Was looking for a quality built diesel-pusher motorhome AND it had to be aluminum skinned(preference because of my A&P mechanic/aviation background), with a 250 hp Cummins, Gillig chassis, and an Allison 5-6 spd. I had narrowed the search down to Beaver, Foretravel, Hawkins, and Wanderlodge("the Bird"). Beavers are well built, but the coaches of the '90's were fiberglass. Most choices on that wish list meant purchasing an older coach with a lot of miles. Just didn't fit my budget. I liked the "Bird" construction but wasn't fond of the 3208 "up~front". Didn't want a Detroit powerplant in the rear either. And then, during my extensive research, I came upon a company called "Barth". This seemed to be what I was looking for. I found this wonderful website(Barthmobile) and thus began the "wait" for a Barth that met my criteria(was patient for almost two years). I know... was a tall order to expect to find that particular combination.
Found what would become our "Breakaway XL" listed for sale in GA(coach had originally been in California). Drove over from Columbus Ga and secured purchase. Worked on it for a couple of months to bring it up to speed,(tires, fluid changes, etc.) and took to the road for 6 months. During that time, I had a job offer I couldn't refuse and so, our full-timing came to a close.
Pained me to see the Barth "sitting" for most of the year, so advertised it for sale(on Barthmobile), and it sold in three days. Well, as it goes, missed it immensely, and had to have to have it back, so ended up buying it back from the same guy who had purchased it from me two years earlier. Keep in mind that I "knew this coach" inside and out from having spent so many hours working on it. I thought there would be minimal surprises having her back. With the exception of a rotting, falling apart entrance door that the PO didn't tell me about, I was happy to have the Breakaway sitting in my driveway once again.
I originally paid $23K. Between keeping up with maintenance/upgrades $$ and the $$ the previous PO put into it, another $15K has been invested. This included tires again, new fridge, starter, batteries, A/C unit, flooring, couch reupholstered, complete painting of the interior, relays, entrance door overhaul, windshield, vacuum pump, headlight relay mod, resolved wiring issues, etc. etc. and countless hours of labor. Put 8K miles on it this past year(164 miles total now), and the tranny and engine performed flawlessly. Had a few minor component failures, but nothing I couldn't handle in campgrounds with my two "loaded" tool boxes that I brought along. I'm probably the only Barth pilot on Barthmobile that is a "repeat~owner". Would I do it all over again.....without hesitation! Our Breakaway challenges me at times, but I've been able to perform all the maintenance on her(except tires) to date. Have received some wonderful, insightful guidance from folks on here,(Kevin, Ed, Steve VW, Rusty, etc.), that have held my hand through some of the more involved, "head-scratchers". My wife and I are "happy~campers" with our big aluminum box on wheels!

"164K total miles on it now"

Iwas looking to relocate to Fla from TX and I didnt want a house and Ive always wanted to live in an RV vs renting a house , To me I would rather rent a shop and live in an RV , being in the Navy for 8 years I like to be mobile and I dont need a lot of creature comforts . So I got to looking online in FLA for RVs and campers . I stumbled on this barth and I knew nothing about them , googling I found this site and found they are 1 of the best built motorhomes and being a 454/th400 I knew it was the choice . price was far, I contacted the guy and he responded but seemed a little shy, come to find out he thought I was a scammer, but after I kept him updated as my travels down here progressed , I met with his today and checked it out. 10 min after I got their and pulled the air cleaner lid off I had it running, he said about 12 so called RV techs had been to look at it and couldnt get it running, just needed few swigs of fuel in the float bowl and sometime running it started pulling fuel on its own , i hit the switch and it ran from both tanks so that checked out but the fuel is really old and it really pings . so once I find some tires I will be back and hope to drive it home, if anyone has installed a rear hitch please let me know.

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I am not sure why the above pictures are bigger than my screen. Is anyone else having this problem? If I view the pictures on an iPad, the pictures appear perfect, but the word part of the posting is too small to read. Does anyone have a fix for this?

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I am not sure why the above pictures are bigger than my screen. Is anyone else having this problem?

Kevin , Same on my samsung chromebook .

Bob

Well I have having a hell of a time finding someone to transport this frigging thing, I've wasted way too much money staying in hotels and not living in my Barth , the main reason I bought the damn thing. Thought I had a guy lined up today , was going to meet him at 1 at the site, so I drove 2 hours to Melbourne and wouldn't you know he never showed, couldn't get a response from text and wouldn't answer the phone, I guess some people dont want to earn money. found yet another guy but he might not be able to get to it till Friday so Its another 2 days in a motel.... Im tired of wasting money.

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Originally posted by Jim_Rockford007:
Well I have having a hell of a time finding someone to transport this frigging thing, I've wasted way too much money staying in hotels and not living in my Barth , the main reason I bought the damn thing. Thought I had a guy lined up today , was going to meet him at 1 at the site, so I drove 2 hours to Melbourne and wouldn't you know he never showed, couldn't get a response from text and wouldn't answer the phone, I guess some people dont want to earn money. found yet another guy but he might not be able to get to it till Friday so Its another 2 days in a motel.... Im tired of wasting money.

Jim sooner or later you need tires, sooner might be the best bet!!

Not to raise anybody's hackles, but I'm thinking Phil might have been pretty lucky. He even called to tell me he got the Euro home with no problems and is really happy. Sorry you aren't having the same kind of luck Jim, hope it gets better soon.

I have no doubt it would make it mechanically I just dont trust the tires on the 40 mile strech of 192 between melbourne and st. cloud uploaded my start up vid on my youtube page today . https://youtu.be/ECOQAxKa8a4

BTW yesterday while I was waiting on the tow guy that never showed the guy I bought it from brought out a huge 3 ring binder with a pile o paperwork in it, upon a quick glance I found this was bought used in Austin ,TX after the owner traded his holiday rambler in for it .

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Well I lucked up maybe and found a killer deal on a set of 8rx19.5 chinese tires, they where brand new and have been in storage since 2013 , guy bought them for his dads motorhome and it wound up burning to the ground right in te front yard before they could have them installed so I bought them for 400 bucks . I got discouraged and put the barth up for sale, had alot of people called and I started talking with a guy over in Christmas that really wanted it and was thinking of trading a 83 27ft Alumalite rv he had fixed up. but after he came and looked at mine he thought the interior was in a little better shape, so I moved on to the next buyer and they liked it and only had one stipulation that If it would make it 9 miles down the road to the tire shop they would buy it, but the next morning the called and backed out.
So I took that as a sign it was ment for me to keep it. Me and te first guy had a lot of stuff in common and we have become friends, so he offered to let me bring my wheels and tires over and we mounted them for free on his tire machine,so yesterday I went over drained a good 15 gallons of bad gas out of the front tank, replaced the soft and rotted 5/16ths fuel line and filter withthe correct 3/8ths line and a ne filter, bypassing the tank selector valve and a cheapo elecric fuel pump I wasnt even sure worked and went right from the tank to the 3/8ths frame hard line that runs tot he engine. fired it up and made a few passes back and forth down the block and it ran better and better every pass.
After all that I jacked the old girl up and removed all the wheels and loaded everything up in my truck and headed to my new friends house and we got them all mounted up last night. so now I just have to get them balanced and reinstalled. Wish I had the time to sand blast and paint the rins, but I need t get it on the road, Did find something interesting, One of the wheels was a new riveted stle that was 6 3/4 wide instead of 6 so I need to go look at the spare that I have and maybe swap the tire to that rim instead. I would post pics but I'll just post a link to my Imagur site .

View post on imgur.com

<script async src="//s.imgur.com/min/embed.js" charset="utf-8">

and My youtube handle is CsxRockford

Well she made her maiden voyage the other day from Melbourne to my buddies house outside Christmas off 250 ... roughly 28 miles and because I didnt fix clean the carb she was not happy. did find someone had the dist hooked to manifold vacuum and it was at 28 degrees btdc at idle..lol so for now I unplugged it and capped it off. Im looking at installing a Fitech system so I dont have to worry about dealing with sticking floats, over fueling, and hope to increase the life of this 454 . seems like it wants to run but being lean from the dirty carb was really holding it back.

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Im looking at installing a Fitech system so I dont have to worry about dealing with sticking floats, over fueling, and hope to increase the life of this 454 . seems like it wants to run but being lean from the dirty carb was really holding it back.

TBI is the best way to go, I would look at the New Holley system also seems more compact and cheaper. My bet, if you just replace the filter in the Rochester carburetor you may see a bunch of improvement. Just that few miles probably does not get it hot enough to start a vapor lock, takes about an hour in my Barth.

I read where you removed an electric fuel pump, best bet if you keep the carburetor is to replace that pump and add an inline filter. I assume you have a recirculating fuel system like mine.

Also the Generator runs off the back fuel tank and it needs to be about halfway full to get gas. Happy Trails

No it was stalling so I removed the filter in the carb , helped but the carb was nasty inside, , I removed it and took it apart at my buddies place, I love q jets on my hpotrods, but for traveling , fuel injection is going to be the way to go,the one main reason is the engines last so much longer because the rings are not washed down from over fueling. I plane on living in this and I when I want to get up and leave a place , I want to leave, Far as the current fuel system I replaced all the rubber line, added a new filter before the pump and the tank Im running off of is aluminum so I dont need to worry about rust, Inspected the filter after this drive and its pretty clean, I drained alot of old gas out of the tank. and the outlets are a the very bottom near the back of the tank. I will be updating the system as I go along.

I wonder if that was a replacement fuel tank sure is different than mine, mine has a dip stick pickup with a sock I guess, no way to get to the top of the tank without removing the steel tank or cutting a hole in the floor of the coach. Nice upgrade!

If I were a rich man I would go TBI for sure.