pump and in-line filter in an easy to reach location.
PRO: Outside shower is directly beside water pump.
PRO: Water heater is directly beside water pump.
PRO: Water intakes are right beside water heater, water pump, outdoor shower.
PRO: Pex tubing.
CON: The water pump/filter compartment had wires routed haphazardly, giving a very untidy appearance and preventing use of that space for additional storage. We re-routed all wires up and out of the way, giving us space to store the water hoses and ensuring no wires get snagged or damaged. Why didn't they clean it up at the factory?

PRO: The underside long storage compartment is pretty spacious for a trailer.
CON: Contrary to the advertised floor plan, it has only one door, requiring a boat hook to retrieve things from the far end -- or a very small but strong child -- we're going with a boat hook.
PRO (really big Pro): this storage does NOT have access to the main cabin via the bed under storage. This is a big security issue from my perspective.

PRO: Solar prepped.
CON: Can only use a particular brand.

PRO: Roof ladder.

PRO: Rear bumper can store sewer hose.
CON: Not the attachments. We like to have them permanently attached, so the hose won't be stored in the bumper.
PRO: Room in the bumper for fishing poles, as long as the reel isn't too big.

PRO: Each corner has its own up/down switch for the jacks.
CON: On each corner.
PRO: One gets some exercise running from corner to corner.

PRO: Two power awnings that cover the curb side completely.
CON: No wind sensor to take them in automatically.
PRO: Our old class A awning was manual. This is definitely an improvement.
PRO: LED rope lights along the curb side.
CON: No door light. It's either light up the whole curbside or use a flashlight to find the door.

PRO/CON (not sure): Grill setup is under the awning.
CON: Directions say to retract the awning when grilling. May as well have put the grill on the back where so many others are.
CON: It's close to the bedroom window. If you open the window when grilling, you'll have food odor in the bedroom.
Whatever: TV mount in same general area as grill mount. I'm not likely to use it, but it may be important to someone else.
CON: Too close to grill mount. Might splatter grease on TV. Grill may interfere with TV watching.

PRO: Protective cover over bedroom window.
CON: Totally manual. Have to stand on the hitch to unscrew, then raise the cover. Haven't tried it yet, but at 5/3", I think I may be too short to reach the top screws.

PRO: Open the door and you have immediate access to the bathroom and bedroom.
CON: No access to main living area when slides are in.

PRO: Two A/Cs. Having the bedroom cold is a big thing for me.

PRO: Good heat the first night we spent in it.
CON: Only propane heat through this furnace.

PRO: Nice size TV and excellent Radio/DVD player/Bluetooth setup, all just above the electric fireplace.
CON: Not sure what the open shelf under the TV is supposed to be for. If it was meant for any electronics, it failed, because there is no hole drilled for pulling electrical cords or cables up to the outlet or TV. Maybe we can make it into a drawer.
PRO: Lots of good quality speakers, indoor and outdoor.

PRO: The tri-fold fake leather sofa is perfect for short people. We can sit there with our feet on the ground, instead of sticking straight out. Comfy to sit on, don't know as a bed (full queen) yet.
PRO: Narrow tables on each side of the sofa, for drinks, glasses, books, etc.
PRO: Theater seats are comfy recliners (they do require us shorties to raise the foot rest).
CON: They're almost black in this color palette. Not my favorite color.
PRO: Electrical outlets on both sides of the sofa.
CON: None near the theater seats or dining table/chairs (none in that entire slide). We'll use a long extension behind the seats.
PRO: Dining table with extension and four chairs with storage inside the seats.
CON: Table was screwed to the floor, so close to one wall that whoever sat in those two chairs had to really suck in the torso to fit. Spousal Unit unscrewed it from the floor, moved it a few inches, and screwed it back. We later figured out the factory centered the table on the window, which doesn't work for adult seating.

PRO: Day/night shades on all windows.

PRO: Shaded window panes.
sorta CON: Windows only crank open from the bottom, out to about 4-6".
PRO: With a few windows cranked out and the Maxx Aire fan running, excellent air flow.

PRO: Pretty luxurious fabrics on the windows and throw pillows.
CON: The entire color scheme makes for a dark, boring interior. We only went with the Biltmore color palette because that model was literally the only one on the lot. We’ll be covering as much of the fabric as possible with some actual color, such as our multi-colored serape blankets sewn into a bedspread and pillow covers. With the window placement where it is, the trailer is too dark for my tastes. Lighter shades on the walls and furniture would help it feel less like a cave. We spent too many years working inside windowless buildings and a couple of mountains to want to do it some more.
CON: A dry clean only bedspread and matching pillows so soft they’re nothing but decoration? No. Just no. The fact that they are also beige to the point of nausea means they left the trailer immediately, never to be seen again.
Comment: Beige on gray on black on brown on beige is bloody awful. Making the beige walls white would have gone a long way to improving things. When it's out of warranty, we'll probably paint them a much lighter color that isn't in the beige family.

PRO: Full-size queen bed.
CON: No bedroom mirror. We'll install a full-length mirror on the bedroom/hall door.

PRO: Three drawers at bottom of bed.
CON: A huge handle sticks out of the bed platform. That's about 3" of thigh bruising that does not need to be there.

PRO: Fairly deep under bed storage.
CON: Not all that large, as the "basement" takes up the rest of the under bed storage.

Kinda PRO: Hookups for a bedroom TV. Not my thing, but some folks like one.
CON: If you actually install one, you'll bang into it every time you walk around the foot of the bed.
CON: Between a TV and that handle, you'll be bruised from shoulder to thigh.

PRO: Charging station on street side of bed.

PRO: Spacious bathroom, especially inside the shower.
Sort of CON: Plastic toilet that makes all kinds of noise. Hard to keep from waking up the spouse when in use at night.
PRO: A circular hand towel hanger was installed right by the sink, nice and handy.
CON: They provided one cheap, crappy towel bar for the bathroom, just tossed into a drawer, with two sets of thingies to hang it up (only needed one set). That towel bar won’t even have the strength to hold one bath towel, much less the four we’ll need, so it went out in the donations (as did the plastic kitchen paper towel holder that broke the moment we folded out the two side pieces). Our old class A had the ideal bath towel setup, which we will now build onto the sliding door between bath and bedroom: wooden slats into which are inserted four moveable steel bars. They’ll be out of the way and easily reachable from the shower. Why didn’t their designers think of this?
CON: They provided the plastic toilet paper roll insert, nothing else.
CON: No place to actually put the TP holder without it being in the way of something. We tossed it and bought a floor TP holder. It sits behind the toilet when on the move, then wherever each occupant needs to put it.
PRO: Shower has several shelves and an attached bag in which to store shower things, bottles, etc., plus there's a sky light above. Nicely done.
CON: Really cheap looking plastic shower head and hose. We immediately replaced with an Oxygenics.
CON: Not much storage in the bathroom, so they put shelves in the slideout wardrobe, which cuts the wardrobe down considerably, but it's still a bigger wardrobe than most trailers of this size.

PRO: Wardrobe slide out with hanging and shelf storage.
CON: The hanging wardrobe isn't deep enough, so that limits the amount of clothing one can hang. The clothes will have to hang at an angle to ensure the doors close. The hanging wardrobes on either side of the bed are deep enough, but unless you're a five-year-old, the bottoms pool up and wrinkle. I'm using my side as shoe storage.

PRO: Suburban cook stove with a 22" oven. Loving that size. Typical 3-burner cook top, with the electric ignition.
CON: Like every RV oven, you have to kneel on the floor, stick your arm (maybe your head) into the oven, then hold your BBQ lighter all the way in the back until the stove finally lights. For someone with a bum knee, this is really difficult - not that it will stop me from baking biscuits.
CON: They put a knife rack at the back of the stove, and then installed a stove model with a bi-fold cover that sits directly on the knife rack when lifted, thereby making said knife rack completely useless. They could have put the knife rack on the right side of the stove (as one faces the stove), where the knives could be reached safely (and the rack itself can be used). I was quite happy to have a knife rack, until I realized it’s a waste of sheet metal.
PRO: At least the stove cover is over the knife rack holes, so food won't drop down the slots.

PRO: Microwave is not directly above the stove.
CON: I need a stool to reach it, and it's really, really tiny - been a long time since I've seen a 1cf microwave.

PRO: Excellent kitchen sink and counter area. Room for our portable ice maker, out of the way, and still space to work.
CON: Sink cover is warped and cheap, as in seriously tacky. I'll be looking for some Corian sink covers, like we had on the class A. Made for a solid work surface, and we need all we can get in RVs.
PRO: Nice sky light right above the stove, with a shade for really hot sunny days.
CON: There is no place to put a kitchen trash can. The tall, narrow under cabinet door to the right of the sink would have been the ideal place, but instead they slapped a shelf the entire length of that under cabinet. We’ll have to rebuild the inside of that under cabinet to make room for a trash can.

PRO: Big pantry.
CON: Shelves are so thin that we'll have to reinforce to keep them from collapsing under the weight of whatever we put in it.

CON: All living/kitchen area cabinets and drawers are narrow and thin. Will be difficult to find safe places for cookware, especially my cast iron skillet and dutch oven, the coffeemaker, and similar items. The drawer bottoms are as thin as the pantry shelves. I expect a whole lot of organizing and reorganizing (and probably some DIY work) before we get things safely stowed.

PRO: 8cf fridge. That's bigger than we had in the class A.

PRO: Most of the trailer has a cushioned wood-look flooring that feels just wonderful to tired legs and bare feet.
BIG CON: Carpet in the living/kitchen area slide outs. Our preference would have been zero carpet – too hard to keep clean in a trailer. I particularly do not like the lump that carpet over carpet forms directly in front of the stove. Frankly, that’s a tripping hazard, one especially dangerous when maneuvering around hot foods and cookware. We've both already tripped several times at the stove, and my balance is normally excellent. I think the Forest River lawyers might have something to say about that design and its unintended consequences…

General observations:

When Spousal Unit's Parkinsons sets the leg to really shaking, the whole trailer shivers. We'll keep working on how we fine tune the stabilizers -- or maybe just learn to enjoy the vibrations... No, we've already gotten some good ideas from this forum on fixing that.

Bathroom vent is a Maxx Aire with rain cover. It's super quiet and very, very efficient. The vent above the sofa is just a vent, no fan, and has no rain cover. We'll install a rain cover shortly. Personal down side to both vents is I need a step stool to reach them. Luckily, my folding step stool fits nicely beside the sofa.

Tow vehicle is a 2014 Ford F-350 diesel. I brought it home with my 2015 Ford F-150 Ecoboost max tow yada yada, but felt it would be easier to fuel up in the truck diesel lanes, and we needed a "new" vehicle anyway, so the F-350... Works like a charm.

On our first trip, opened a couple of windows, set the bathroom vent fan on setting 2 (of 4), and was gone for a couple of hours. The cats were just fine. Did not turn on the air conditioner at all the entire trip (that's a big thing in Texas).

Because the cats like to sit on the table, where they prefer the outside view, I bought some non-skid that's smooth on top. It's on the table for them to sit on, and we take it off when the humans need the table. Somewhat lessens the "ewww" factor, since there's no way to absolutely keep them off of it.

The items that needed fixing:
Furnace and A/C air flow through vents was pretty much nonexistent. Dealer re-taped the vents. Also fixed a tiny gas leak in the furnace.
Kitchen slide leaked in a heavy rainstorm the night before the first trip. Slide was closed. Soaked the upper layer of carpet. When open, there was a noticeable gap on the side by the sofa. Dealer adjusted the slide.
V-strip lights on the front only partly worked. Dealer ordered new sets.
On the way home, a 12' trim molding panel fell off. Heard a scraping noise just as Spousal Unit yelled to pull over. Luckily, it was a smooth, level road with a very wide shoulder. Had to get out the tools to finish removing the panel, which was still attached with only one screw. The other two (really, only three screws?) had stripped out of the panel screw holes. Placed it inside and came on home with no further damages.

Soon as Steinbaum (Rockwood in German) comes home, we're off to see the Marfa lights.

Augustpilot, feel free to add anything you've noted since you picked up your 2906ws.
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Old 05-07-2016, 12:47 PM   #2
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Our new 2906WS

You covered things on unit really well. We love our trailer, it is loaded with options like yours. We have both fans and rain covers, they do keep,unit cooled down with great airflow. Our furnace is working great, so are the air cond.
We used toilet paper stand as you did, no place for mounting roller. Have not mounted towel bar yet. Putting mirror on door to bedroom . Led lights in unit work great. You can make unit bright as you want. I have noticed the outside fiber glass seems to have a cloudy haze on it, am hoping a good wax will clean the fiber glass. The mattress that came with unit is very comfortable. I have always had to throw out the delivered mattress before, not this time.
I have added a blue fan in frig to help move air, try to prevent freezing on top shelf. Have put protector mats in bottom of sink. I took off stove cover, wrapped well and put away. My wife loves the knife holder in the back of stove.
Tv and DVD player work well. Still have not been able to put usb stick in front and play music. Manual for dvd unit is not well written. You were right when you corrected me the other night, both ac's are ducted throughout trailer. The floor plan is great, you do not feel cramped in this unit. Anyone interested in this model, just post questions, will try to answer.
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Old 05-08-2016, 10:10 AM   #3
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The second set of "thingies" for the towel bar are for the plastic toilet paper roll insert. I know, it's a round peg in a square hole, but it fits. I mounted mine on the side of the cabinet. It's close to the shower, but it's right in front of you when you need it.

We picked up a stainless paper towel holder at Walmart last night. Just a cheap wall mount but it will work fine and it sort of matches the hardware.
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Old 05-08-2016, 10:12 AM   #4
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With nowhere to put a wall mounted TP holder that would not result in wet TP or being a collision point, we opted for the floor model. Much nicer all around.
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Old 05-08-2016, 10:32 AM   #5
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Our 2703 has a scare light (white above the speaker), a porch light (amber below the speaker) and a step light (in the skirt next to the steps. I'm going to look into a dimmer for the LED's.
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Old 05-13-2016, 09:03 PM   #6
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Not gonna be seeing the Marfa lights this month... Dealer called. Steinbaum was ready, and then the freezer died. Having to replace entire fridge (a Dometic), so they ordered it. Be a couple weeks before it arrives.

Good thing it broke at the dealer and not as we're off on a trip.
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Old 06-02-2016, 07:00 PM   #7
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We are thinking about purchasing a Rockwood 2906ws. Thank you for all the information!
Does the trailer have an TV antenna? With HD booster?
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Old 06-02-2016, 09:58 PM   #8
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booster and antenna

Has both the booster and antenna, works great
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Old 06-02-2016, 10:08 PM   #9
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Originally Posted by Augustpilot View Post
Has both the booster and antenna, works great


Thanks!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Old 06-03-2016, 12:44 AM   #10
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Sounds a LOT like our 2604WS with most of the same observations.

We found towel bars and toilet paper holder at Lowes that match the cabinet pulls very well:
Shop Gatco Latitude 2 Satin Nickel Single Towel Bar (Common: 24-in; Actual: 26-in) at Lowes.com

We also went to Bed Bath and Beyond and perused the Simple Human stainless steel trash cans. Lots of shapes and sizes to choose from. We went with a rectangular moderate sized with step to open lid. Fits under the drop down door on the entertainment center. Travels against the back wall and still allows the slide to retract.
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Old 06-06-2016, 08:23 PM   #11
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Steinbaum is home, all fixed. Now we can plan the trip out to see the Marfa lights.
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Old 06-10-2016, 06:28 PM   #12
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We have new 2015 2703WS bought in Feb 2016. So far have not had any problems. Have enjoyed comments above, especially re TP holder! We ended up with one that sits on the door of cabinet so that it is right in front of you! Replaced the light above table - it was so bright - very strange LED "bulbs". Replaced bulbs (981s) in new light with dimmable LEDS and have dimmer controller. Pricey but excellent. Get from RVlighting.com Our 5 labradors love the dual slides in the living area! Question - does the short FM aerial on roof at back fold down? Will want to do that when put cover on.

Tows just great with Ford Expedition EL 2015
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Old 06-10-2016, 06:37 PM   #13
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Originally Posted by frogeratk View Post
We have new 2015 2703WS bought in Feb 2016. So far have not had any problems. Have enjoyed comments above, especially re TP holder! We ended up with one that sits on the door of cabinet so that it is right in front of you! Replaced the light above table - it was so bright - very strange LED "bulbs". Replaced bulbs (981s) in new light with dimmable LEDS and have dimmer controller. Pricey but excellent. Get from RVlighting.com Our 5 labradors love the dual slides in the living area! Question - does the short FM aerial on roof at back fold down? Will want to do that when put cover on.

Tows just great with Ford Expedition EL 2015
Suggest you post the question in this thread:
http://www.forestriverforums.com/for...te-108649.html They'd know better than we do.
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Old 06-10-2016, 06:47 PM   #14
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Loved it!

We had a 2806W for awhile and absolutely loved it! We upgraded to a Class C last year and I honestly miss the TT. We had the dining table and chairs in it and it was great to work out of while on the road.
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Old 07-13-2016, 08:33 PM   #15
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We also have the 2906ws. Have any of you had any problems with the wiring on the refrigerator slide? Ours is in for wires hanging down. Wire hangerscwere also broken. Also had a problem with a high pitched squeal coming from the dining table slide. They enlarged the hole for the drive assembly through the frame.

Would also like to know the aluminum frame locations for any modifications that I might want to make.

We are also from Texas and bought ours from FunTown. Not displeased with their work, hope it keeps being good.

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Old 07-13-2016, 11:26 PM   #16
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Have not had any of those problems, Little Red Wagon.

We can't help with where the frame pieces are -- no idea. Hasn't been necessary yet to look for them.

All of our modifications have been very minor, not involving the frame.
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Old 08-02-2016, 06:18 AM   #17
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I just ordered a 2906ws and am very excited to be joining the club with you guys. Yay!

Do you happen to know what size of bed that tri fold couch folds in to? A full queen? RV queen? Something else? I'm trying to get bedding figured out and would love to know what size that bed will be.
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Old 08-02-2016, 11:29 PM   #18
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Do you happen to know what size of bed that tri fold couch folds in to? A full queen? RV queen? Something else? I'm trying to get bedding figured out and would love to know what size that bed will be.
It's a short queen.
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Old 08-03-2016, 01:40 AM   #19
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It's a short queen.
I kid you not, I've gotten 3 answers and they've all been different lol. I've heard full size, queen and now short queen.
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Old 08-03-2016, 09:33 AM   #20
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I have had it opened once to see how to open it, but I have no idea what size it is.

Welcome to the 2906 owners. Hope you enjoy yours as we have ours.

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