I Just Drove This 6 Ton Box from The Poconos to Denver [RV REVIEW!]

I’ve never really driven a motorhome before, so driving this thing from my fiancé’s father’s place in the Poconos to Denver was a very new experience for me. This is my (sort of) review of the 1998 Fleetwood Bounder 30E

The trip started last month when we thought “hmm, we have this motorhome at our disposal, because her dad’s generously offered to let us borrow it, so we should actually take a trip this summer, since it’s easy to keep to ourselves in this”. We originally planned to drive out to California, and sort of bounce around a bit since we’re both working remotely and have hotspots / etc to connect to the internet with.

What we ultimately decided was that we didn’t really know how confident we were about taking someone else’s 22 year old, 90K mile RV past Colorado, in the mountains twice, so we found friends that were planning on going to Denver around the same time anyway, and the 4 of us (after we all quarantined ourselves & tested negative for COVID-19) decided we’d do a trip out here, see some friends that live in the area, and then head back - hitting some Americana-esque stuff in the midwest along the way.

Right now, we’ve completed the first half of the journey, writing this from a buddy’s couch just outside of Denver proper. We head back towards the east coast Thursday AM.

Here’s my experience driving this thing:

The motorhome:

It’s a 1998 Fleetwood Bounder 30E, with a Chevy 454 7.4 Vortec, making something around 290HP / 410 Ft/Lbs of torque. For the most part, everything in the coach works, which is great for being 23 years old. There’s only a few things that need some attention, which I’ll get to.

The Interior:

The interior is 23 years old, and it’s stayed that way - her dad’s had it for about a year and a half. In that time, he’s re-done the plumbing, the exhaust manifolds, and put in a new windshield. Other than that, the original CRT TV’s are still in place, and it smells like your grandma’s home.

The seats are all VERY comfy, which makes 6+ hour drives not that bad.

It’s got a bathroom with a shower (all works fine), a stove and microwave and a fridge, and air conditioning - all which can be hooked up to shore power or run off pumps / generator. The only issue we’ve had here, is the hot water heater ignitor, which I fixed yesterday with a new circuit board from amazon.

Acceleration: (3/10)

What did you expect? It’s a chevy big block V8 that’s trying to pull an 11 x 7 x 30 foot box that weights 6 tons. It gets up to 60-65, and that’s about it. We ran for a while at 70-75 before doing some quick research and finding out about the dangers of tire ratings, as well as drastically worse fuel economy (more on that)

Braking (2/10)

To be honest, I think the brakes need some work. It stops, but you reaaaaaly have to push the pedal in. We leave plenty of distance

Handling & Ride Comfort (4/10)

For whatever reason, I expected the ride to be much softer than it is. It has air suspension up front (with a small leak, so I carry a compressor to fill occasionally) and leaf in the rear for towing. It’s smoothish on smooth roads, but terrible on bad roads because of the weight. Double rear axle in the back.

Once we started to climb to altitude, it was relatively easy to notice that the engine was struggling.

I also suspect it needs a good wheel balance because of some vibrations at speed.

Features (9/10)

Here’s where the barge really shines though. 30 Amp hookup, 4k watt generator, I can cook, shower, charge everything, and use the bathroom without needing to leave the box. It has everything you need.

It’s not fancy and new, it doesn’t have slide-outs, but it has a relatively comfy queen bed and tons of storage, and lights. It’s an home on wheels. We can keep our food cold since the fridge runs both on AC power and LP propane, and I’ve only had to recharge the small leak in the Chevy front air system once this trip. The AC unit on the top of the coach was recently replaced after fiancé’s dad went under a bridge just a bit too low and took it off. Using outlets in motion requires the gen to be on, which in the interest of MPG, we only do if we really need to run the big AC because it’s hot.

With 100 gallons of fresh water & 50/50 grey/black, we still dump pretty much every campsite (less weight), but we haven’t filled totally.

Yes, I’ve dumped the poop. No, it hasn’t gotten on me.

It’s got hydraulic levelers, which I learned really need to be spot on when showering to avoid water going everywhere, but they work totally fine.

It loses a point for sound. It has 4 speakers, which handle 0 bass, and one definitely has a bad ground. I bought that a bluetooth tape adapter for tunes.

Visibility (7/10)

Huge front window, massive mirrors, and a rear view camera. Hell, even the rear view mirror works OK seeing out the back window 30 feet away.

That said, the headlights are mediocre, and night driving is not awesome.

MPG (4/10)

LOL. Better than expected. In the 1800 or so miles we took to get out here, we averaged around 11MPG. I was expecting closer to 6-8. Fill ups are around $100, with a 60 gallon tank on 87 octane. I wasn’t expecting Prius economy, and having 45 ways to split what we’re estimating around $1k in fuel for the trip isn’t bad.

That’s about all I’ve got so far. I’ll update again after our return trip, but until then, AMA!

We went on a local test-trip before this big one, which was my first time driving the coach - it took a bit to get used to the size and how wide it was, but once adjusted.

We’re not staying in it while we’re here in Denver, since none of our friends have land to park it on, so it’s sitting at a friends’ parents’ place just outside of Denver for a bit.