9/4/2011 Shoddy, Shoddy, Workmanship!

We miss our Newmar 5th wheel! That was a quality recreational vehicle! We didn’t have any problems with that unit. It was solidly built and we couldn’t see any corners that had been cut.

Carriage,,,,eh, not so much. We paid more money for this Carriage than we did for the Newmar but boy the workmanship just isn’t there.

For example, a couple of weeks ago Bob noticed a gap between the microwave/convection oven and the frame around it. Upon further inspection he found out why. You are just not going to believe this! The oven was falling down away from its support!

This is what it looked like when he took the oven out.

Here’s another view giving you an idea of how big (and heavy) an appliance goes in this space.

Take notice of the bright rectangle you see, that is the vent to the outside. Take further notice that there is no, for the lack of a better term, weather-stripping around it. Nothing to close the gap between the back of the oven and the vent. Something that should be there.

Now the real surprising part. The oven was screwed in place to a quarter inch piece of plywood. A quarter inch piece of plywood! Are they nuts?

Needless to say, Bob put in much sturdier supports for this heavy oven.

Valerie told us that they have a friend whose oven fell down from the same space before they even got to their first campground after picking it up. Somehow I’m not surprised.

Bob also put the needed weather-stripping in place.

I’m really sorry to say that Bob has had too much work to do around this brand new rig. Not really huge jobs but ones that he shouldn’t have had to do.

I have pictures of everything he has done, I think I’m going to find out how to write and send pictures to the president of Carriage. I wonder if he would care?