My guess is that an rv that is exercised on a weekly basis will incur lower repair costs and be more reliable in the long run? Fact or fiction just wanting others input. Yearly fixed maintenance costs I would assume would be similar. A few bucks a month to get it up to operating temps and even spending a night a week in the coach would be beneficial. Wife thinks that putting it up on a golden pristine pedestal is good. All opinions welcome. I have not bought the foretravel yet, but from my research it's a very well built unit, and older units offer a lot of bang for a buck. While still keeping a slush fund for the unknowns, and the avoidance of excessive property taxes. This forum is very insightful and I thank all contributions from the members.
My coach goes on the road every two weeks for a minimum of a twenty mile loop. All systems are running, Aqua hot , generator, both A/Cs. I have very few problems and I truly believe it is because of this practice. I keep a log and make notes etc of anything that needs to be "watched" or repaired. Exercise is good for you and your coach too.
regular use and exercise in general is thought to lead to less maintenance overall required of the unit. Myriad reasons for this potentially, but a coach that sits also can have little things go unnoticed that can become very big things over time. Most of those events deal with water in some form or fashion.
You are on the right track
The same for us humans. If we don't move it we lose it. We need to exercise and move in order to stay fit or we will deteriorate . Our coaches needs to be exercised .
John
In thirty years of running two coaches, I never exercised them, kept them plugged in and had zero problems. The last coach before this one had over 250K when we had to retire her (rear-ended). As others have said, "warming it up" without a load every two weeks is doing more damage than just sitting.
After long term non running storage it is recommended to turn over the engine without starting it for 30 seconds.
How to do it? No idea
Fuel solenoid?
Just turning the engine over without running helps for long term non use. The valves that are open will after time set the springs. The '81 Foertravel I have had been parked in a trailer park with full hook-ups for 3 years. Unknown to me when I purchased it the generator had not been used during that time. My first trip out it started missing and being all electric it was needed. I determined which cyl was missing and guessed wrong that it was just a bad injector. It would keep rpm and run the inverter charger so I let it run. About an hour later it blew up. Turns out that one of the valve springs had set and dropped a keeper that was the miss. Eventually the valve dropped into the cylinder and met the piston head on. being a wet sleeve engine helped some. replaced block, cam, 2 roller injectors, 2 valves, one cylinder and piston set one connecting rod. This happened in 1994 it has run ever since the repair, but I do turn it over if it isn't started after a month or so.