Sneak Peak at Our Next RV

Jennifer and I are super geeked. We will soon have a brand new Roadtrek. This decision has been a long time in the making. But our love for off-the-grid boondocking and the new innovations in Roadtrek technology – plus an unbeatable deal from American RV in Grand Rapids, MI – led me to the Roadtrek factory in Kitchener, Ontario Canada to get a sneak peek at our still-under-construction coach.

The new unit is a new CS Adventurous on the XL, or Extended Length, Sprinter chassis. Roadtrek President Jim Hammill gave me a guided look what Jennifer and I will soon be driving. You can see it in the accompanying video.

Now I can’t share everything about some of the things we will have on this unit just yet. Especially when it comes to the lithium batteries and some of the details about the Roadtrek  power management system. All that will be revealed in a couple of weeks at the big Recreational Vehicle Industry Association National Trade Show  in Louisville, KY.

But one thing you can see very clearly is that we have a lot more solar. In fact, the entire roof, except for an opening for the fan, is covered in solar. I'll get some three times more than the 240 watts on our current Etrek. How did they get all those solar panels up there? By locating the air conditioner somewhere other than the rooftop.

Our unit is the new Champagne pearl color with an ebony interior. It will have black leather seats and that XL feature – which adds another almost 16 inches of space on the back. I'll use it to store all by photo, blogging and podcasting gear.

If you check out the video, you can see them installing a new option we will have, a powered rear cabinet that lets you access some of that extra rear space from from the inside of the coach.

We have some custom design work we'll have done on this unit. Roadtrek, as you know, is a major sponsor of this blog and we'll also be adding some special technology that I need to be able to send my videos and podcasts to the net. We'll have a small remote podcast studio set up in the coach. Some of these items are still being developed and we'll serve as a sort of test bed for them as well. I'll show as much as I can so you'll see what's coming.

Jennifer and I will also be at the Louisville RVIA show the first week of December, reporting on new Roadtrek innovations being revealed at the show. I'll have a report here on the blog and in my Wednesday Roadtreking RV Podcast next week that will give you a preview of an entirely new model that will soon be added to the Roadtrek lineup.

As for our new CS Adventurous, our  plans are to return to Kitchener the week after Louisville to spend a couple of days setting up the interior just right for our journalistic needs. We'll actually take possession of the van shortly afterwards from American RV in Grand Rapids, which will take our current Roadtrek Etrek in on trade.

This is going to be a great Christmas present. And we can't wait to get traveling in 2015.

 

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