So I called the airstream HQ yesterday. Fun fact of the day. Installing solar systems, even the ones airstream offers. Totally removes them from offering any kind of help. They are classified as after market. This is now a dealership dispute. Would you buy them if you knew this info? That's why I over paid and went with Seattle airstream.
The customer service experience has been terrible. After we got back home to Canada after the 3rd visit. I had told them about my frustration and what the likely issue was. I had told them the DC solenoid was the likely issue. Their idea of a solution was they send me the part and I swap it myself. First off that was wild to me as these systems are high voltage. They also leave you little room to work. One wrong move with a wrench its a high risk of electrocution. Secondly I felt like this was a trick to get me to void my warranty. I said a top brand like airstreams solution can’t possibly be a DO IT YOURSELF one could it? All this done via text they now wanted a call. I said no text only. I told them I was too mad to talk and text would have too do. It’s at this time I had mentioned to them I own a social media marketing company and will gladly make this go viral. Things got serious now. I stopped talking to the techs and got the GM. He was very well spoken and good at defusing the situation. I had told him I will give him 48 hours to get my situation handled. I wanted to swap this unit for one with zero solar, or get massive warranty. I then sent him 5 instagram reels I planned to launch. He said he heard me and that I have the attention of everyone at Seattle airstream. He offered to swap units or give me warranty. So after the weekend passed I phoned and said lets try the warranty route. I asked him for the details about this but he gave none. I didn’t want to do a social media blitz because it would like be so damaging to Seattle airstream and airstream as a whole. So I choose the easiest route. I told the GM next time we speak I need warranty details. I got none and I had arranged for them to pick my trailer up at the border this Sunday. Turns out that’s father’s day so I had to reschedule. But as If one final nail in the coffin the whole system collapsed last night at 9pm. We had to pack up and drive home. My wife’s MS medication has to be kept cold. Replacement costs are too high. So we had to take all the kids and drive home. We got home at 1230am. The trailer no longer works on shore power and shows no signs of life. Right now we are $185,000 into this mess. I hope this happens to nobody ever again. The negligence and incompetence of their techs are unsafe. Not something I would expect from made in USA brand like Airstream.
Ok so I decided to take my airstream back to get everything sorted. I was adding 2 more lithium batteries, getting the solar controller and smart shunt. I should be set. So I rented an Airbnb and waited a couple days for the work to be done. When I arrived this time the tech went over the victron connect app. Showed us how to see the solar controller and smart shunt. He showed us the battery capability and said this is a sweet setup. Everything looked clean and very proper. We again paid almost $10,000 and went on our planned trip to the Redwood forest. Unfortunately for us he failed to do one crucial step again. There is also another safety step they should offer but do not. Which I will cover soon. So we went on our trip and once we reach the redwood the problems began. So apparently there is a setting on the victron app that needs to be set to lithium. Which the tech tells us later when we come back to troubleshoot his work. If you do not do this you risk permanently ruining your batteries and losing power. All of which happen. This topic is so deep and long I encourage you to type it into google AI yourself. The short answers are your batteries over charge, send that extra voltage elsewhere. The first place it sends it is back into your tow vehicle. So slowly it starts to cook your own batteries. This happened to us my kids say daddy it stinks like rotten eggs in here. They were right it did. So I pulled over and looked for the problem. After some trouble shooting the one battery was red hot! I ordered two new batteries and changed them at the beach while the kids played. Turns out if I didn’t do that we risked major issues. I just thought it was old batteries as we needed a boost twice that morning. Another thing that would have eliminated that would have been a DC-DC charger. This stops current from going back into the tow vehicle. This wasn’t offered but you’d think they would know this. Once we added 4 batteries they also would push current into our system through the 7 way charger. Again not something I would know as the customer. When I told the GM he didn’t even know this. It also causes your own alternator to get weak. So we swapped the batteries and went back to Seattle. We didn’t know anything was wrong yet. We were going to the dealership to pick up a tv we ordered. But just before we got there. The whole system started going crazy. Lights beeping when batteries had full charge, fridge beeping, water pump reading error. All this after we flushed the toilet. No big deal we are going to the dealership let them look it over. I felt like it was a loose connection. So we went there they looked it over again. Only thing they could think of was faulty toilet or DC solenoid. It’s at this time the tech mentioned. He has forgotten to set the system to the lithium settings. As long as we were plugged into shore power we were good. They couldn’t fit us in for two weeks. I needed to get my wife home she was sick and has MS and we didn’t want any US Medical bills. So I decided to go home and make a plan. Turns out we all got very sick for two weeks. Well since current had been allowed to pass through the system unchecked things got bad. The DC solenoid has fried, do to the electricity passing through it. It’s the green button that turns your airstream on and off. So since that no longer works lights flicker, power surges, fridges beeps uncontrollably. Next I will get into the customer service part of things and what happened next ……….
Hey everyone,
I will be making a multi post series. Detailing my experience with Airstream Seattle. It will be lots of information filled with facts, actual text messages and outcomes. I will break them down per visit so the readers do not get bored. My goal is to stop this from happening to anyone ever again. So to start with I purchased airstreams 500watt package thinking this was plenty for me. I left my 2024 flying cloud B.H. with them for a week. When I came back I picked up my trailer and paid my almost $10,000 bill. I drove almost home to Canada. But before hand I picked up tons of food for my fridge. To my surprise, I was woken up at 6am to my system beeping telling me low voltage.I thought maybe I used all the juice in my 2 lithium batteries. No big deal it was sunny out. Time to charge them as I drive home. However once I got home 4 hours later not a single charge had happen. So I called the dealership and asked what’s happening? Turns out they didn’t hook up the system correctly. They didn’t install the victron solar controller or a smart shunt. When asked they said the tech hooked up the solar to the factory pre wired ports but did not verify functionality. So I left with a solar system with missing parts and never worked from the start. Because it was late fall and hunting season I was very busy. As an indigenous man this is important time of year for my family. So we decided to to wait til next year to bring it back. So it sat all winter unused. They admitted their mistake and offered me a solar controller for $250. I know mistakes happen so let's get past it and move on. That's why I decided to get more work done.This was the biggest mistake I could have made. I wanted to get 2 more lithium batteries, the MPPT solar controller, and smart shunts. I will post part 2 later today.