Newmar Kountry

Newmar Kountry. Different than I imagined. More industrial, with sharp contrasts between bleak and stark and clean and modern. Old meets new perhaps.

Let’s start with the old. Customer coaches currently park for service in a bleak and stark gravel lot.

We are parked here, on site 15.

Rustic.

We have a full service pedestal, with 50 amp electric, water and sewer.

The immediate area consists of buildings bounded by chain link fences topped with barbed wire.

The head office is not too far from where we are parked.

Understated.

It is clear that Newmar does not overspend on production facilities. We have a plant tour tomorrow and that should give us a better look at the operation although I won’t be allowed to take pictures.

I did, however, spy a Newmar Super Star, the new Super C model, in one of the fenced-in areas. I clambered up the fence to snap a photo before an Amish dude tackled me to the ground. Fortunately, as I was tumbling to the ground, I was able to eject and swallow the memory card. After performing a different form of ejection protocol, I was able to develop the following image of this new coach.

As far as I know, there are only two of them in existence. Haven’t seen the other one yet.

Every morning, for the three days of service, we are up at 5am to prep the coach for delivery to the new customer service centre. This building is located a few miles away from the production facility. That would be the new part of Newmar. They are building 60 or so modern sites in a gated area for customer coaches. Concrete pads, fully paved, adjacent to a modern, state-of-the-art 50-bay service facility. Should be open soon. Just not now.

We drive our coach to the service area where it is taken to its assigned service bay, bay 41, with oversight by our service technician, Dean.

We are feeling the effects of the time zone changes coupled with the lack of sleep. Waking up at 5am really does feel like waking up at 2am right now.

We then spend the day in the pet lobby of the facility.

The lobby areas are nicely designed. Clean and comfortable.

We can check up on our coach at any time by simply walking over to the service bays.

We’ve made a number of friends here as we generally pass the time by sharing coach war stories.

But you never know who you might meet.

Back in December of 2016, I had posted about a Dutch Star catching fire due to what would later become a major recall item for Freightliner. You can read that post over here.

A couple entered the lobby this afternoon. Their 2016 Dutch Star was in for some maintenance work. And we began talking and sharing some coach war stories. Their story was dramatic as they shared the time that their coach caught fire shortly after they started the engine. Their story was very familiar to me.

I asked them if they had read about a similar event on my website. Not only had they read it, it was their coach and they left a number of comments on that post.

Small world.

They are still in the same coach. The fire damage was resolved.

They have quite the story about how they had to challenge the manufacturers to do the right thing. Thankfully, they pressed hard which resulted in a safer coach for many of us.

Our maintenance items are very minor in comparison. The service team here has been outstanding in every way. They have done an excellent job on our work items as well as on the 3-year maintenance service.

And the Girard awning issues? Fully resolved.

Newmar installed a ground correction system to remedy the potential random deployment of our awnings.

The LED lights on the awning are just like factory now.

All like new.

Makes me happy for some odd reason.