First, welcome to the forum. Lots of friendly and knowledgeable types here.

If you are going FT, you might find a smaller fridge will require more trips to the grocery store. Uness you are near one, long trips could get old real fast. As for a King Bed vs a smaller one, I'm guessing you already have a king, if your comfortable with it, you may find the closer sleeping arrangements not to your sleeping routines. King beds take up a lot of space in the bedroom of most 5ers, you'll have to decide if giving up that space to get around the bedroom is worth it. Also a 38' 5er will limit, to a degree, the number of places you can get your rig into. 

Any choice will involve compromises, knowing what you are comfortable with will help you make the right choice.

FWIW

 

-- Edited by biggaRView on Saturday 9th of August 2014 01:56:35 PM

Maxine,

Welcome to the RV Dreams forums.  You've definitely found a good source for finding answers to your questions because the folks here are knowledgeable about all kinds of RV's.

We have a 38 1/2-foot fifth wheel and have been living in it full time for a bit over 3 years.  To us, it is a very comfortable size of trailer.  When we ordered ours back in 2010, we took the option of a queen-sized Select Comfort (Sleep Number) bed, and because we did we ended up with two nightstands; one on each side of the bed.  If we had stayed with the standard king-sized bed, we would have lost the nightstand on the side nearest the closet.  We are extremely glad we went that route.

As for the refrigerator, ours originally came with a 13-cu. ft RV refrigerator, but after having troubles with it after only two years, we modified our trailer so as to put in an 18-cu. ft. residential refrigerator.  Of course, in our case we already had a 3000 watt inverter, so we didn't have to add either an inverter or the extra batteries.

Feel free to ask your questions.  The only "dumb" questions are those that don't get asked and then one has to deal with either an expensive or a time consuming mistake.

Terry

First let me say we are both minimalist by nature. So our 33'8" rig with a queen bed and 9 cuft LP / AC refrigerator works great for us. We can get just about any place we want including most older state and national parks. We also went with a Splendide washer dryer one piece unit that only needs 120 V electric and uses less water which reduces the amount of power require to do the laundry and frees up more space for inside storage. Power needs can now be minimal if needed so we can get by easily on 30 Amp service, unless we want to run both AC's which is not often.

One size does not fit all, so you will need to look first hand and determine what fits you best. Also remember the bigger the rig, the bigger the truck needed to safely handle it in all situations. The tow rating of the rig does not necessarily mean it can stop it quickly or provide good stability in cross winds or down hill situations.

Just some information from someone who decided to stay a little shorter and are quite please with the choice.

We are different. We would choose the smallest practical size for our use. We would also avoid RV refrigerators that are located in the slide since leveling can be problematic. When considering a refrigerator, the larger ones will be more expensive (suggest you price a replacement) and more of a hassle to replace and they do have a shorter lifespan than residential refrigerators. For a family of 4, an 8 cu ft worked fine for us with room to spare and it seems the space in the RV frig is much more efficient for some reason that I just can't figure out.

In today’s rigs I’m not sure what difference it makes whether a refrigerator is in a slide or not as pertains to leveling.  Never seen this to be a problem.  If you level the rig the slide should be level if the rig is properly constructed – even the kitchen slide.  If it is not, I’d consider another rig.

With that said, back in days past (back when “slides” were actually referred to as “tip outs”) it was true some slides had to have outside jack supports to keep them from sagging which, to some extent, can cause a leveling issue for the refrigerator different from the coach.  But I’ve never seen that to be the case with rigs manufactured in the last, say, 15 odd years.  I'm referring to 5th wheels.  Not super light weight tag trailers which are not as likely to have a refrigerator in a slide.  Naturally you mileage may vary.

BTW, Cathy, nice to see you back on the forum

Maxine,

I would suggest you prioritize the positives and negatives of a 31' versus 38' RV. The length difference will make a difference where you can stay and they type of options you can incorporate.

If staying in National Parks/State Parks (versus staying at a campground near by) is important to you, than 31' will have some significant positives. If you value comforts/conveniences such as the King bed and other items such as larger refrigerator, clothes washer and dryer, dishwasher --all of these items do take up some space/add weight and can be positives (i.e., this is your house). But at the end of the day, everyone priorities things differently.

We personally ended up with a 40' (plus a couple inches) to address our prioritized list (e.g., King Bed, residential refrigerator, clothes washer and dryer, dishwasher). Although it would simplify some of our park/campground searches if we were smaller -- when we are sitting in the coach (and using the options we incorporated), we would not have the coach any smaller (or larger for that matter).

Lynn

Another welcome, merlins. It sounds like you have settled on one of two coaches. Since there are only so many ways to arrange the interior of a box, might I suggest that you step back a bit and look at all sorts of floor plans. Pretend to do your everyday activities ("wash" dishes, "take" a shower, "watch" tv, etc.) to see what really fits your needs and wants. Jo Ann and I moved from a double bed to a queen a few years ago, and that seemed huge to us. On a recent work trip we had a hotel room with a king, and we didn't care for it. For us, a queen with two nightstands is the way to go. Your needs and wants may vary. We replaced out RV refrigerator (it died) with an apartment-sized residential one. I think it is about 10 cu. ft. and it works well for the two of us. A little larger would have been helpful, but we couldn't find one that would go through the door.

Where you are going will influence the length of coach you can use. If you regularly go to older parks you might find that smaller is better. If some of your favorite parks are reasonably close to you (half a day's drive) go out and see what's there. Ask the owners of some of the longer rigs how difficult it is the maneuver them. If your favorite places are farther away, ask here whether anyone has been there with a larger rig.

Be sure to check the weight capacities of your truck before you buy a coach. If you're going to buy a new truck get the weights of the heaviest coach you are considering and use those numbers to spec the new truck.

As an aside comment that is in regard to "making changes," check the widths of door opening spaces.  Since an RV door generally will open back against the outside wall, most cases will see that the opening of a door will be limited in comparison to a regular home.  In our Mobile Suites, ours is about a 28" opening, but we were able to remove the doors from an 18 cubic foot Samsung refrigerator that we bought to replace the 13 cubic foot RV-style refrigerator.  We didn't have any problems with getting that refrigerator through the door.  It was the same by buying a La-Z-Boy Reclinaway love seat recliner to replace the two small "stock" recliners that came with the coach.  All we had to do to get the love seat through the door was remove the backs.

If one decides to replace furniture or appliances, it really pays to measure carefully to see what will fit through the door, otherwise one might have to remove large windows to get the stuff inside.

Terry