It is a Cougar 26RBS and I don't know where the "L" came from at the end...
Yes, this is a LONG post... Read on!
We purchased this camper from Camping World a few weeks before Memorial Day. Brand new 2023 Cougar 26RBS! This is a camper with a list price of $65,000 and was on end of model year clearance for $51,000.00 to make room for the 2024 models.
We had given our sales person a list of what we were looking for in a camper. She showed us 6 or 7 and we came back to this one. When we first looked at it there was no water heater in it, just a big hole with the statement that the original one had some kind of issue and a brand new one was being sent. We also had to step around the valance that goes over the slide-out that was sitting on the floor because it was being repaired/adjusted. We were told that something had happened to it during transit.
We went back the following week, looked at it one more time before committing to purchase. Wanted to make sure the slider was back together and the water heater was in the hole where it belonged.
First thing that happened was when they backed my truck up to the camper to install the WDH, the electric jack on the camper would not operate. They figured it was a fuse or bad connection, or something. Went inside, did the paperwork while our hitch was adjusted to the camper. Then went out to do our walk-around with the man that usually does that.
Next thing that happened was he could not access the In-Command panel. Had to reset it by holding the power button and it rebooted/reset. He said it was a fluke and probably happened due to all the work being done on it to prepare it for us taking it home.
We were the last appointment of the day. After we did the paperwork we were told to go do a little shopping and someone would come and find us when the camper was ready to take home. 6PM closing time came and went. The girl in the store said that they were actually closed now. We brought our items to the counter and told her that we were still waiting for someone to come tell us that we were good to go. Never happened and one of the other employees brought us out through the garage area to our camper. It was not hooked to my truck, doors and compartments were still open on the camper so I had to close it up and connect to my truck myself. Not a biggie as I have owned campers for 15 years.
In starting the hookup process I immediately noticed that the brown propane tank cover was broken on one side. It was now after 6 PM. All the doors were locked, lights off and everybody had gone home. I did send a picture of the damage to the sales person right then... crickets as in "No response". Funny, she had been very attentive and responsive before the sale and would respond within minutes to any question or concern. I used a piece of metal, some pop-rivets and fixed the propane tank cover myself. No offer was made to replace it.
Got the camper home and set it up in the yard. My wife and I decided to sleep in it over the weekend as it was supposed to be very rainy with downpours predicted. What better way to see how the camper sleeps in the rain! Our TrailManor was very LOUD inside during heavy rain and made it hard to sleep.
I was pleased to find that the noise level in the Cougar was super low!
Now for the list of things that have been found broken, defective, not put together properly with just plain laziness and stupid stuff.
That first night sleeping in it, the rain was coming down hard. I went into the bathroom and discovered water trickling in at a good pace through the vent fan, dripping on to and in to the medicine cabinet and making a puddle on the sink counter. I have video of it! I got some cardboard, made a "V" shape, then lined it with aluminum foil. I put this under where the water was coming in to divert it into the shower.
Next day I got up on the roof and discovered that the plastic attic vents had been broken at the factory when they were installed, then the rubber membrane was installed over the cracked vents and the white sealant poured around the vent to seal the membrane to the outside edge of the vent. With the cracks in the vent plastic the rain water ran through the cracks and followed the roof under the membrane to the bathroom vent where the water ran through the hole for the vent. That vent was sealed to the membrane but the water was running under the membrane. Sloppy work, lazy person that broke the plastic vents and didn't bother to get new ones. I went to Walmart and bought a can of white Flex Seal so my camper wall, medicine cabinet and floor wouldn't get ruined! I took pictures of how the vents were installed before I sealed them up.
While in stocking feet, I stepped into the shower. I found the floor of the shower was very soft and spongy in a large area just inside the doors around the drain. The rest of the shower floor was firm and solid. I did NOT like how it felt so I opened the access panel under the shower enclosure to look underneath. More stupidity! Who ever installed that shower cut a HUGE HOLE in the plywood base around where the drain goes. It is 12 to 14 inches in diameter, WAY too big of a hole resulting in no support for the shower enclosure floor. It SHOULD have been just big enough of a hole cut in the plywood to accommodate the shower drain and even that should have been supported properly. I did NOT want to be replacing the shower enclosure due to no support of the unit floor. I found some pieces of wood and 2x4's and put some support under that area of the shower. Now, when you walk on the shower floor, it doesn't feel like you are going to go right through the plastic. Very poor, shoddy workmanship at the factory. Somebody need some retraining on things!
When having the camper perform the "Self Leveling" it would end up with the front of the camper 5 inches higher than the rear and indicate that it was level. You walked down hill to get to the bathroom! It turns out this was just a matter of setting the Zero Point in the system. There is nothing in the literature as to how to do this. It would have been really nice if Camping World had done that initially AND shown us how to do it if the setting should be lost. We were not shown how nor had the self leveling system explained, as with MANY features of the camper. The man that did the walk through could not answer some of my questions like how many gallons of fresh water does the camper have? Depending on where you look on online or videos you watch it was either 55, 56, 58 or 60 gallons of fresh water. I THINK this one has the 56 gallon tank, I THINK! The guy said that he demonstrates every camper that is sold and nobody can know everything about every camper. He then said "YouTube is your friend" when you need to know something about the camper. THAT is poor in itself! We did get a number of pieces of information from him that turned out to be not true.
Took the unit camping over Memorial Day weekend and another trip 3 weeks later. This is what I found or had happen over the 2 trips.
Put the bedroom steps down the first trip and found every screw was sitting 1/4 inch from the plate securing it to the floor. Figured the screws just didn't get tightened down all the way. Nope! Discovered that who ever installed the steps used self drilling tip screws designed for metal to secure the steps to the flooring. The WRONG SCREWS had pulled out! Had to reinstall the screws and got the CORRECT screws when I got home to properly attach to the floor.
Screen door for the rear entrance would not latch. Found that every single hinge screw in the frame on the door was stripped out allowing the screen door to just flop around on the hinge. When I got home I first tried finding larger screws. No luck so I drilled holes and installed bolts with lock washers and nuts. Had to do the same on a few of the bedroom door screen mounting screws.
Found that the In-Command panel on the wall by the door is totally unreliable. I can tap the screen to wake it up, enter my access code but after that it goes unresponsive. I have to hold the POWER button until the screen glows a slight blue color, then it reboots and will usually work after that. The man at Camping World had the same thing happen when he was showing us how things worked. I have done some research and see where others have the same trouble. They believe to have found that interference from a cell phone can cause loss of communication from the panel to the head unit or a defective panel or head unit. Just about EVERYTHING is controlled by the computer and you can do almost nothing without the In-Command system. I just use the app on my cell phone to control things which always seems to work. There was a firmware update for the unit, once I connected it to a WiFi connection. Hoped that would fix the issue but it did not.
The plastic back splash behind the kitchen sink was bowed away from the wall and starting to fall off. I looked behind to see what was going on and found that whoever installed the piece had run out of glue and there was very little there to hold the plastic on. I purchased some spray adhesive and attached the back splash to the wall properly. Poor workmanship!
When listening to the radio or TV through the overhead speakers, they sounded like crap. Very bad rattle and raspy sound. I took the screws out of the first one by the bathroom and found it was full of sawdust. Who ever cut the holes in the ceiling to mount the speakers never cleaned the sawdust out. And, to top it off, they used drill tip screws. WRONG SCREWS!! Either WOOD SCREWS or SHEET METAL SCREWS are what you use in wood paneling!
I was under the camper installing an outdoor sensor for a thermometer. While under there I was horrified to find that the leveling jack on the front passenger side was not even secured to the camper on one side!!! One of the bolts on the inboard side that holds the unit to the camper had already had the nut, washer and lock washer fall off with the carriage bolt just sitting in the hole. The other one that was still there was literally just 1 turn from falling off the end of the bolt! Whoever installed the jack on that side NEVER TIGHTENED ALL THE FREAKING NUTS!!! Fortunately I had tools and tightened the nut that was still there, then I obtained a new nut, washer and lock washer for the one that was missing. I shouldn't have had to do that!!
When I was breaking down camp in preparation to head back home, my TANKS display on both my phone and In-Command panel indicated that my Black 1 was 2/3 full, Gray 1 was completely full and Gray 2 was 2/3 full. I had water rapidly dripping from around the hole where the Grey 2 discharge was. Evidently there is a leak in the tank or pipes going to it.
After I drained the Black 1, Grey 1 and Grey 2, the tank level indicators said that Black 1 and Gray 2 still were 2/3 full yet nothing came out the discharges. 3 days after we returned home the tank indicators then said the tanks were empty.
This unit has the built in black tank shower to flush out the solids when you are done camping. Great feature! Memorial Day trip I connected my hose to the fitting for the Black 1 shower, turned the water on and had water spraying from the fitting. Nothing I did stopped this. When I got home I found there was no rubber gasket in the fitting. Purchased some and installed in the fitting.
Next camping trip a few weeks later, drained my black tank, hooked up my hose, waited until the flow almost stopped, then turned the water on. The hose got stiff, nothing came out of the black discharge. I turned off the water, loosened the hose and got soaked by a pressurized amount of water spraying from around the black shower fitting. I checked to make sure there was nothing blocking the opening, tried the shower a second time and again had nothing going into the black tank shower system and again got soaked when I disconnected the hose. I have seen on this forum where others have had this same thing happen and it is caused by some in attentive person at the factory that managed to crush the water line going to the black tank shower. Laziness, inattentiveness or stupidity. Don't know which...
Looking at the tail lights on the camper I found one of them is not right. They are LED and one of them is defective. The one on the drivers side is symmetrically lighted where the one on the passenger side has an odd pattern that is not like the other one. Some LED's are bright all the time.
The last camping trip we were sitting in the recliners. Suddenly I heard a BANG come from the bedroom. I found that the piece of wood that the hydraulic lifting piston for the storage under the bed had popped off the bottom of the plywood cover. Who ever installed the pistons only put the mounting block on with 4 wire staples and didn't use any wood glue. The staples let go. If you are going to use staples then you MUST use wood glue. Now I get to reinstall the mounting block and put screws in it like it should have been done at the factory.
The seats at the kitchen dinette will not stay in place. The base was made just a little too small for the seat cushion to set down into the lip. Or it could the plywood that the seat was made from was cut just a little too big. If people sit at the table the seat slides around under their butt if they move at all. They also fall on the floor during travel. I have some rubber feet that I am going to mount to the bottom of the seats to keep them in place. Sloppy workmanship.
We have only camped twice and the last trip the Theater Recliner Seats started sliding around on the floor. One side was no longer secured to the floor. I got underneath and discovered that who ever installed the seats only used ONE screw on the left and ONE screw on the right front of the chairs. These screws have very small heads on them and one of them had pulled right through the metal slot on the chair. MORE screws should have been used with either BIGGER HEADS or at the very least, WASHERS of an appropriate size and diameter so the chair unit stay secured to the floor! Sloppy workmanship or laziness.
The USB port on the drivers side bedroom wall doesn't work unless you hold down on the plug. The one on the other side works as it should.
The refrigerator door wouldn't latch properly and I had to adjust it so it stayed closed.
Don't get me wrong. We LOVE this camper and enjoy showing it off. We DO NOT like the STUPID things that were not done right by people at the factory. But when you pay this much money for a camper because you want the added "quality" that Keystone normally delivers, it kind of pisses you off that somebody at the factory did not do their job and now others have to do things to correct shoddy work from employees at the factory.
Camping World knows about most of these issues. I haven't told them about the most recent issues. This unit is still under warranty and we purchased the extended warranty. I will NOT have my camper sitting at Camping World for weeks on end waiting for repairs to be done. I have scheduled camping trips to go on and the summer camping season in NH is short. They will get this camper to work on at the end of the season which will be after Columbus Day.
Not sure if anybody from Keystone ever reads the posts on this forum. My post would be a good one for them to be aware of. The people at Camping World said they are definitley going to let Keystone know the issues with my camper. They should have record of WHO exactly worked on WHAT so the problems can be addressed.
Way too much money to spend to have these issues and problems! That's what Camping World told me as well as my disappointed wife!
People have told me that by all rights Camping World, Keystone or the extended warranty company SHOULD PAY ME for all the repairs I have had to do so far to this camper in the little over a month that we have owned it.
Going camping again NEXT weekend. I am going to have FUN and ENJOY my trip, and cross my fingers that nothing else breaks, falls a part or...
Yes, this is a LONG post... Read on!
We purchased this camper from Camping World a few weeks before Memorial Day. Brand new 2023 Cougar 26RBS! This is a camper with a list price of $65,000 and was on end of model year clearance for $51,000.00 to make room for the 2024 models.
We had given our sales person a list of what we were looking for in a camper. She showed us 6 or 7 and we came back to this one. When we first looked at it there was no water heater in it, just a big hole with the statement that the original one had some kind of issue and a brand new one was being sent. We also had to step around the valance that goes over the slide-out that was sitting on the floor because it was being repaired/adjusted. We were told that something had happened to it during transit.
We went back the following week, looked at it one more time before committing to purchase. Wanted to make sure the slider was back together and the water heater was in the hole where it belonged.
First thing that happened was when they backed my truck up to the camper to install the WDH, the electric jack on the camper would not operate. They figured it was a fuse or bad connection, or something. Went inside, did the paperwork while our hitch was adjusted to the camper. Then went out to do our walk-around with the man that usually does that.
Next thing that happened was he could not access the In-Command panel. Had to reset it by holding the power button and it rebooted/reset. He said it was a fluke and probably happened due to all the work being done on it to prepare it for us taking it home.
We were the last appointment of the day. After we did the paperwork we were told to go do a little shopping and someone would come and find us when the camper was ready to take home. 6PM closing time came and went. The girl in the store said that they were actually closed now. We brought our items to the counter and told her that we were still waiting for someone to come tell us that we were good to go. Never happened and one of the other employees brought us out through the garage area to our camper. It was not hooked to my truck, doors and compartments were still open on the camper so I had to close it up and connect to my truck myself. Not a biggie as I have owned campers for 15 years.
In starting the hookup process I immediately noticed that the brown propane tank cover was broken on one side. It was now after 6 PM. All the doors were locked, lights off and everybody had gone home. I did send a picture of the damage to the sales person right then... crickets as in "No response". Funny, she had been very attentive and responsive before the sale and would respond within minutes to any question or concern. I used a piece of metal, some pop-rivets and fixed the propane tank cover myself. No offer was made to replace it.
Got the camper home and set it up in the yard. My wife and I decided to sleep in it over the weekend as it was supposed to be very rainy with downpours predicted. What better way to see how the camper sleeps in the rain! Our TrailManor was very LOUD inside during heavy rain and made it hard to sleep.
I was pleased to find that the noise level in the Cougar was super low!
Now for the list of things that have been found broken, defective, not put together properly with just plain laziness and stupid stuff.
That first night sleeping in it, the rain was coming down hard. I went into the bathroom and discovered water trickling in at a good pace through the vent fan, dripping on to and in to the medicine cabinet and making a puddle on the sink counter. I have video of it! I got some cardboard, made a "V" shape, then lined it with aluminum foil. I put this under where the water was coming in to divert it into the shower.
Next day I got up on the roof and discovered that the plastic attic vents had been broken at the factory when they were installed, then the rubber membrane was installed over the cracked vents and the white sealant poured around the vent to seal the membrane to the outside edge of the vent. With the cracks in the vent plastic the rain water ran through the cracks and followed the roof under the membrane to the bathroom vent where the water ran through the hole for the vent. That vent was sealed to the membrane but the water was running under the membrane. Sloppy work, lazy person that broke the plastic vents and didn't bother to get new ones. I went to Walmart and bought a can of white Flex Seal so my camper wall, medicine cabinet and floor wouldn't get ruined! I took pictures of how the vents were installed before I sealed them up.
While in stocking feet, I stepped into the shower. I found the floor of the shower was very soft and spongy in a large area just inside the doors around the drain. The rest of the shower floor was firm and solid. I did NOT like how it felt so I opened the access panel under the shower enclosure to look underneath. More stupidity! Who ever installed that shower cut a HUGE HOLE in the plywood base around where the drain goes. It is 12 to 14 inches in diameter, WAY too big of a hole resulting in no support for the shower enclosure floor. It SHOULD have been just big enough of a hole cut in the plywood to accommodate the shower drain and even that should have been supported properly. I did NOT want to be replacing the shower enclosure due to no support of the unit floor. I found some pieces of wood and 2x4's and put some support under that area of the shower. Now, when you walk on the shower floor, it doesn't feel like you are going to go right through the plastic. Very poor, shoddy workmanship at the factory. Somebody need some retraining on things!
When having the camper perform the "Self Leveling" it would end up with the front of the camper 5 inches higher than the rear and indicate that it was level. You walked down hill to get to the bathroom! It turns out this was just a matter of setting the Zero Point in the system. There is nothing in the literature as to how to do this. It would have been really nice if Camping World had done that initially AND shown us how to do it if the setting should be lost. We were not shown how nor had the self leveling system explained, as with MANY features of the camper. The man that did the walk through could not answer some of my questions like how many gallons of fresh water does the camper have? Depending on where you look on online or videos you watch it was either 55, 56, 58 or 60 gallons of fresh water. I THINK this one has the 56 gallon tank, I THINK! The guy said that he demonstrates every camper that is sold and nobody can know everything about every camper. He then said "YouTube is your friend" when you need to know something about the camper. THAT is poor in itself! We did get a number of pieces of information from him that turned out to be not true.
Took the unit camping over Memorial Day weekend and another trip 3 weeks later. This is what I found or had happen over the 2 trips.
Put the bedroom steps down the first trip and found every screw was sitting 1/4 inch from the plate securing it to the floor. Figured the screws just didn't get tightened down all the way. Nope! Discovered that who ever installed the steps used self drilling tip screws designed for metal to secure the steps to the flooring. The WRONG SCREWS had pulled out! Had to reinstall the screws and got the CORRECT screws when I got home to properly attach to the floor.
Screen door for the rear entrance would not latch. Found that every single hinge screw in the frame on the door was stripped out allowing the screen door to just flop around on the hinge. When I got home I first tried finding larger screws. No luck so I drilled holes and installed bolts with lock washers and nuts. Had to do the same on a few of the bedroom door screen mounting screws.
Found that the In-Command panel on the wall by the door is totally unreliable. I can tap the screen to wake it up, enter my access code but after that it goes unresponsive. I have to hold the POWER button until the screen glows a slight blue color, then it reboots and will usually work after that. The man at Camping World had the same thing happen when he was showing us how things worked. I have done some research and see where others have the same trouble. They believe to have found that interference from a cell phone can cause loss of communication from the panel to the head unit or a defective panel or head unit. Just about EVERYTHING is controlled by the computer and you can do almost nothing without the In-Command system. I just use the app on my cell phone to control things which always seems to work. There was a firmware update for the unit, once I connected it to a WiFi connection. Hoped that would fix the issue but it did not.
The plastic back splash behind the kitchen sink was bowed away from the wall and starting to fall off. I looked behind to see what was going on and found that whoever installed the piece had run out of glue and there was very little there to hold the plastic on. I purchased some spray adhesive and attached the back splash to the wall properly. Poor workmanship!
When listening to the radio or TV through the overhead speakers, they sounded like crap. Very bad rattle and raspy sound. I took the screws out of the first one by the bathroom and found it was full of sawdust. Who ever cut the holes in the ceiling to mount the speakers never cleaned the sawdust out. And, to top it off, they used drill tip screws. WRONG SCREWS!! Either WOOD SCREWS or SHEET METAL SCREWS are what you use in wood paneling!
I was under the camper installing an outdoor sensor for a thermometer. While under there I was horrified to find that the leveling jack on the front passenger side was not even secured to the camper on one side!!! One of the bolts on the inboard side that holds the unit to the camper had already had the nut, washer and lock washer fall off with the carriage bolt just sitting in the hole. The other one that was still there was literally just 1 turn from falling off the end of the bolt! Whoever installed the jack on that side NEVER TIGHTENED ALL THE FREAKING NUTS!!! Fortunately I had tools and tightened the nut that was still there, then I obtained a new nut, washer and lock washer for the one that was missing. I shouldn't have had to do that!!
When I was breaking down camp in preparation to head back home, my TANKS display on both my phone and In-Command panel indicated that my Black 1 was 2/3 full, Gray 1 was completely full and Gray 2 was 2/3 full. I had water rapidly dripping from around the hole where the Grey 2 discharge was. Evidently there is a leak in the tank or pipes going to it.
After I drained the Black 1, Grey 1 and Grey 2, the tank level indicators said that Black 1 and Gray 2 still were 2/3 full yet nothing came out the discharges. 3 days after we returned home the tank indicators then said the tanks were empty.
This unit has the built in black tank shower to flush out the solids when you are done camping. Great feature! Memorial Day trip I connected my hose to the fitting for the Black 1 shower, turned the water on and had water spraying from the fitting. Nothing I did stopped this. When I got home I found there was no rubber gasket in the fitting. Purchased some and installed in the fitting.
Next camping trip a few weeks later, drained my black tank, hooked up my hose, waited until the flow almost stopped, then turned the water on. The hose got stiff, nothing came out of the black discharge. I turned off the water, loosened the hose and got soaked by a pressurized amount of water spraying from around the black shower fitting. I checked to make sure there was nothing blocking the opening, tried the shower a second time and again had nothing going into the black tank shower system and again got soaked when I disconnected the hose. I have seen on this forum where others have had this same thing happen and it is caused by some in attentive person at the factory that managed to crush the water line going to the black tank shower. Laziness, inattentiveness or stupidity. Don't know which...
Looking at the tail lights on the camper I found one of them is not right. They are LED and one of them is defective. The one on the drivers side is symmetrically lighted where the one on the passenger side has an odd pattern that is not like the other one. Some LED's are bright all the time.
The last camping trip we were sitting in the recliners. Suddenly I heard a BANG come from the bedroom. I found that the piece of wood that the hydraulic lifting piston for the storage under the bed had popped off the bottom of the plywood cover. Who ever installed the pistons only put the mounting block on with 4 wire staples and didn't use any wood glue. The staples let go. If you are going to use staples then you MUST use wood glue. Now I get to reinstall the mounting block and put screws in it like it should have been done at the factory.
The seats at the kitchen dinette will not stay in place. The base was made just a little too small for the seat cushion to set down into the lip. Or it could the plywood that the seat was made from was cut just a little too big. If people sit at the table the seat slides around under their butt if they move at all. They also fall on the floor during travel. I have some rubber feet that I am going to mount to the bottom of the seats to keep them in place. Sloppy workmanship.
We have only camped twice and the last trip the Theater Recliner Seats started sliding around on the floor. One side was no longer secured to the floor. I got underneath and discovered that who ever installed the seats only used ONE screw on the left and ONE screw on the right front of the chairs. These screws have very small heads on them and one of them had pulled right through the metal slot on the chair. MORE screws should have been used with either BIGGER HEADS or at the very least, WASHERS of an appropriate size and diameter so the chair unit stay secured to the floor! Sloppy workmanship or laziness.
The USB port on the drivers side bedroom wall doesn't work unless you hold down on the plug. The one on the other side works as it should.
The refrigerator door wouldn't latch properly and I had to adjust it so it stayed closed.
Don't get me wrong. We LOVE this camper and enjoy showing it off. We DO NOT like the STUPID things that were not done right by people at the factory. But when you pay this much money for a camper because you want the added "quality" that Keystone normally delivers, it kind of pisses you off that somebody at the factory did not do their job and now others have to do things to correct shoddy work from employees at the factory.
Camping World knows about most of these issues. I haven't told them about the most recent issues. This unit is still under warranty and we purchased the extended warranty. I will NOT have my camper sitting at Camping World for weeks on end waiting for repairs to be done. I have scheduled camping trips to go on and the summer camping season in NH is short. They will get this camper to work on at the end of the season which will be after Columbus Day.
Not sure if anybody from Keystone ever reads the posts on this forum. My post would be a good one for them to be aware of. The people at Camping World said they are definitley going to let Keystone know the issues with my camper. They should have record of WHO exactly worked on WHAT so the problems can be addressed.
Way too much money to spend to have these issues and problems! That's what Camping World told me as well as my disappointed wife!
People have told me that by all rights Camping World, Keystone or the extended warranty company SHOULD PAY ME for all the repairs I have had to do so far to this camper in the little over a month that we have owned it.
Going camping again NEXT weekend. I am going to have FUN and ENJOY my trip, and cross my fingers that nothing else breaks, falls a part or...
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