I was speaking with a neighbour as we shared the hot tub tonight and she mentioned that I had no slide out, seeming very puzzled by the fact.

Miranda being a slide-out free RV was a deliberate choice on my part. One of the very first things I knew when I was searching for a motorhome was that it would not have slide-outs, which pretty much knocked class As out of the running. There were several reasons for this:

Weight

Slide-outs dramatically reduce an RV’s carrying capacity, and this is especially evident with class Cs. One of my readers, Croft, has a rig that is very comparable to Miranda–same engine, same chassis, same length. But he has a slide-out and fully half Miranda’s carrying capacity! I’m full-timing so having as much carrying capacity as possible is much more important than having more floor space.

Mechanics

Slide-outs are just one more thing to maintain, one more thing that can leak or break, and they weaken the overall chassis. Again, a few more feet of floor space isn’t worth the potential hassle.

Weather

Slide-outs are the least insulated part of an RV. Since I knew there was a chance I’d be using my RV in extremely inclement (read very wintery) weather, not having a slide-out meant that there was one less drafty place in the rig. I was also concerned that if I parked somewhere for the winter, the weather would damage the slide-out.

Convenience

I didn’t want for every stop to be cause for the interminable debate: “Slide-out in or out tonight?” I wanted to be able to park at a Walmart and have full access to my home. In a park, I didn’t want my slide-out window to be two inches from my neighbour’s slide-out window.

Having visited a lot of RVs with slide-outs, the only real advantage they seem to provide is floor space. That’s useful if you’re two or more people sharing a rig since it would be easier to contour each other, but as a sole RVer they just don’t seem to be worth the potential headache.