Cardinal RV Club

We are finally ready to buy a 5th-wheeler, and after enjoying living in an older Cardinal for 18 months while building our home, we decided that when we bought a 5th-wheeler for traveling, it would be a Cardinal. However, we've moved from Austin, Texas, where RV dealerships and service departments are readily available, to a remote part of Montana, where RV dealerships are few and far between, and Cardinals are not readily available. We've been unable to actually see a variety of floor plans/interiors because the dealers we've visited have either an extremely limited number of units (2 or 3), or nothing but a brochure to show us. On the other hand, Montana (by Keystone) retailers are everywhere, and there's a very large Montana/Keystone dealer and service department within 90 miles of us. While we do like the Montanas we've seen, and we've been able to see a lot of them--all the floor plans, interior options, etc.--we still like the interior and exterior of Cardinals better. We've contacted Forest River directly to see if there were any RV dealers between Dillon and Denver or between Dillon and Seattle carrying a variety of Cardinal units to look at, but apparently the closest place to us to see many Cardinals is in Oregon, and that's a 2-day drive away. The bottom line is that we surely would like to own a Cardinal, but we are concerned about getting service after the sale (as well as even finding a dealer that actually carries many Cardinal models so we could see the unit before we bought it). We never considered buying a Montana or other brand until we ran into so many problems locating Cardinals up here, so we need your expert opinions! Our question is this: Would we be making a mistake buying a Cardinal since we've had little success in finding Cardinal dealers in our state, which would also make service an issue? Love those Cardinals!

I probably won't be much help, but I bought my Cardinal from a dealer 50 miles away and i've returned once for warranty issues. My suggestion would be to talk with various independent RV techs in your new area and see if they could do factory warranty work on the Cardinal for you. Attempt to pin them down--you know--"am I last on your repair list because it's a warranty repair", etc. and see what they say. If you truly want a Cardinal (& we do love them), you will do what you have to to get one.

BTW, my local rv tech is the one who mainly persuaded me not to get a Keystone product cuz he works on them the most.

I believe several of our members use independant RV Techs for warranty work as stated above. Also several have not used a dealer at all but gone through places like RV Direct. I also note that after initial problems are detected and corrected these units are relatively trouble free from there onwards.

While you may have to travel to distant dealers to view and purchase models of interest, I have found that as a a rule most local dealers that handle Forest River products will handle warranty issues on brands they do not represent. I purchased my Cardinal from a dealer 200 miles away since our local dealer did not have the model I wanted on the lot and the local dealer has been helpful in handling warranty issues. I feel other brands are as equally as good in quality and decor but what we all are looking for when we purchase is that one brand that has the floor plan, decor, graphics and other amenities that make us happy with our purchase. Good Luck on your search and decision.

We have never had our rig back to the dealer and we are only a few miles from him. We use an rv tech that comes to our home and have been very pleased. He also does warranty work and has never put us on a waiting list. He usually comes out the next day after we call him. I'm really surprised that there aren't many Cardinal dealers in Denver or Seattle....

Good Luck with your search and I realy hope you get your Cardinal!!

You won't go wrong with a Montana. It's a very nice rig. I love my Cardinal, but I would not turn down a Montana at a good price.

We are one of those who bought our Cardinal from RVDirect -- great price and we planned to FT anyway, so wouldn't have a local dealer. We haven't had any problem having warranty work done along the way -- even at FR non-Cardinal dealers.

We had trouble finding bunkhouses in stock to look at as there weren't many dealers near us either, so we choose to go to a large RV show in Hershey, PA about 3 hours away and saw more RVs than I could ever imagine. You might want to look into upcoming RV shows in your area.

Having said that, I do agree with Mike, that Montanas are nice too -- they just didn't have a bunkhouse. Good luck with your shopping

Yahoo maps shows you near Kalispell. You have a wonderful dealer at Destination RV. We've been very happy with how we've been treated there. You can also go the the Forest River site and use their dealer locator. Like most Cardinal owners, I think they give you the most bang for your buck. Ken

Thanks for all the suggestions for finding a Cardinal dealer. We're going to check out Terry Vaughn in Texas when we're there next week, and then we'll visit Destination RV in Kalispell (Montana) when we get back home. (Thanks, Don & Sharon for the Destination RV info; when we went to the Forest River site and put in our zip for a dealer locater, only one dealer location appeared, and it wasn't Destination RV--even the FR rep who contacted us failed to mention Kalispell had a dealer. Without your info, we'd never have known about that.)

Wayne & Carolyn

Ken and Rita

Welcome to the Cardnal RV Club! Good to see new people jump in and help out. That is what has made this the great site it is.

You guys sure live in one of the most beautiful parts of our country!!

Don

I'll ditto what Don said...welcome to the club!!

We talked to the dealer in Kalispell today and definitely will make the trip there to look at his inventory. And yes, we do live in a gorgeous part of the country. We live on the southwest end of the Clark Canyou Reservoir and are surrounded by Bureau of Wildlife Management area. We can literally walk to the water from our house, or we can sit on our deck and watch the moose, elk, deer, and other critters amble through our yard (55 acres, actually). We've reached the point, however, that instead of sitting on our deck or worrying about maintenance on our home (a restored 1917 Sears & Roebuck catalog house), we'd rather downsize and travel again. So, after swearing we'd never, ever build/remodel/move again, here we are, a For Sale sign down by the cattle guard, and wearing out the Cardinal brochures until the house sells. We aren't leaving the area, however. Instead, we're building a small home with an RV pad just down the road, and will still enjoy the water, animals, and views, while being able to hit the road a lot more than we can now. We get to see a lot of pretty Cardinals go by on Interstate 15 when we're fishing in the Beaverhead River (less than 5 miles from us). If you're ever in this area and want a nice overnight stop, there are several free state campgrounds scattered around the reservoir, right on the water (take Exit 44 off I-15). If you camp at the largest of them, the one at the dam, you can fish in the lake or take a 5-minute walk to the Beaverhead, where the fly-fishing is excellent!