Owners Manual

[acadianbob]

Having gone through our new travel trailer for the first time this weekend, I would say that the Forest River owners manual is pretty worthless. Topics that should have schematics, locations, and explanations were treated with a vaguely worded paragraph that ended with "see the manual" for whatever you were working with. And you guessed it, the manual for the applicance (or whatever) was largely installation instructions with a few references to operation but then said "see the owners manual". Pretty frustrating.

 

[MRimmer]

Yep they are a waste of paper imo


Mike

 

[steveqvs]

Yes I decide to get one of those first time RV books at wal-mart. It actually had some good info in it. Our manuals sound like yours.... pretty useless. Schematics would be great but I guess the manufacturers don't include them for fear that some other company would copy them?? Seems far fetched to me though.

 

[rockwood06]

I think that all manufacture wire there units pretty much the same, I just think it more work for them to supply the diagrams. The thing I look for is that there is only one wire coming off of each breaker in the panel, it's against code to piggyback breakers.

 

[MOOCAT]

I BOUGHT A SET OF MANUALS, SEND FOREST RIVERS AN E-MAIL AND LET THEM KNOW WHAT YOUR FEELINGS ARE.
WINNEGO HAS A
MUCH BETTER MANUALS AND CUSTOMER SERVICE. DAMMIT, WHY DID I SELL MY 1995 BRAVE??
ERNEST NUNEZ
MOOMOOCAT@AOL.COM

 

[Hokiehall]

The FR manual is basically a generic one that covers all of their products, making it a complete waste of a tree. I had a Terry and a Prowler before this one and at least Fleetwood would put in a manual for travel trailers and not everything else they made. It wasn't great but it was more useful than the FR manual.

 

[granite]

HokieHall, you are absolutely on the money. The manual for our brand new Wolfpack wouldn't even qualify as a general rv instruction book. I suppose hiring a technical writer is too expensive?

 

[NDJollyMon]

You get better instruction manuals for small objects than big giant ones!
Something as large as an RV should be precise, and in depth. I got more information with my new Salem about installation...and systems I don't even have than useful stuff. It's too bad they can't step up and do it right.

 

[eandsphotography]

They make a great campfire starter though!!!

 

[MRimmer]

GREAT IDEA!!!! I will remember this for the future.

Mike

They make a great campfire starter though!!!

 

[acadianbob]

Another Thought

Yes, should have burned mine in the campfire last weekend. Don't have the faintest idea of why I'm hauling it around inside the trailer. The firestarter is the best idea I've seen yet.

 

[acadianbob]

Forest River Contact

I know there is contact information on this site. But I looked all over the Forest River site yesterday to send them a note about their "Instruction Manual". I was not able to discover a way to contact them from their website. Maybe they don't want to hear from us?

 

[nchoate]

Thanks for the info. I just got an older FR- Rockwood, with a manual. I was afraid it was just me. Glad to know the manual is as bad as I thought!
N

 

[BarabooDad]

Yeah - we got a new FR Flagstaff 27BHSS last month. Great trailer, and lots of more or less comprehensive refrigerator, microwave, awning, GFCI, and every other component manuals under the sun. But a rather humorous excuse for a trailer manual! I've got them all in a binder, but the FR one is rather silly by it's thin self. To be honest though, I only really read it the first nights I had the trailer before I went camping in it....

But I agree that some helpful info like wiring/plumbin schematics would be nice, and some info about hanging stuff on the walls like towel/TP hangers, etc. Not to mention driving/parking tips for us newbies!

But I love our trailer!

 

[acadianbob]

Yeah, the problem is that things like your heater bypass will be unique to your trailer. They could really help you out a bit more with model specific information. It doesn't convey a customer focus.