aljimenez
'13 LTV Serenity on '12 3
No more than 10% off MSRPWould any of you mind sharing what you paid for your Serenity? What percentage off of MSRP can be expected?
No more than 10% off MSRPWould any of you mind sharing what you paid for your Serenity? What percentage off of MSRP can be expected?
I currently drive a 2015 Airstream Interstate, but have been looking at the Serenity. on the AI, the ride in back is extremely rough. People have added Koni shocks and a sway bar, but report that while those add stability, the ride is, if anything, even more firm. How was your Serenity ride in back to start, and what effect did the Koni / sway bar have on it?Woohoo action on the Serenity board! I don't feel so lonely anymore! We bought our Serenity in September of 2013 and absolutely love it. We flat tow our Jeep Rubicon and with the addition of a Brake Buddy the Serenity handles it very well. I have also added Koni shocks and a Helwig sway bar from the Sprinter Store and it has really made a differance in the way it handles the road. We've also added a Tire Minder monitor and valve stems from the Tire Man (stems are a must). We use a Winegard in motion satellite with a dish receiver for our entertainment. Also bought a separate DVR player...using the coach radio to play movies was not for me. Leisure Travel did a great job with the satellite pre-wireing making the installation easy. I have also installed an Ultra Gauge, a hardwired EMS surge protector, a Trik-L-Start to keep the coach batteries happy and Weathertech floor mats. Remi blinds are next on the list. My wife's claims I can never leave anything the way it comes......I guess she's right. Just put a Whipple 650 hp supercharger on my Ford Raptor for an example. This forum.....well the Unity side of it has been a wealth knowledge in choosing what I feel were the right things for me to add to our Serenity. You will truly love your new Motorhome. PM me if there is anything that I can possibly help you with. We all have our own opinions here but it's you that ultimately get to make the decisions on your new motorhome...enjoy!
would be interested to know as well, I know one member stated not more than 10%. Find that hard to believe...may be others can share as well. Thank youWould any of you mind sharing what you paid for your Serenity? What percentage off of MSRP can be expected?
New to you or brand new? Brand new should have come with warranty repairs.We bought a new 2016 Serenity last year.
We agree they are good especially compared with most other RV'sWe think it is a beautiful vehicle, but we have had a lot of problems with our unit. Keep in mind that Leisure Travel Vans is just the builder of the unit and they do a pretty good job with construction. The problems we have had are primarily with the components, not built by LTV.
You don't give details so can't help. Our furnace has never given us problems in any of our numerous RV's, but we made lots of mistakes at first and thought it was a problem with the furnace.Our first cool night out, we found that the furnace did not work.
I haven't had these problems so I guess you got unluckyThen we had a failure of a tail light and the third brake light. Both of these were caused by water leakage due to bad seals.
If your screen door is like ours, a screen that rolls to the left when open and to the right when closed, then yes they are delicate but I am really happy with this design.We have had the screen door jam and come off its track (you must be super gentle with these).
This was the case for one of our cabinets when we bought ours new and the dealer fixed it and we have had no issues since then. This issue should have a simple adjustment to make the door lock and open like the others.We have a cabinet latch that is locked and won't open unless you slide a knife behind it.
You definitely had had some bad luck as this has never happened to us in any of our RV's.We have had the toilet overflow (valve wouldn't shut off).
We have had a couple of these break also; they are fairly straight forward to fix though.The support cables for the storage doors broke on two of the doors.
Don't know how serious this is. We have have the shower head fall to the floor while driving.The shower head fell off.
This can happen to these relays, although we have been lucky as it has never happened to us.The vehicle alternator would not charge the house batteries which was traced to a failed relay (contactor).
This happened to us too. Flooded batteries can be messy since they need so much maintenance to keep them filled with distilled water often. We took the slide tray out and cleaned everything, painted it and replaced the batteries. I now have Lithium batteries that are maintenance free.The house battery hold down strap corroded and was found sitting loose on the battery and the slide tray rails were totally seized.
I certainly hope Mercedes stood behind these problems with the engine.But worst of all has been the engine problems. First it was an oil leak and then two weeks later the engine decided to just stall at random in the middle of the highway, sometimes running perfect, and other times, stopping for no reason.
I sure hope your unit is finally settling. However, don't expect it to run perfect forever. This is a house on wheels with an engine. Lots of preventive maintenance and lots of fixing is part of the package of this.We ended up having to wait over a month for this to be repaired while we were stuck in a motel, 2700 miles from our home.
Needless to say, our first year of vacation was very stressful. When everything worked it was fun and exciting, but when things started breaking. it was very disheartening.
We hoping the bugs are worked out and will start again fresh next year, but I will always have a little paranoia about the reliability.
It would be interesting to hear if anyone else has had similar issues. I really get the feeling (based on all my reading) that we just got a lemon.
Wow... a lot to discuss here, but let me say first that we did buy it brand new and it was our first RV and first time RVing. We did 6 months of researching before buying (maybe a couple of hours a week). I had just retired and we wanted to travel the Country.New to you or brand new? Brand new should have come with warranty repairs.
We agree they are good especially compared with most other RV's
You don't give details so can't help. Our furnace has never given us problems in any of our numerous RV's, but we made lots of mistakes at first and thought it was a problem with the furnace.
I haven't had these problems so I guess you got unluckyIf your screen door is like ours, a screen that rolls to the left when open and to the right when closed, then yes they are delicate but I am really happy with this design.This was the case for one of our cabinets when we bought ours new and the dealer fixed it and we have had no issues since then. This issue should have a simple adjustment to make the door lock and open like the others.
You definitely had had some bad luck as this has never happened to us in any of our RV's.
We have had a couple of these break also; they are fairly straight forward to fix though.
Don't know how serious this is. We have have the shower head fall to the floor while driving.
Then we added a velcro hold to keep the shower there while on the road.
Easy to remove when taking a shower.This can happen to these relays, although we have been lucky as it has never happened to us.This happened to us too. Flooded batteries can be messy since they need so much maintenance to keep them filled with distilled water often. We took the slide tray out and cleaned everything, painted it and replaced the batteries. I now have Lithium batteries that are maintenance free.
I certainly hope Mercedes stood behind these problems with the engine.
Again you have had such bad luck as our engine has been very reliable.
I sure hope your unit is finally settling. However, don't expect it to run perfect forever. This is a house on wheels with an engine. Lots of preventive maintenance and lots of fixing is part of the package of this.
wow, quiet a story, thank you for sharing. I ordered a brand new Serenity and hopefully I do not have to go through what you had to. As far as buying used is concerned, the options were just too limited for what I was looking for...Wow... a lot to discuss here, but let me say first that we did buy it brand new and it was our first RV and first time RVing. We did 6 months of researching before buying (maybe a couple of hours a week). I had just retired and we wanted to travel the Country.
Regarding the warranty..... we did not buy locally so it is over a 200 mile round trip for every time we need service. Fuel costs and wear and tear are not reimbursable. I didn't mention it in the original post, but the first time we drove this unit on the highway, the front end vibrated significantly. We called LTV and they told us to get the tires balanced and have the alignment checked. We made an 80 mile round trip to a frame shop who specializes in this work. They aligned the front end (only camber was off), trued one tire that was out of round and balanced the tires. LTV reimbursed us the $225 cost for this.
The furnace ultimately turned out to be a stuck sail switch. The unit would run one time and lockout. Then after you drove the vehicle for a while, the furnace would run one time and lockout (over and over again). LTV said to call a Suburban furnace authorized mobile repair center. The guy came out, worked on it for a bit and said he could not repair it the way it was installed. His comment was... "apparently they installed the furnace early in the interior assembly, and then finished building the unit around it because there is no way I can remove this furnace to take it back to my shop. It will take major disassembly. You will have to take your RV to an RV repair place and leave it there". Then he gave me a bill for the service call for which LTV ultimately reimbursed me for. I talked to Brad at LTV and after he checked with his assembly people, he confirmed that there is a lot of disassembly required, but gave me the information on how it is done. I ultimately spent an entire day removing the seat frame including the propane detector, power switch, trim that goes vertical along the door, and slicing of the silicon bead at the floor. I shut off the gas, purged the line, disconnected the electric.. and ultimately got to the opening of the furnace. I spent a couple of hours figuring this out and even replaced the control board to no avail. It ended up that the sail switch would move back when the fan came on, allowing the gas to ignite in the burner, but the sail switch was a hairs length from the heat chamber. The slight expansion of the heat chamber touched the sail switch paddle causing it to stick in the closed position. It would free up when we drove because of vibration and the fact that the heat chamber eventually cooled. I bent the paddle slightly away from the heat chamber, and it has worked perfectly. That was about 6-7 hours of my labor on me. I honestly believe we had have had 2 or 3 trips to the dealer and they probably would have just replaced the unit on the third trip (we would have been raising holy heck at that point). Even Suburban factory tech has never heard of that happening (so they say).
The tail light was ultimately fixed by me (after dealer supposedly fixed it and it went out the next week). The light lens fasteners are accessible from inside the rear storage space, but blocked by the vertical plumbing pipes. The factory failed to put one fastener in because it is tough to access. This caused the gasket to leak and water to drip on the light socket. It corroded and the bulb lost electrical contact. I figured it out and managed to get a proper nut into the stud of the lens and finally got it sealed. I have had no more problems, but dread the day I have to get in there to change the bulb. That is definitely a poor design.
The third tail light (which is a LED rail) was fixed by drilling a number of drain holes in the bottom to let the water out, and sealing around the assembly with silver caulk.
I ended up buying some stainless eyelets and a crimping tool to fix the broken support cables for the storage compartment doors.
The alternator not charging the coach batteries ended up being a burned up White-Rodgers 12 volt contactor. With research on the Internet, I performed the voltage checks to prove this and replaced the unit myself, after disconnecting both the chassis and house batteries to prevent blowing fuses or creating big sparks. Just probably took about an hour to do, once I figured out the location of the unit and all the details on how to change it. I absorbed the $60 cost.
It has been 2 months since LTV said they would send me a replacement cabinet latch. It has not showed up yet. I guess I will eat the cost on this one too. They are less than $10 on Amazon. I believe that they see my number pop up on their caller ID up at LTV and probably say "oh no, not that guy again" lol.
The engine problem: This was a horrible fiasco. I have quite a story on the iRV2 forum about our experience for over a month. We were stuck in Montana while Mercedes tried endlessly to try and fix the engine from randomly stalling. We really thought this would go to court and we would have to turn in the Serenity under the lemon law. As it ended up, LTV offered a lot of support here, really putting the pressure on Mercedes, and Mercedes came through, but not until we had just left Montana for Florida over a month since the break down. Everything was ultimately covered including our expenses. I signed a non-disclosure for the settlement so I am not allowed to talk about the financial details. In a nutshell... the dealer could not diagnose the problem with any diagnostic machine (no meaningful error codes). They started shotgunning replacement parts including pressure sensors, wiring harnesses, computers, etc... all with the international engineers giving instructions. They tested the injectors as good, but the thing that fixed it was ultimately replacing the injectors. There was an intermittent short in one that took the computer down and stopped the engine. Apparently it was so intermittent that no diagnostic equipment could detect it. In case your wondering, they did a fuel analysis which checked good. This was an electrical problem. If you can imagine being stuck in one place for a month, hopeless to what was going to happen... that was us. Once fixed, we drove the unit home with no more engine problems... but the toilet did overflow for some unknown reason.
That has been my story of my first year of ownership. I know, should have bought used... lesson learned.
When you get your new Serenity, please let me know if they have struts for the compartment (storage) doors instead of those steel cables. I think I saw where the new unit doors now have struts.wow, quiet a story, thank you for sharing. I ordered a brand new Serenity and hopefully I do not have to go through what you had to. As far as buying used is concerned, the options were just too limited for what I was looking for...
yes, will do ... end of AprilWhen you get your new Serenity, please let me know if they have struts for the compartment (storage) doors instead of those steel cables. I think I saw where the new unit doors now have struts.
I'd eventually like to modify my doors to have slow open struts.