New less expensive Airstream

[dkottum]

Big windows indeed, one of our favorite features. I dislike a feeling of enclosure inside many rv's. And Airstream knows it; look at their ads of the interior photos and you will see more landscape (lakes, mountains, forests etc) than you will see interiors.

What's even more cool is with the tinted glass and rock guards you can see out a lot better than the passer-by can see in.

[m.hony]

None of the Scamp, Casita, Escape, Oliver type trailers have the interior warmth and style of the Airstream. White fiberglass just isn't my bag, man.

[Gene]

Bob Wheeler was going to expand the market with the Basecamp and it was a total failure. After that debacle, if Wheeler hadn't been married to the daughter of one of the Thor management honchos, he might be elsewhere. How ironic that now he buys the "assets" of a trailer company designed by the same guy as the Basecamp. When I looked at the Nest photo i thought it was a cross between a Basecamp and a Casita. I wonder whether Nest has been sued a lot and thus it was unwise to buy the liabilities of the company also.

I don't know whether this will sell, but it will be have inferior parts and workmanship, just like Airstreams, and sell at a premium price. That is Wheeler's real job—cut costs and cut them more. If not branded as an Airstream (necessary to sell it), they will fill up the rear parking lot at the factory until taken to the crusher (I wonder if all those unsold Basecamps went to the crusher?).

Gene

[moosetags]

That's pretty brutal, Gene. True, but brutal.

Brian

[DanB]

m.honey, I think you hit the nail on the head.

Airstreams should be made out of aluminum, or at least metal! Why? dunno! It just feels right.

I've always "accepted" interstates, b-vans, and other motorhomes as Airstreams. Basically because it was not an "alternative" to a current product. The Skydeck is/was a reach for me. Although I do like it!

Even the Basecamp just seemed to work. It was a unique design that still felt like an Airstream.

So what is the primary reason for the Nest? Simply low cost. Apart from the monocoque construction, the similarities to the Airstream atmosphere ends.

Maybe if this had a fiberglass belly with a laminated aluminum skin I'd feel different. Right now, I'll trust Bob and remain cautiously optimistic that the Airstream badge & perceived quality reputation is not being cannibalized just for sales figures.

[m.hony]

If I didn't have a big ass truck I might get a Casita though...
Before we bought the truck we were attempting to find a trailer my V6 Nissan Pathfinder would pull.
The longer trailers just appealed to me more-
Living space, storage, layout/
All are better, more comfortable, more homey feeling-
Maybe there are lots of people who don't share this sentiment?


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[Gene]

Originally Posted by moosetags

That's pretty brutal, Gene. True, but brutal.

Brian

Brian,

Yeh, I wish the truth were not so, but it is. Lately, having to look up some replacement parts for things that broke or otherwise failed, I note that of the various product lines made by a specific supplier, Airstream bought the cheapest stuff they made. I had seen this before, but tried to forget it.

After the warranty period was over, the problems with ours subsided quite a bit. The first years were so bad that my wife asked if we should sell it—and she wanted it badly and fell in love with it, but after a year of one thing after another, she almost had it. I didn't want to take the big loss of selling a used one that was relatively new, so we plugged along. There were scores of problems including with the genuinely incompetant dealer. We had warranty work done at the Airstream Service Center. We gave up on the dealer after they put a hole in the back of the trailer. They fixed that damage, but we almost sued them after finding more damage (we settled with them on that). Since I can fix most things (though I am less likely to as I get older and older), the costs of maintenance have not been overwhelming.

The point of the Casita-style trailers is that they are less likely to leak because a one piece fiberglass top is set on a one piece fiberglass bottom. One upside-down tub on another tub. Of course, there are still penetrations and they can be handled badly and leak. The simplicity of a fiberglass shell should cut costs and I would think adhesives could be used on windows and other penetrations to better seal it.

I suppose a large sheet of aluminum could be formed as a one piece top and bottom. It would look Airstream proper, but the cost might be astronomical between manufacturing a sheet that big, shipping it and the machine that forms them into an upper and lower tub. But maybe airplanes use extra big sheets and they can be shipped as rolls. The forming machine might be the stopper. They have one for the compound curves in the top end caps. I don't know what such a machine costs for a large shell. I'd put the aluminum over a fiberglass shell.

If I were in the trailer market, I would look for a superior brand even if it looked dumb. Airstreams are cool looking and tow well. They probably have a better coefficient of drag than the square trailers and thus save some gas money. That's it. Or, look for a gently used, marked down, well maintained Airstream—those go fast.

Gene

[Andrew T]

Bob Wheeler was going to expand the market with the Basecamp and it was a total failure. After that debacle, if Wheeler hadn't been married to the daughter of one of the Thor management honchos.

This is not correct, Bob's wife has no relationship to anyone in the Thor organization. You are confused with Dicky the previous President of Airstream who is married to Wade Thompson's daughter. Wade was a cofounder of Thor which was created to purchase Airstream from Beatrice foods. Dicky was the first to wake Airstream up after several years of stagnation, likely his best move was hiring Bob to take over for him. I have known every Airstream president since 1971. Bob is a very capable leader with a true quality focus, I know I could not come close to accomplishing what he has in the last few years.

As for the Nest? It looks interesting, we have done a lot of work on fiberglass trailers over the years and have sold some as new and used products. Nothing in this world is perfect and fiberglass trailers can have their own special set of problems. They can be a good way to get aerodynamics cheaper than an Airstream but I would never pay an Airstream price for one. So the current price of the Nest concerns me but maybe Airstream will be able to find some good ways to reduce the cost of production. Certainly their tooling will go a long way towards helping with that.

Andrew T

[malinois38]

Originally Posted by DanB

m.honey, I think you hit the nail on the head.

Airstreams should be made out of aluminum, or at least metal! Why? dunno! It just feels right.

I've always "accepted" interstates, b-vans, and other motorhomes as Airstreams. Basically because it was not an "alternative" to a current product. The Skydeck is/was a reach for me. Although I do like it!

Even the Basecamp just seemed to work. It was a unique design that still felt like an Airstream.

Funny you say that an Airstream should be aluminum. When we were pulling out of JC last week, I asked an employee for a peek at the new fiberglass Airstream. This employees reply was, "What? If its not aluminum, it's not an Airstream! Things that make you go HHMMM...

[Vaughn Hobbs]

Are there any pictures of this new "NEST" Camper?
I've been following this thread for a long time but I don't remember seeing any pictures of something called a "Nest".

[DavidsonOverlander]

Originally Posted by Vaughn Hobbs

Are there any pictures of this new "NEST" Camper?
I've been following this thread for a long time but I don't remember seeing any pictures of something called a "Nest".

http://www.nestcaravans.com/

[moosetags]

Originally Posted by Vaughn Hobbs

Are there any pictures of this new "NEST" Camper?
I've been following this thread for a long time but I don't remember seeing any pictures of something called a "Nest".

Google Nest Caravan. You'll see plenty of pictures.

Brian

[switz]

Glad we got one of the last of the 2015 23D International Serenity model. We were able to modify it to our custom needs that the Nest would never fulfill. When I mentally added the accessory parts prices to the Nest base price to make it somewhat comparable to our 23D, the price was considerably north of $40,000 or over half the list price of the newer 23D International models.

[Denis4x4]

I was involved with an Indy car team in the 1970's and the bodies were hydro-formed aluminum over solid bucks. After seeing that process, I can't see why that process couldn't be used to manufacture aluminum caps for fiberglass trailers. The stainless steel DeLorean is nothing more than metal caps glued to a fiberglass body.
It appears that Thor is going to continue to ride on the Airstream legacy and market to a new generation of koolade drinkers.

[Flht2k]

I know this is not inexpensive, but did not know to post http://www.maxim.com/rides/bowlus-ro...trailer-2016-4

[Gene]

Originally Posted by Andrew T

This is not correct, Bob's wife has no relationship to anyone in the Thor organization. You are confused with Dicky the previous President of Airstream who is married to Wade Thompson's daughter. Wade was a cofounder of Thor which was created to purchase Airstream from Beatrice foods. Dicky was the first to wake Airstream up after several years of stagnation, likely his best move was hiring Bob to take over for him. I have known every Airstream president since 1971. Bob is a very capable leader with a true quality focus, I know I could not come close to accomplishing what he has in the last few years.

Andrew T

I stand corrected on Wheeler's relationship (or non-relationship actually) with Thompson's daughter. I got that from a Forum member who was very knowledgeable and has long since disappeared from the Forum. I believe that I checked it out some years ago from independent sources and confirmed it, but can't find them now.

However, quality is another issue. My experience and those of many others is that Airstream uses cheap parts whenever they can and workmanship is equally poor. Maybe things have improved in the past several years, but every few years a new thread begins about the poor quality and workmanship and when I see them, they read just about the same way as the previous outbreak of complaints.

I met Wheeler once and we discussed Airstream for over an hour. He was quite nice and wrote down a lot of the issues I raised. I did not see that there was any difference in quality or design subsequently. Since Airstream is a wholly owned corporation and Thor makes the real decisions, Wheeler is more like a division director than a "president". Thor's many lines of trailers appear to follow the same philosophy—cheap materials, low paid workers resulting in poor workmanship, little investment in quality control or design improvements. This is anecdotal, but last Sept. I remember talking at a campground to some people with a Keystone trailer (a Thor product) who complained it was a year old and already falling apart. Though trailer ratings are hard to find, those that are out there show Thor's brands to be consistently low in quality and Airstream to be just about a low on quality, but somewhat higher than average on design. The basic design was perfected generations ago by Wally Byam and simply carried forward by Thor.

Gene

[moosetags]

Originally Posted by malinois38

Funny you say that an Airstream should be aluminum. When we were pulling out of JC last week, I asked an employee for a peek at the new fiberglass Airstream. This employees reply was, "What? If its not aluminum, it's not an Airstream! Things that make you go HHMMM...

That employee's spontaneous answer could be very telling. His answer was very direct and specific. Maybe Aistream has acquired Nest Caravan for it's interior components and design.

Brian

[Bob662]

Originally Posted by Flht2k

I know this is not inexpensive, but did not know to post http://www.maxim.com/rides/bowlus-ro...trailer-2016-4

I spent an hour looking at one of these Road Chief's while at Airventure last year. It felt claustrophobic to both my wife and I, and the one on display was right at $135,000. It seemed vastly overpriced for so small a space, and the small windows and peculiar bed arrangement were non-starters for us. YMMV.

We also considered the Oliver before buying our new Airstream, since Oliver is in our "backyard" so to speak. It is well-built, but the interior is quite stark. Maybe that's just a personal preference thing. We kept defaulting back to the Airstream...

Our first choice would have been a FC 23 footer with twin beds -- of course, there is no such thing.

[m.hony]

I appreciate the new Bowlus Road Chief remaining true to its roots.






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[66Overlander]

Originally Posted by Gene

Since Airstream is a wholly owned corporation and Thor makes the real decisions, Wheeler is more like a division director than a "president".

Do you have proof to back up this statement? It sounds like your opinion that design decisions are made by Thor and not Airstream. Everything I ever ever heard suggests that Thor is very "hands off" and allows each division to run itself. There is no way that Thor could be significantly involved in Airstream design decisions. Airstreams are just too different from any other Thor brand to have much crossover beyond using common appliances and other commodity parts. I am not sure there would be significant "economy of scale" cost benefits to purchasing such parts across multiple divisions, but there would be significant logistical and accounting nightmares from trying to do so.