Plant Tour, History and Bluegrass

Saturday, June 22nd

Today we had to get up and going early to get out to the busses for the trip to the Heartland factory. We were running late because I misplaced my cell phone, how dare it hide from me in my POCKET! Anyway, we got a lift from some friends that were driving over, and it seemed we were the last ones on the bus, because as soon as we were on, we left!

Once at the factory we heard welcomes from many of the brand managers and Coley Brady, VP of sales, then we were split up to go to a tour of a few of the assembly lines.

We chose to go on the ElkRidge tour, which was nice because there were only about 8 of us, which made for easy listening and following of the guide. He also answered lots of questions, and let us spend a long time looking at the areas of the plant. No workers were present, so we just took our time looking closely at lots of things.

Frame with holding tanks

Coaches in various states, as seen from 2nd story where roof work is done

Additional oaches in various states, as seen from 2nd story where roof work is done

The kitchen slideout from a 34QSRL

Looking into the kitchen slideout hole, into a 2014 ElkRidge 34QSRL

Walls come from another plant, ready to be put on



Cabinetry is pre-built, then installed before the walls

After the plant tours we got to go through some of the finished RVs -- a few floorplans of many brands, all hooked up to power. We really like the new Bighorn front bathroom floorplan... We had seen it in March, but they have tweaked the plan some and I like the changes. No new rig for us yet, but it would be a floorplan to consider.

After that we headed over to the RV/MH Hall of Fame Museum, where we had lunch and visited with the Heartland execs some more. They even had an open Q&A and took suggestions from the crowd. Coley said that they really take customer feedback into consideration when making changes, and they listened to a number of suggestions and responded with "that's a good idea, we are going to look into that!" Which was nice to hear.

After that, we were free to roam around the Museum, which was really interesting! If you happen to enjoy camping or RVing at all sometime in the past or currently, this museum is worth seeing.

All owners got a free t-shirt and were asked to wear them today.

Us at the RV/MH Hall of Fame

1954 HOLIDAY RAMBLER

1957 SERRO SCOTTY 12' REAR ENTRY

1967 FAN LUXURY LINER

1928 PIERCE ARROW FLEET HOUSECAR

Identified as the Privateer, it is one of only 3 models known to be produced on Pierce Arrow truck chassis before the market crash of 1929

For a virtual tour of the MH/RV Hall of Fame, click here.

Once we were done at the museum, we boarded a bus. Once the bus was full, it headed back to the fairgrounds. We returned home and took a much needed nap, then went and picked up our unsold "for sale" items. We hung around the trailer for a bit, then it was time to head to the rally hall for the final catered dinner and entertainment, a bluegrass group called Goldwing Express. They were great, but where were were seated in the rally hall, the sound was not well balanced, and was not as enjoyable. We decided also we were pretty tired, so we left early and headed back... But the weather was so nice, we decided to go on one last bike ride around the grounds. We stopped a few times to visit with folks one last time, and then went home. We took a few pics, including Eileen's, then did a few things to get ready to leave out tomorrow.

Eileen on the edge of our truck bed, just to show perspective, with just a few rigs on our row.

Eileen at Elkhart County Fairgrounds, Goshen, IN

It's been a great Rally! We had a terrific time, and very glad we came.

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