Awesome man! You have to be stoked. I'm only a few hours from Yakima...where the heck is MINE!? Lol. When did you order yours? We ordered in the first 1.5hrs of their release info and got the RTT etc of course.
Scout Olympic vs Kenai
- Thread starter GeorgeHayduke
- Start date
GeorgeHayduke
Active member
We're definitely excited, especially since we sold our previous Northstar last year in anticipation of the Scout and have been without a truck camper for a while now. We didn't order immediately, maybe a week or so after the release? Early enough to get in the first batch though.
We got the RTT, Dickinson heater, stove, fridge, and Thetford cassette toilet. Skipped the awning, shower, and duffel bags.
Honestly, the whole dealer aspect is a bit of a buzzkill. We're not the typical RV crowd and would prefer to avoid RV dealerships whenever possible. I'm sure you'd have preferred to pick it up straight from the factory given that you're so close.
Bah, I just got an email from our dealer that our camper is delayed another week. Its fine, I get it the supply chain for everyone is a nightmare today...but man we are so close lol.
EDIT #2: Scout says its supposed to ship by the end of next week 100%. They have the truck booked and everything. They were delayed a little bit in that they switched to a larger Maxxair Dome fan to increase airflow over the shower area (its a 200+ CFM fan instead of the little tiny solar ones). I'm actually stoked for the larger fan. Its not that much space in there and it should be a sweet functional upgrade. Crack the windows and run the fan to keep heat/condensation at a minimum.
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GeorgeHayduke
Active member
It's here! First impressions are very positive, let me know if you have any particular questions I can help with. I'll do an in depth write-up once we've had some more time with it.
Sweet man, congrats!! Can you do a video of it or something?
- How did the mudroom etc turn out?
- Are you able to close the Roofnest tent with just one person easily enough? (I've seen some reviews saying it can be challenging)
- Is that Maxxair Dome fan pretty decent?
- Can we see some pics of the interior?
- How did the mudroom etc turn out?
- Are you able to close the Roofnest tent with just one person easily enough? (I've seen some reviews saying it can be challenging)
- Is that Maxxair Dome fan pretty decent?
- Can we see some pics of the interior?
GeorgeHayduke
Active member
I think the bolts in your first picture are for the overhead rack that you can clip a bag to. Not sure where your second picture is, but I was definitely struck by how many things were screwed into the roof. Even things like the shower curtain has like 6 tabs screwed into the roof. I'm not sure but it occured to me that the change in RTT from Roost to Falcon might have resulted in an extra set of bolt holes. I'll snap a picture in daylight tomorrow.
GeorgeHayduke
Active member
I think the mudroom will be great for skiing which is a big use case for us. There's a plastic insert in the metal shower pan that feels a little flimsy but I could see replacing it with something wooden down the line. It's not quite a trip hazard but you do notice the floor is a little higher in the entryway. We didn't get the Rinsekit shower but they still ran a 12V outlet in the upper passenger cabinet which could be handy.
Closing the RTT was a little fussy. Tent fabric pokes out and you have to tuck it back in by hand. Once you get it in place though it seems to seal up nicely. They had an Olympic with a Roost and I thought the Falcon looked much nicer, so I'm still happy about it. One other unexpected hiccup: because the Kenai roof is longer it's actually hard to reach the rear latches on the RTT from the doorway. I ended up climbing into the roof to get them.
Maxxair fan seemed ok but to be honest I didn't look too closely.
I'll snag more interior pictures tomorrow!
GeorgeHayduke
Active member
Ok, I snagged some more pictures.
First, roof penetrations for @Victorian
Most of the 'cabinets' appear to be attached to the wall with pocket screws and plug sort of like what you'd find at IKEA
The cabinet holding the water jug has a reinforcing bracket:
I was wrong earlier, the shower pan isn't plastic. Instead it's metal with a rubber top layer:
A really impressive amount of storage under/around the dinette in addition to the wardrobes on each side of the mudroom and the exterior compartment:
The manufacturer's stated weights: 1394# with standard equipment and 1840# with the options we chose: RTT, jacks, stove, fridge, Dickinson heater, and Thetford cassette toilet.
First, roof penetrations for @Victorian
Most of the 'cabinets' appear to be attached to the wall with pocket screws and plug sort of like what you'd find at IKEA
The cabinet holding the water jug has a reinforcing bracket:
I was wrong earlier, the shower pan isn't plastic. Instead it's metal with a rubber top layer:
A really impressive amount of storage under/around the dinette in addition to the wardrobes on each side of the mudroom and the exterior compartment:
The manufacturer's stated weights: 1394# with standard equipment and 1840# with the options we chose: RTT, jacks, stove, fridge, Dickinson heater, and Thetford cassette toilet.
Thanks for the pics man!
1- That shower area looks so handy. The toilet area is all a metal pan from what I can tell from the pics? That's sweet, does the toilet area all drain down into the pan? I just got my airhead composting toilet and it looks like it'll be a sweet setup for that area.
2- It looks like their is a fair amount of storage in there, especially if you get a nice hanging bag setup (I've got some Dakine Descent bags I'm hoping to carabiner up there maybe).
3- How many of those MaxxAir Dome fans are there? It looks like there is one over the stove and another one over the bathroom area perhaps.
4- Can you take a portrait picture of the bathroom area? I'm interested to see the final design there and how it works with the curtain and pony wall.
5- The weight is pretty nice, if you drop the jacks you are only 1750lbs I think. Insane for a camper that sleeps 4 adults fairly comfy without the BS dinette conversion every night.
6- How do you like the dinette design and fit with the fam? We sat in the Yoho's and it was surprisingly decent.
7- Are you liking the space in that "wardroom" area?
8- Is the slideout bed situation pretty functional?
9 - Anything else you particularly like or dislike so far? Anything surprise you?
1- That shower area looks so handy. The toilet area is all a metal pan from what I can tell from the pics? That's sweet, does the toilet area all drain down into the pan? I just got my airhead composting toilet and it looks like it'll be a sweet setup for that area.
2- It looks like their is a fair amount of storage in there, especially if you get a nice hanging bag setup (I've got some Dakine Descent bags I'm hoping to carabiner up there maybe).
3- How many of those MaxxAir Dome fans are there? It looks like there is one over the stove and another one over the bathroom area perhaps.
4- Can you take a portrait picture of the bathroom area? I'm interested to see the final design there and how it works with the curtain and pony wall.
5- The weight is pretty nice, if you drop the jacks you are only 1750lbs I think. Insane for a camper that sleeps 4 adults fairly comfy without the BS dinette conversion every night.
6- How do you like the dinette design and fit with the fam? We sat in the Yoho's and it was surprisingly decent.
7- Are you liking the space in that "wardroom" area?
8- Is the slideout bed situation pretty functional?
9 - Anything else you particularly like or dislike so far? Anything surprise you?
GeorgeHayduke
Active member
1) Yup, the toilet area should drain into the shower pan. The seams for the shower pan aren't perfect and there's some ugly caulking in a few places, but for muddy or snowy boots/kids/dogs it should work great. I'm not sure I would actually shower in there, mostly for fear of getting all the plywood wet.
2) Yeah, we moved over all of our stuff from the previous camper and only filled up about half the compartments. The exterior storage compartment on the passenger side is really huge too and basically acts like having a toolbox on a flatbed build. The compartments are more like cubbies than cabinets and we're trying to figure out containers that fit through the different openings to actually hold stuff in place.
3) Just the one fan over the stove. It moves enough air to where you can use the stove inside and not worry too much about fumes, but it seems like it moves less than the fantastic fan in our previous Northstar. It's a smaller diameter, so not surprising really.
4) Here's a pic with the toilet lid/counter in the up position. It folds down to create a bunch of really useful counter space, and reveals another pretty large but not super deep storage compartment.
5) I'm pretty happy about the weight and it agreed well with the predicted weight on their website. A good chunk of the weight is in the RTT which is up ~7' above the truck bed so we'll probably run an aftermarket sway bar. The jacks removed really easily but were a lot less stable than normal Happijacs that are rigidly bolted on. My truck has stock suspension and 35" tires and we only barely were able to sneak the truck under the camper with the jacks fully maxed out in height. I also really liked the racheting tiedowns, they're quick to loosen and cranked down really tightly.
6) I'd give the dinette design a B rating. I would have like the seats to have been a little deeper and would have sacrificed a little aisle room or leg room for it. The Lagun table is great, it adjusts and swivels easily while still feeling sturdy. I think we'll be able to seat 4 reasonably comfortably. We discovered you can even sit on top of the fridge if you're under about 6' and have a nice view out the window if you need more space than in the dinette. The main aisle in the camper is pleasantly wide, and two people can get by each other without trouble.
One other thing about the dinette, I can't seem to figure out the Tetris for converting to a bed. All the spare cushions seem to be the same size and a couple inches too short to cover the table top. The cushions themselves are adequate but not mind-blowingly comfortable.
7) There's a ton of storage in the wardrobe areas when you come in, but it's all vertical and I'm not sure how best to use it yet. They included some racks that you could use to hang clothes and we might explore some other shelving options. I'm not sure how we'll use the compartment that opens to the inside and outside. Maybe a place for a trash bin or routing a shower hose? Let me know if you come up with anything clever.
8) Slideout bed works as advertised.
9) Overall, we're really happy with the Kenai and very glad we chose it over the Olympic or other brands. Some specific likes and dislikes:
Pros
As discussed previously in the thread, the mechanicals are dead simple, the heater and RTT are super cool, and the interior layout is really functional. Some unexpected positives: the unit feels surprisingly spacious on the inside, I think due to not having any bathroom walls and pretty tall ceilings. The Dometic stove actually seems pretty decent. I was actually getting basically the same if not slightly better MPG with the Kenai than with our popup camper. All I can think of is that the curved cabover shape is helping.
The construction isn't perfect (see next section), but in comparison to a DIY build I think they made a lot of the same decisions I would have and it comes in at about the same quality or slightly better than where my threshold would have been if I tried to do it all myself.
Cons
Tucking the RTT fabric back into place when you close it is a real pain, especially along the sides. You have to climb forward on the roof to reach it all and it honestly feels a little dangerous being so high off the ground and trying to fit on the narrow gap between the RTT body and edge of the roof.
The build quality is not perfect. I think it's a combination of a new design that doesn't have all the kinks worked out, COVID issues that I'm sure threw a wrench in things, and going as light as possible.
The plywood is a little flimsy in places. It noticeably deflects when you lean up against the pony wall and there are a few places where the plywood is wavy. Exposed edges and straight off the CNC machine with fuzzies and some imperfect cuts and voids. Here's the worst void I've spotted:
There are some other things that would have been nice if they were done with a bit more polish, like beveling plywood where it meets walls at an angle or sorting out the right number/location/size of holes and screws in various brackets:
Hope this all helps, happy to answer any other questions!
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GeorgeHayduke
Active member
Yup, it's a 12v for the RinseKit shower thing. Nice of them to include the wiring even though we didn't order that option.
