New AS - extended warranty, protective coating

[sdkornfeld]

A couple of issues we are dealing with in buying our new 27'FB; should we buy the extended warranty? should we buy the protective coating the dealer is wanting to sell us? We will bde spending extended time at the beach and they say this prevents corrosion. In advance, thanks for your input, Stan

[Inland RV Center, In]

Originally Posted by sdkornfeld

A couple of issues we are dealing with in buying our new 27'FB; should we buy the extended warranty? should we buy the protective coating the dealer is wanting to sell us? We will bde spending extended time at the beach and they say this prevents corrosion. In advance, thanks for your input, Stan

Stan.

Extended warranties for most part, are a scam. Things could fail during the warranty, therefore you don't need an extended plan. Secondly, the extended warranties plans are a huge profit for the dealer.

What in the world is the dealer going to do to your coach, to protect it from salt?????

The only protection I know of, is stay away from the salt.

Sounds to me like another gimmick the dealer is suggesting. Find out "EXACTLY" what his "protection program" is and post it. I have been with the Airstream program for 44 years, and have never heard of such a protection.

Andy

[ROBERTSUNRUS]

Originally Posted by sd kornfeld

A couple of issues we are dealing with in buying our new 27'FB; should we buy the extended warranty? should we buy the protective coating the dealer is wanting to sell us? We will be spending extended time at the beach and they say this prevents corrosion. In advance, thanks for your input, Stan

Hi, how much is the protective coating and do they guarantee that it will prevent corrosion? Don't buy any extended warranty, at any price, unless it is from the manufacturer of the product. After market warranties aren't worth the paper they are written on.

[CanoeStream]

This seems to fall into the category of ADP -- additional dealer profit.

Protective coating ... coating on what? If it's for the aluminum's plasticote, you can do as well with some good Meguiar's wax. For the frame? I'm not buying its effectiveness... This is no deal even if they give you a multi-year warranty on the coating.

Extended warranties themselves are a different topic and I would still avoid them like the plague. Airstream warrants your coach for 2 years. Some of the appliances have longer warranties than that. If my fridge or furnace makes it through the first 24 months, I certainly would expect it to be relatively trouble free for the practical life of such items -- and this always should range well beyond the 'extended warranty' coverage they're offering you for years 3, 4 or 5. Extended warranties have a reputation of having all sorts of exclusions. This week I've tightened a loose shower door and refastened the microwave built-in kit. These were clearly from road wear-and-tear origin.

They're an Airstream dealer? They must honor your warranty for 24 months with the same promptness. You will come up with a list of things for them to fix; take it in! (a problem with buying 2 or 3 states away...) Use your Airstream happily and more things will loosen up after a season of running down the road. So plan on taking it in again to take full advantage of the normal warranty.

[TBRich]

Don't do it! We had an extended warranty on a previous moho and I will never do that again for anything. It was like pulling teeth to get anything approved for repair with it, despite the fact that it was clearly a warranty issue...it did nothing but sour our relationship with the dealer.

By the way, the one we had said the repairs had to be done at the dealer who sold it to us unless repairs were "pre-authorized." That's a big red flag. Save your money. If anything goes wrong it will be under warranty for 2 years and then if you want you can extend warranties on appliances on an individual basis.

We ended up selling the moho and then canceling our extended warranty...then — talk about the dragging of feet to get our money back to us — 3 months, and countless phone calls.

The coating to prevent corrosion sounds like bunk to me...just wash and wax faithfully and do preemptive treatment for corrosion issues...

PS: Welcome to the Forums..the best place around for everything you need to know RE Airstreams!

[Gene]

If you've gone to your nearest dealer, I expect you may have been told, as we were, "it's an earthquake on wheels". When I said no to the extended warranty twice, the guy turned to my wife and tried to scare her. Trying to come between us angered me enough that I was ready to walk out (and maybe I should have given the difficult time I had with that dealer), but she didn't fall for it either and walking out would have been a difficult thing to do at that point.

As for the "protective coating", that's a scam that has been around for at least 50 years and even car dealers usually don't try that anymore.

This dealer also set up the hitch improperly and didn't check everything out carefully. They were difficult over some warranty work and damaged our trailer later on.

If it's not too late, I'd consider other dealers. These things are a warning. We ended up getting subsequent warranty work done at Jackson Center, but we could fit that into other trips and had the time to go there.

Gene

[famlyman]

i am about to close on a new 27' flying cloud. I am financing the purchase and was told that I could extend my credit line to include the purchase of a $3,400 extended warrantee (7 years) but not for other after market accessories like a solar package etc. This sounded lame. After reading some of the postings above, I am more certain that I don't want an extended warrantee. Thanks for the advice. It sounds to me that the dealer reserved some of the credit line for this more lucrative warrantee option. any thoughts on this?

[ROBERT CROSS]

FM,

Un-like a motor vehicle, not much on an AS requires an extended warranty.
Unless it covers leaks, corrosion and road hazards.

You will get an Owners Packet with all the paperwork for the non-Airstream items, water heater, furnace etc,etc. Fill out the warranty paperwork and mail them in, thats all the Extended Warranty 'ya need.

BTW..who's the dealer?, & what company sells a $3400.00 trailer warranty, thats 1500 more than a 5 year GMPP on our Burb.

Bob

[ROBERTSUNRUS]

Hi, for $3400.00, that warranty should also cover the Engine, Transmission, and Differential; Wait just a cotton pick'n minute, your trailer doesn't have any of these.

[SilverRanger]

Originally Posted by famlyman

i am about to close on a new 27' flying cloud. I am financing the purchase and was told that I could extend my credit line to include the purchase of a $3,400 extended warrantee (7 years) but not for other after market accessories like a solar package etc. This sounded lame. After reading some of the postings above, I am more certain that I don't want an extended warrantee. Thanks for the advice. It sounds to me that the dealer reserved some of the credit line for this more lucrative warrantee option. any thoughts on this?

I won't give you my opinion of an extended warranty. All I can offer is our experience. We did buy the 7 year extended warranty for the 2005 Bambi. This was the first (and last) extended warranty we ever bought on anything. But, considering the Airstream cost more than our first house, we were inclined to want some extra protection. The price we paid was significantly lower than the one you were quoted. Of course, this was about six years ago, and we bought significantly less trailer.

The dealership was reputable family-owned business, and had been selling Airstreams (and SOB's) for decades. The offer (by the daughter of the owner) of the extended warranty was was no pressure - just take a look and think about it. We read it carefully, asked a lot of questions about their actual experience with warranty repairs, and decided to go for it. There was a $25 deductible if the work was done at the dealership, and $50 if done at an "approved" repair shop.

Early this year, after we returned from a cross country trip, we decided to address some issues that existed prior to the trip, and some that developed during. Some existed from shortly after we bought the trailer, but were not properly handled under the Airstream 2 year warranty. After setting up an appointment at the dealership, I wrote a list of repairs, and was careful to reference each repair item to the appropriate section of the agreement. The list included, among other things, a malfunctioning furnace, some plumbing issues, a black tank flushing system that never worked, and a faulty AV system.

I delivered the trailer, and about 10 days later they called and said it was ready. All issues were addressed. The cost of repairs was well over $2,100, which was more than twice what I paid for the extended warranty. My portion of the bill was about $41, which included the deductible, and the rest was for the shipping of parts. I knew about the shipping costs because I read about it in the agreement.

I realize I may swimming against the stream here, but the extended warranty worked out rather well for me.

Some observations:
- I took the Audio/Visual system, and the black tank flushing system problems to the dealership, along with a list of other problems, to the dealership while the trailer was still under the Airstream warranty. They said it was a loose wire for the AV (it wasn't), and didn't even repair the flushing system (I found out about that the hard way later on in the spring). Under the extended warranty they successfully repaired the flushing system, and replaced the entire A/V system.

- Just before the cross country trip the furnace was acting up intermittently, so I decided to take it to a local RV repair shop. Primarily because we would need the furnace on the trip, and our dealership couldn't fit us in for two months. I made sure the "approved" repair shop had prior approval for the work. The owner of the repair shop said "those extended warranties weren't worth the paper the were written on", and that "they would find some way to weasel out of it", but he would work with us and file a claim if we liked. The repair bill was only $80, slightly above the deductible, so we didn't bother to file a claim. He said it just needed cleaning. The furnace failed again the day after we left on the trip. It turned out that the burner had practically disintegrated, and there was a crack in the base of the ignitor. I guess they didn't catch that when they "cleaned" it. I won't be going back there.

- The dealership was easier to work with using the extended warranty than under the Airstream warranty. Sometime during the first six years of the warranty period the dealership stopped selling Airstreams, but are still an authorized AS repair facility.


I still have about 6 months left on the extended warranty, but everything is working fine.

[famlyman]

Thanks for all of the effort in responding to my concerns regarding the warrantee. I will consider these thoughts.

[techiej]

We have owned 2 class A's (1xgas, 1xdiesel) and now the AS.

On the A's we didn't bother with an extended warranty and everything was fixed during the standard warranty --- BUT we use dthe heck out of those rigs the first year (we were travelling abolut 50% of the time back then).

With the AS I can honestly say that I think the assembly/construction quality is better than the A's but we will only be taking a handful of trips each year. Since we don't expect to put enough wear-n-tear on the systems we're most concerned about (2xAC's, furnace, fridge) we decided to get the extended warranty (7 years - 2 AS + 5 warranty).

Our rationale was that during this period a failure of one of those aforementioned items would cost us at least as much as the warranty and that if any other type of problem occurred we would be ahead of the game.

We paid $1,700 for ours which we think was still too much but we negotiated a good deal on the price of the AS as well as the trade of our prior rig and on a net price basis we were happy.

If you can use the heck out of the rig during the 1st 2 years then I wouldn't bother with an extended warranty, otherwise it might be something to think about...but not at the price you were quoted!

On the protective coating I personally wouldn't bother since as long as you keep it waxed and clean off road debris (i.e. tar) on a regular basis I can't see where that will do anything for you. Generally, they are not a warrantee of the rig's coating but a promise to recoat with their product if their product wears or doesn't protect against non-impact items like tar, acide rain, etc.

[roundrobin]

So happy I found this. Just bought a 23fb Signature International. They want $2700 for the protection package. I am going to tell them no! I love working on my rigs and keeping them clean and shiny and I don't mind the work.
Thanks again Forum members for your great help

al
roundrobin

[lbdesign]

I've been offered a coating as well —*Cilajet.
Since I pay a professional (Abe near San Diego) to wax it for me, I'm thinking it would save me money if I never need to actually wax it during the 7 years that the Cilajet warranty is valid. Though Abe is great.
Has anyone used Cilajet or another dealer coating and found it to be effective?
Being able to prevent aluminum corrosion on the cut edges and around rivets would be a pretty great thing, if it works.

(The dealer described it as a nanocoating that bonds tightly with the surface and is very good at NOT wearing off like regular wax does.)

[AtomicNo13]

I'd personally save the nano coating dough and buy a $9 bottle of NuFunish, a good bottle if bourbon and go find a great place to camp for the week. Money ahead!

[jsog6]

New Bambi owner and the dealer wants to sell us a protective coating, for $1,350- is it necessary to have a protective coat on the airstream?

[rmkrum]

Only if you want to increase the dealer's profit by that amount...

Cheaper to wash it yourself and put a good coat of paint sealer on it, for a lot less money...and I can bet you will do a better job, since it's YOUR trailer...

[Protagonist]

Originally Posted by jsog6

New Bambi owner and the dealer wants to sell us a protective coating, for $1,350- is it necessary to have a protective coat on the airstream?

"Protective coat" really means "wash and wax." Do not pay for it. But by all means wax it yourself, especially at all rivet lines.

[Boxite]

Originally Posted by SilverRanger

I won't give you my opinion of an extended warranty. All I can offer is our experience. We did buy the 7 year extended warranty for the 2005 Bambi. This was the first (and last) extended warranty we ever bought on anything. But, considering the Airstream cost more than our first house, we were inclined to want some extra protection. The price we paid was significantly lower than the one you were quoted. Of course, this was about six years ago, and we bought significantly less trailer.

The dealership was reputable family-owned business, and had been selling Airstreams (and SOB's) for decades. The offer (by the daughter of the owner) of the extended warranty was was no pressure - just take a look and think about it. We read it carefully, asked a lot of questions about their actual experience with warranty repairs, and decided to go for it. There was a $25 deductible if the work was done at the dealership, and $50 if done at an "approved" repair shop.

Early this year, after we returned from a cross country trip, we decided to address some issues that existed prior to the trip, and some that developed during. Some existed from shortly after we bought the trailer, but were not properly handled under the Airstream 2 year warranty. After setting up an appointment at the dealership, I wrote a list of repairs, and was careful to reference each repair item to the appropriate section of the agreement. The list included, among other things, a malfunctioning furnace, some plumbing issues, a black tank flushing system that never worked, and a faulty AV system.

I delivered the trailer, and about 10 days later they called and said it was ready. All issues were addressed. The cost of repairs was well over $2,100, which was more than twice what I paid for the extended warranty. My portion of the bill was about $41, which included the deductible, and the rest was for the shipping of parts. I knew about the shipping costs because I read about it in the agreement.

I realize I may swimming against the stream here, but the extended warranty worked out rather well for me.

Some observations:
- I took the Audio/Visual system, and the black tank flushing system problems to the dealership, along with a list of other problems, to the dealership while the trailer was still under the Airstream warranty. They said it was a loose wire for the AV (it wasn't), and didn't even repair the flushing system (I found out about that the hard way later on in the spring). Under the extended warranty they successfully repaired the flushing system, and replaced the entire A/V system.

- Just before the cross country trip the furnace was acting up intermittently, so I decided to take it to a local RV repair shop. Primarily because we would need the furnace on the trip, and our dealership couldn't fit us in for two months. I made sure the "approved" repair shop had prior approval for the work. The owner of the repair shop said "those extended warranties weren't worth the paper the were written on", and that "they would find some way to weasel out of it", but he would work with us and file a claim if we liked. The repair bill was only $80, slightly above the deductible, so we didn't bother to file a claim. He said it just needed cleaning. The furnace failed again the day after we left on the trip. It turned out that the burner had practically disintegrated, and there was a crack in the base of the ignitor. I guess they didn't catch that when they "cleaned" it. I won't be going back there.

- The dealership was easier to work with using the extended warranty than under the Airstream warranty. Sometime during the first six years of the warranty period the dealership stopped selling Airstreams, but are still an authorized AS repair facility.


I still have about 6 months left on the extended warranty, but everything is working fine.

Your failure to present problems to the dealer while it was still within the factory warranty was... well, ... your failure.

The "two month" delay in getting your warranty items covered ... was ridiculous considering you were the original-purchaser, they were the original retailer...AND you had purchased an extended warranty from them which should have placed you in the "immediate attention" aisle.

The reason a shop will work more energetically during an extended warranty than they will otherwise is: 1-they'd already made a commission by selling your the warranty (which is actually owned by a third party), and 2- if they worked on it during factory-warranty they earn less than if they wait... and get actual cash-payment from the third-party warranty-insurance. In other words, they "took you" TWICE... first time by selling you a warranty on a product that was ALREADY warranteed.... and second time by collecting additional money from a third-party insurer while putting YOU on "HOLD" until that insurance became effective!

The WORST PURCHASE anyone can make is to buy a warranty on a product which is already warranteed. Doh. Sellers know they're charging more for the extended warranty than experience shows them they'll be "out" for repairs. YOU can insure YOURSELF cheaper than that...and even if you have a failure beyond factory warranty... you will have had the money inside your own pocket during the timeframe...and the same statistic that guarantees the dealer a profit from the EW also works to YOUR benefit.

Before we were married, my wife bought an EW on her auto and had paid $425 for it. At the end of her EW period, the oxygen-sensor failed. The dealer wanted $350 for the part. (It's an easy labor-matter... about ten minutes to unscrew the old one and screw-in the new one and plug the wire into the harness.) The local AutoZone (with a lifetime part-warranty) sold that same part for $40. We drove 80 miles to the nearest dealer to let them put in their $350 part and one-hour labor they collected from the underwriter... only because it was the only way to justify in her mind that she'd collected anything/ever for her $425 EW expenditure. (We would have saved over $375 and 160 miles roundtrip and an entire day sitting in a waiting room if we didn't have that EW!!!)

The reason most people buy EWs is not because they think the product is defective (or they'd not buy the product to begin-with)... EW's are nothing more than insurance-policies against yourself...and with deductibles. And with prerequisite regular-service-requirements. If it's a big loss to the warranty-underwriter... they'll deny coverage because you failed to have yoru regular service-inspections, etc. Save your money. Have confidence in your original purchase decisions. Insure yourself.