Thor Industries, Airstream, and Livin Lite

I've been a little obsessed with Airstreams since at least 2007 when I bought the 1973 Airstream that I full-timed in for 2.5 years. Since then I've owned three vintage Airstreams including the 1962 Airstream Safari I bought last year and just sold. I sold it because I'd maxed out what I could put into it and it still needed more work. It's an amazing trailer and it has a new owner who will continue with improvements and ensure it has additional life.

The aesthetic of an Airstream with its airplane-like aluminum body is the main appeal. But living in mine ten years ago also introduced me to a community of people who I fell in love with. The vintage crowd especially were a cool group, but I also became friends with owners of newer Airstreams.

When I decided to sell my latest Airstream I wasn't planning to get another RV, but over the last two weeks I fell down the slippery slope.

Before talking about my new trailer (yep, I bought a new one--and I mean brand new), I want to discuss Thor Industries. Thor is a company that was created in 1980 when Wade Thompson and Peter Orthwein purchased what at the time was an ailing Airstream from Beatrice Foods (which was a big conglomerate in the 1960s and 1970s). Airstream has its roots in the 1920s but officially opened in 1931. It's the only surviving brand of hundreds of travel trailer companies that existed before World War II. Under Thor, in the early 1980s, Airstream quickly returned to profitability.

And Thor itself began its rise to becoming the world's largest manufacturer of recreational vehicles. Thor took over that number one spot in the early 2000s after many acquisitions and savvy management of its growing list of subsidiaries. Today Thor dominates the RV market with 48% market share when all of its brands are added up. The number two company is called Forest River, they have 34% market share as of 2017.

I was not only infatuated with Airstreams, I was both an Airstream enthusiast and a snob. After selling my latest Airstream I ventured down to Parris RV, an SOB dealer (some other brand is what we Airstreamers call all other RVs) in Salt Lake. While there I had an epiphany. For the amount of money I had in my vintage Airstream, which I LOVED, I could have had a brand new RV. Now part of me probably knew that, but until very recently I wouldn't consider another brand unless it was some cool other vintage trailer.

A T@B. Like Airstreams (and me), made in Ohio!

I browsed the lot at Parris RV and found myself liking much of what I saw. It was T@B (Tab) trailers that drew me to that particular dealer--plus it was close to my house. But they had other brands that caught my eye. I loved the look of the Riverside Retro series--though I wasn't sure about the quality of the Riverside products. There are so many cheap RVs. With many brands you just can feel the bad or questionable quality when you step inside. (Riversides may be fine, but I wasn't feeling it).

The T@Bs were cool--they seemed very well built, but were very small. There was one T@B that was bigger (still small in the RV world but big for T@Bs) that I liked, but it was too expensive. At the end of the day I was intrigued by the Rockwood Geo-Pro. They came in a 14 foot floor plan that I liked and were very affordable. The Geo-Pro was cool, but as with the Riverside retros I was suspicious of its quality--though at that price . . . of course that's why so many cheap RVs are built and sold--because they can be made cheaply, in every sense of the word.

So I came home and started scouring the Internet. At this point I knew I was basically a goner. I'd probably be buying something.

I found out Rockwood was a Forest River brand and that Forest River settled with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for $35 million in 2015 for their shoddy work. After learning that, I was even more dubious of the quality of the very cute Geo-Pro. It may or may not be a solid product, but . . .

The RV industry is big so I figured there must be something out there that was a good product, given the price range I'd settled on. I didn't want or need a big trailer. My online search continued. I looked at the new teardrops. I considered the Minnie line by Winnebago. I considered some cool and very rugged little trailers like the Moby1 line, which is made here in Utah. As cool as the Moby1 looked, and it looks like quality too, it was just too small. I wanted small, just not that small.

So I went back to the mother ship--Thor. They own Airstream so I figured maybe one of their other brands would be worthy and in the size and budget of my search. And then I found it via Thor's website . . .

Livin Lite.

This is a brand I'd never heard of. I clicked through to Livin Lite's website from Thor's and it didn't take me too long to become smitten. Livin Lite makes all aluminum trailers, including the chassis! Even Airstreams have steel chassis and Airstreams are infamous for having rusted out chassis. Coming from the vintage world I was well aware of that problem (though I'd never dealt with it myself luckily, I have seen a number of horrifying Airstream chassis that were severely rusted out). Airstreams are also built on a wood floor, which rots. I did deal with some floor rot in my 1973 Airstream.

Livin Lite eliminated both steel and wood from their trailers creating what the founder called a "generational trailer," one that was designed to last for generations. I kept reading and looking online. Livin Lite seemed like a small company but one with a damned good product. I searched for the Utah dealer--Legacy RV.

My visit to Parris RV was on Saturday, January 27. On Tuesday, January 30 I stopped by Legacy to see Livin Lite's CampLite product. By the end of that day I'd signed the contract to buy a CampLite trailer.

This Airstreamer had fallen off the wagon!

Now back to Thor . . . and another division of theirs called KZ. I didn't know this on January 30, but it turns out KZ manages Livin Lite. Both companies are Thor subsidiaries.

As many people do when making a purchase like this, I kept researching and learning all that I could. I wasn't taking delivery until Saturday, February 3.

Late at night on February 2, I stumbled across some disturbing messages. There's a company-hosted online forum for Livin Lite products and a post dated February 1 was titled "Is Livin Lite really going out of business."

What?!?!

On the verge of making this purchase this was disturbing. Even worse, I found a Facebook owner's group where dealers were confirming this rumor. It turns out that around January 31 or February 1 dealers were notified by KZ that Livin Lite was being shut down.

Arrghhh.

Now I know many people spend a lot longer than I did doing their homework on these types of purchases, but I'd taken a pretty deep dive and was sold on the CampLite/Livin Lite products. Also with my background with Airstreams I knew a little bit about RVs (enough to be dangerous).

So I went to Legacy a little early the next day to see what they knew. They confirmed they'd received a similar message. It seemed like they weren't sure what it all meant. Would CampLite (a Livin Lite brand) continue under KZ?  Legacy's owner thought they might, but if they did KZ would do away with the aluminum chassis (and maybe more aluminum) because they were too expensive to produce. Though it was the aluminum chassis and frame that was one of the main things that differentiated Livin Lite to begin with!

I decided I didn't care. I liked the trailer I picked out. I wasn't worried about the warranty. If Livin Lite was to go away I was still buying a Thor product and Thor isn't going away any time soon.

So I took delivery.

My new CampLite by Livin Lite! 

But now my research kicked up a notch. I occasionally write and edit articles on Wikipedia. By Sunday night, February 4, I'd finished a substantial first draft of my new article on Livin Lite the company. You can see the new article on Livin Lite here.

I proceeded this week to contact KZ and Thor executives by email, to respectfully ask them what's up. I heard back from a senior Thor executive who assured me my warranty would be honored (which, again, I wasn't worried about).

Here's what he wrote:

As the management oversight group for Livin’Lite, KZ will continue to produce Livin’ Lite trailers as orders are received.  However, since they are not a fully mature product line, they will be batch run into the early summer.  At that time, final decisions will be made to the future designs of the product.  Although Livin’Lite is experiencing a transition in the products offered, rest assured that all warranties on all Livin’ Lite products are and will continue to be honored for their full terms, the same as any other brands we produce.

Thanks again for purchasing a CampLite and welcome to the KZ family. 

I pressed him on the question of what was happening and he said:

"no final decision has been made."

I didn't know I was joining the KZ family, but I found out soon enough! Hope it's as good as Livin Lite.

I'll write and post more on my new trailer later. I am excited about it.

To wrap this post up, here's the Thor family of companies as they stand today. If Thor wasn't the entity that saved Airstream I never would have found Livin Lite at all. I do hope Livin Lite's product lines continue. And don't miss the Livin Lite Wikipedia article I wrote to learn more about the very cool, if endangered, company that made my new trailer.

New axle and Colin Hyde's hypnotic manner

Ten years ago in Georgia, I met a guy named Colin Hyde. I was standing there with my 1973 Airstream lined up with the other vintage Airstream people, minding my own business. We were prepping to caravan in to the 50th annual Wally Byam Caravan Club International's meetup. Many hundreds of Airstreams converge each year at different locations for this event. They still do it today. This year's will be in Michigan.

The next thing I know, as I stood waiting in line, Colin is laying on the ground inspecting the underside of my trailer. He informed me that I needed new axles.

It had never occurred to me that it was an issue. I was living full-time in my Airstream and had more than 4,000 miles on my trailer by that point and hadn't noticed anything amiss as I rolled down America's highways and byways. And yet meeting this guy Colin, he almost immediately convinced me I needed new ones and before I knew it I had driven to his shop in Plattsburgh, New York--way up north, not far from Montreal.

I got my axles replaced.

There was something hypnotizing about Colin's manner. I never doubted him.

In production year 1961, Wally Byam, the founder of Airstream switched all new Airstreams to torsion axles. He did this after leading a caravan across Africa from Capetown to Cairo. Prior to '61, Airstreams had leaf spring axles which I am familiar with from farm equipment my family has had over the years.

Leaf spring axle.

Leaf spring axles date back hundreds of years and are still used today in some heavy trucks, SUVs, and a variety of vehicles and trailers--though not too often in modern travel trailers. 

During the 1959 Capetown to Cairo caravan, Wally Byam had torsion axles on his Airstream. This was experimental technology for Wally and Airstream though torsion axles date back to at least the 1930s. Wally had no problems on that epic 1959 trip, whereas many of the other people in the caravan had all sorts of problems with fractures and breakdowns in their leaf spring axles. Hence the switch for 1961. 

My new-to-me 1962 Airstream Safari had its original torsion axle. With the Colin-embedded-in-me fear of old axles, a new axle was high on my list for my newly acquired trailer. But why?

Torsion axles provide the suspension for the trailer (most Airstreams also use shock absorbers to reduce bounce). When you buy any old trailer the old axles often still work, but they don't work as they were designed. With no suspension left in the axles you drag your trailer around and it feels every bump and gets bounced all over the road. For Airstreams, rivets can--and do--pop out. The body can become separated from the frame. Appliances and built-in furniture take a beating. All of this is really, really bad for a trailer. The worst case though is axle failure including a wheel flying off--which is especially bad on a single axle trailer like my 1962 Airstream Safari. In the case of my Safari, when I first brought it home it bottomed out on my not very steep driveway because the arms in the torsion system had collapsed. 

So a new axle was coming my way. Here's my original axle which we had to cut off since it was welded on. On later models the axles were bolted on which meant much less work in switching them out. 

For Airstream and other vintage trailer people who want to read more about this, check this article out by Andy Rogozinski. I am borrowing this image from Andy's article because it illustrates what failed on my original axle:

And another photo of my now retired axle:

As you can see I'd attained the negative angle on my torsion arm. As a result my trailer rode lower and had no suspension. 

Here's my new axle, just before we welded it on:

It's now got a positive angle again which you can see will raise the trailer and give it suspension. With this system each tire has independent suspension and the trailer enjoys a smooth ride. 

So thank you Colin for putting me under your spell and making me a believer in the value of updating my axle. Thanks to my new amigos at Camper Reparadise here in Salt Lake City for doing the hard work of removing my old welded-on axle and installing a new one. A special shoutout to Airstream/vintage-trailer enthusiast and Chad of Camper Reparadise who cut off the old axle. Thanks too to Evan for welding on the new one. 

You can follow Chad here on Instagram, he's a true craftsman who loves his work and does an excellent job of showing his work in photos. 

Click here to follow Camper Reparadise on Instagram (they do amazing work!). 

If you are back east, look up my friend Colin Hyde who you can also listen to and get tons of great vintage trailer advice from on the Vintage Airstream Podcast (the VAP). There, you too can experience his mesmerizing voice!

I didn't attempt to explain why torsion axles don't last--it has to do with the rubber used in them. Andy discusses that in more detail (see link above). One thing Andy doesn't come out and say in his article is that all torsion axles are at or near the end of their life after about 20 years. That doesn't mean they'll outright fail, but they are no longer performing as designed and your trailer will pay the price if you drive with older axles. 

Boom times for Airstream and the entire U.S. RV Industry

Today my mom, sister, nephew, and I stopped by Idaho Airstream in Caldwell, Idaho near my sister's ranch. We had fun looking at the new Airstreams--which are awesome! They are also expensive. I asked the sales guy about hitches as I am trying to pick a hitch for my new vintage Airstream.

One number he mentioned stuck with me. He said Airstream will manufacture about 3,400 trailers this year.

3,400!! That's all?

Really?

The number sounded low so I did some quick and dirty research.

The first number I found online was from 2.5 years ago when they were said to be producing 50 Airstreams per week which would be 2,600/year. Source: Washington Post, "Airstream can’t keep up with demand for iconic silver trailers," January 1, 2015.

The same article said they are on track to increase production by 50%, but didn't give a timeline. An April 2016 Dayton Business Journal article said they were up to 72 trailers per week and on track for 77 by the end of 2016. That's all consistent, and even ahead of the the 3,400 number I heard today.

These would likely be their highest numbers since at least 1979-1980!

"That's all?" wasn't the right reaction. These are boom times!!

This photo, from the Airstream website, is the 2017 International Serenity, it was our favorite today.

I am curious how many they were producing per year from about 1955 to 1978.

After reading the history of Airstream it was likely 1974-75 when sales really began to plummet during the 1970s because of the OPEC induced spike in gas prices that shocked the whole economy.

I've heard from a few sources, including Colin Hyde on the Vintage Airstream Podcast (The VAP), that Airstream is in the midst of a big expansion. You can read more about it in the Dayton Business Journal, November 2016.

In 2016, U.S. RV shipments totaled 430,691 units. These are big numbers! This was a gain of 15.1% over the previous year and the biggest year in 40 years according to the Recreational Vehicle Industry Association (RVIA). That number is for all RVs including travel trailers and all motorhomes. Source: RVIA, April 2017. Here is another RVIA link with some historical data, but it only goes back to 1978!

2016 was also the best year ever for Airstream's parent company Thor. Thor was founded in 1980, the worst year in the RV industry in 40 years. The company began when it's founders acquired Airstream in a fire sale deal from Beatrice who owned Airstream since December of 1967. Since 1980 Thor has grown to become the largest company in the RV industry by acquiring and growing a variety of different RV brands.

Source of Thor's 2016 results: "Thor Announces Record Results for Fourth Quarter and Fiscal 2016."

The industry is highly cyclical and we here we are in the midst of a historic boom. Of course booms don't last, but we can enjoy it while it's here. More RVs for Americans! For better and worse. I've grown to love RVing and especially Airstreaming.

May 30 postscript: I am catching up on past issues of Airstream Life, today the Winter 2016 issue arrived. In it, Publisher Rich Luhr wrote: "Airstream is blowing out sales records every year--and this is the fifth year in a row . . . . the Airstream community is getting stronger. I doubt if it has been so healthy and enthusiastic since the 1970s. The Wally Byam Caravaner Club International (WBCCI) is gaining members again. . . ." Of course Rich is more in tune with the Airstream world than I am, so it's not surprising he scooped me on this observation. His letter was titled It's a Great Time to be an Airstreamer. Of course I couldn't agree more!

It would still be nice to see actual numbers from Airstream, especially historical ones.

Posted from Kuna, Idaho

Update: Read my June 1 post with information on production circa 1971. 

Unplugging in the Great Basin

It was time to unplug for a few days. No Facebook. No telephone. No texts. No emails. Not even a place to charge. No, we exchanged our modern world for a few days of true recharging in the American West.

Welcome to the Great Basin.

My friend Bernard and I drove west last Friday into the forbidding landscape of the Great Basin. This is the largest area in North America with no outlet to the sea. Salt Lake City is on the eastern edge and Reno is on the west. The Great Basin stretches north-south from southern Idaho to below the southernmost point in Nevada to California in the area that includes Palm Springs. In most of its wide open expanses there are few people or roads.

Our primary destination: Great Basin National Park. The park is just south of Highway 50, “the loneliest highway in America,” and ten or so miles west of the Utah/Nevada border. It is one of the least visited national parks in the U.S.

John McPhee's book Basin and Range beautifully discusses this unique region. The topography undulates with one mountain range after another, all running north-south, each separated by valleys or "basins." It's dry country.

Pulling into our campground at an elevation of 7,500 feet we were greeted with a pleasant sight: a 1999 Airstream Bambi. We found a campsite situated next to a rushing mountain stream and surrounded by Aspens. After setting up camp, eating, watching and terrorizing (but not hurting) a giant beetle, we ventured out to begin our explorations. The Airstream was stop number one. Owned by a Salt Lake City couple who married in 1974, and honeymooned at the park (at that time it was called Lehman Caves National Monument), they graciously allowed us to tour their aluminum home away from home. Bernard was underimpressed, but all it needed was an interior remodel.

We drove to a trailhead at 10,000 feet to do a four mile hike to a Bristlecone Pine grove. These trees are the oldest living organisms in the world, with some individuals standing for 5,000 years. This predates not only Ancient Rome but also Ancient Greece, and even the Egyptian pyramids! Shaped by wind erosion, they are gnarled into crazy shapes.

Bristlecone Pine. Photo by BVG. 

My best preppy-rugged outdoorsman look. 

Dinner, campfire, sleep.

Saturday we woke, chilled to the bone, and anxiously awaited the arrival of sunlight in camp. It came and the chill faded. Temps had dropped to 37 degrees Fahrenheit overnight.

Our hike for the day began at 10,160 feet, near the trailhead of the evening before. In front of us: a 2,900 foot ascent up Nevada's second highest peak--Mount Wheeler. I did fine until we hit a certain pitch, then the elevation and my poor conditioning conspired to slow me down. But I plugged along and though it was tough (there were even gale force winds along the way) I loved being on the mountain. We had the summit to ourselves with views for at least 75 miles in all directions, and for whatever reason the wind wasn't bad on top.  

Approaching the summit of Wheeler Peak, Nevada. Photo by BVG. 

On the way down, my weak left ankle betrayed me, it popped and I went down, body-slamming the jagged rocks on the trail. I landed on my left side and writhed around in pain for a few minutes. This happens too much, though it was the first time in at least six months. I had to press on, so after the initial pain began to subside that's what I did. I gimped on down the mountain, though most of the pain was over in the first five minutes. When I took my shoe off at the bottom and stepped on it again the pain went back up temporarily but with some ibuprofen it didn't affect the trip beyond my dramatics when I first went down. 

On the ascent with Wheeler Peak above us. 

Bernard at the summit. 

The summit hike was my favorite outing, though there was still much to see. After the hike we showered in camp with Bernard's solar shower, then headed in to town to check out the local bar. It was, as he aptly put it, a "one-horse town." Baker, Nevada owes most of its existence to revenues generated from the national park. One gas station, a multi-denominational church, two bars, the park visitor center and maybe a dozen houses--that was the whole town. 

Some guy had a snake in hand and he was blocking the entrance to the Silver Jack Inn (and bar) where we wanted to go. I skirted around him, went inside and got my beer. The building seemed to be vintage 1920s--certainly pre-WWII. It was a funky little place. And quiet. 

Back to camp, dinner, another campfire, and bed. It was much warmer the second night and we both slept better as a result.

After breakfast and breaking down our campsite, we went to Lehman Caves and did a 90 minute tour of an amazing limestone cavern (it's one cave despite its plural name). This was easily the best cave tour of my life, though I've only done a few.

The most iconic formation in the cave, part "shield" part curtains. Shields occur in only a small portion of caves around the world. Photo by BVG. 

It was a mellow weekend and just what the doctor ordered. The West maintains its spell over me thirty years after I first visited. It's a great place to live, and an even greater place to unplug from the modern world.

Part two from the trip: A Wild West Long... Drive... Home.

All photos by BVG except for the one of him.