The Escape 19

[Grassland]

Our fiberglass monocoque trailer is completed and thanks to insane Covid restrictions I had to have it shipped here. It's on the truck now on its way from BC to MB.

I originally wanted the shorter 17A model, which also lacks a bathroom. My wife overruled me.
We wanted a trailer we could use for 2-3 week long road trips, but something that's also ready to go for long and regular weekends. Our pop up trailer was not ideal for that last bit. We also wanted something that will last multiple decades. Not the staple and glue specials they pump out now with finance terms that go longer than the life of the trailer.

We live in central Canada, and the price of typical garbage RV stuff is sky high and has been for ages. R-Pods were $25999 last I looked a few years ago. So we decided that $42k, despite being at the top of our budget, for something that would last far longer, wasn't so crazy afterall.

Once the trailer is here, I'll post more photos and list some of the features.

A quick run down for options:
190 watt fixed roof solar and quick connect port for portable panel.
Dual six volt batteries
Dual roof fans (one is max fan)
Axle lift
Some reinforced walls
Extra exterior lighting.

Dryweight is claimed at under 3700 lb.

 

[Grassland]

Have to hand it to my friend at Pembina Hills Transfer who came through on short notice to get it here.

Original plan was for my wife and I to drive to BC and get it, but the lock downs prevented us from entering BC, and would have forced a 2 week quarantine on return to MB.

 

[Todd780]

Very nice! I'm sure you will enjoy it. We went from a tent trailer to a hard wall a couple years ago and love it. Not having to open and close the trailer to pack it, then open and close it at the camp site, then open and close again to unpack back at home is huge.... It's soooo much easier with the hard wall.

 

[skyfree]

Make sure to leave that blue plastic on there so it doesn't get scratched

We have had an Escape 17B since Feb 2017 and will probably keep it forever. Owning an Escape for us broke the "constant upgrade" syndrome that comes with stick built RV's.

We boondock with ours about 50% of the time and have been able to get it in some pretty remote sites.


It's also good for winter camping and we've used it in some ski resort parking lots.

 

[Grassland]

Even when in campgrounds we don't have power so having the roof panel and adding a portable, and the double capacity compared to our tent trailer excites me for how long we can stay in one spot.

We've been getting by with a 95 AH group 27 and a cheap Coleman 90w portable.

Now we have 225 AH and a factory 190w panel!

 

[Buddha.]

I had dual golf cart batteries on my 30’ trailer. Furnace was the biggest draw. It would go 2-3 days at ~50f. I didn’t have a battery monitor so maybe I could have gone longer.

 

[Todd780]

Even when in campgrounds we don't have power so having the roof panel and adding a portable, and the double capacity compared to our tent trailer excites me for how long we can stay in one spot.

We've been getting by with a 95 AH group 27 and a cheap Coleman 90w portable.

Now we have 225 AH and a factory 190w panel!

Our biggest limiting factor seems to be water.

 

[Grassland]

Our biggest limiting factor seems to be water.

We've been lucky. The places we have camped have a potable water spigot you can fill jugs at. We've been getting by with two 2.5 gallon jugs. We'll probably still use that method and keep the fresh tank for washing dishes and bird baths. Gas is expensive enough I don't need to haul 10 gallons of water if not necessary

 

[Todd780]

We've been lucky. The places we have camped have a potable water spigot you can fill jugs at. We've been getting by with two 2.5 gallon jugs. We'll probably still use that method and keep the fresh tank for washing dishes and bird baths. Gas is expensive enough I don't need to haul 10 gallons of water if not necessary

So do the places we camp. It's just annoying to have to refill the tank using a 5 gallon jug and a funnel. We are looking at picking up one of these to refill the trailer water tank:

 

[Grassland]

Finally got her home. My drop hitch it's sits two low and my riser hitch sits too high. Need a parallel or none riser/drop hitch to be level by the looks of it. Glad it's only seven feet wide.
It's far less bouncy than the pop up was

 

[Todd780]

Finally got her home. My drop hitch it's sits two low and my riser hitch sits too high. Need a parallel or none riser/drop hitch to be level by the looks of it. Glad it's only seven feet wide.
It's far less bouncy than the pop up was

And I'm guessing easier to maneuver as well.

 

[Buddha.]

Looks good. I sold our 30’ trailer, it was just too big.
I borrowed a 20’ long by 7’ wide cargo trailer today and it’s much easier to maneuver.

 

[Grassland]

Total length is 19 and the body is 15'8.
I'd rather have the 17 model but a happy wife as they say.
Going through it today. Seems the black tank and fresh tank are full and 2/3 full respectively. I'm hoping it's a water/anti freeze mix from testing stuff.
Lots of sawdust and bits left in cupboards. Door latch is crooked. Haven't gone thru the electrical too much yet but turned the battery disconnect back to "on" and the solar panel was hard at work instantly. All the interior lights and fans work.

 

[skyfree]

Get on escapeforum.org for lots of helpful people that can help with specific Escape issues.

We bought ours when they were still built by the original owners so things probably changed a bit but overall I think people are happy with the newer ones since the change. Those seem like minor issues but it's strange that the tanks were full. We picked ours up in Chilliwack/Sumas. They took it over the border and we towed it from Sumas and continued on our trip, camping on the way home so the tanks had to be empty but I did have them fill the fresh water.

The only "issue" we had was that they had added a power jack for free. It ended up getting scraped off on one of our numerous off-road camping adventures and was later replaced with a manual jack that did not hang down below the frame at all.

 

[Alloy]

Total length is 19 and the body is 15'8.
I'd rather have the 17 model but a happy wife as they say.
Going through it today. Seems the black tank and fresh tank are full and 2/3 full respectively. I'm hoping it's a water/anti freeze mix from testing stuff.
Lots of sawdust and bits left in cupboards. Door latch is crooked. Haven't gone thru the electrical too much yet but turned the battery disconnect back to "on" and the solar panel was hard at work instantly. All the interior lights and fans work.

Those tank sensors are notorious for leaking current from one probe to another. Truck drivers are know to use the facilities in trailer though.

There are a 3-4 types of external level sensor that are superior to the probes.

My buddy and I stopped by Escape a year ago to inquire if they'd increase the GVWR so we could increase the tanks sizes. They told us they'd look into it and get back to us but we never heard back.