October 4, 2009

"Several years ago, based on comments from other Alfa motorhome users plus comments on the Airtab website, I installed a full set of Airtabs on our Alfa SeeYa motorhome. They were very easy to install - even over the roof and satellite antenna area. The supplied instructions and templates are very easy to use. The Airtabs are great - they have made a world of difference in handling the motorhome in the wind - especially crosswinds - as well as I now hardly notice passing trucks! I had driven our motorhome in severe crosswinds prior to installing the Airtabs, and it was a "handful." Now, it is much easier to control - I no longer have to dread the weather conditions when we are traveling! I recommend them to everyone with an RV!"

Randy S.
California

June 29, 2004

Gentlemen,

After seeing the Airtab® installation article in Monaco Coach's Lifestyles magazine I ordered a set for my 38' Monaco Diplomat motorhome. I returned from Dallas to New Braunfels with about a 30 mph crosswind all the way with intermittent rain to find my Airtabs™ on the front porch (quick delivery I might add). I installed them the same week in about 4 hours - it was amazingly simple, and they looked great! The next weekend I left for Houston, and traveling I-10 I had about a 25 mph crosswind and a lot of heavy truck traffic. This was not even the same coach!!!! The crosswind's effect was neglible, and even more amazing was the fact that passing trucks (I set the cruise at 65) had almost NO effect on the tracking of the coach. Two trips back to back in roughly the same conditions convinced me. Hats off for a great product. I haven't thought to check the boost gauge to see if the turbo is not working as hard, but there seems to be slightly better fuel economy-.3 to .4 mpg on the 330 hp Cummins. I'm telling everyone I see about them and showing them mine if the coach is anywhere nearby.

Thank you very much,

Glenn W. S.
New Braunfels, Texas

Email: Thanks for your speedy one day service. I ordered my Air Tabs on Thursday and they were here by Friday, and Installed Saturday on my 2004 Alfa See Ya motorhome. I'm attaching a photo of one side of the installation. Pretty easy to install...

Ira Reynolds

I originally bought the Airtab® product in the hopes of keeping the rear of my cab over camper cleaner while driving down the road. Wind typically would whip up and deposit road debris all over the rear of the camper especially when it was raining. After installing the product I have driven several thousand miles with the camper and have been in a variety of road and weather conditions. To date the difference is amazing, even after a two hour drive in cats and dog rain on freshly chipped sealed roads there is hardly any dirt accumulated at the rear of the camper.

The money I have saved in car washes alone has justified the purchase.

The good news has been the additional benefit of improved mileage. I had been consistently getting 11.7 mpg with this setup prior to the Airtabs™ . Out the gate with the Airtabs™ installed on a 1600 mile trip I averaged 12.5mpg! That has proven to be the case since driving 60mph, a .8mpg improvement.

One other noticeable difference has been an improved handling of the vehicle (very high profile) in windyconditions and improved handling when semi trucks pass.

I am pleased with the product and thus am willing to endorse their use as a 'must have' on any RV.

Sincerely,

Tim E.
Bozeman, MT

Hi Ron. Just got back from the trip and had a wonderful trip the Airtabs™ worked great got about one mile to the gallon better than before with the handling in the wind was great and the truck buffing when they past from behind and when passing other trucks was great. made driving much better.

R. C.
Eugene, OR

Received February 20, 2006

Jack,

I have had 2 different RV Trailers and put the Airtabs on both. The first was a bumper pull trailer and was a toyhauler. These trailers have a very square rear-end and flat. On the TT, I noticed it was pretty easy to pull, the rear door is clean and stability was wonderful.

My Current Rv Trailer (see pics) is again a Toy-hauler but is a 5th wheel with the fiberglass siding for the Airtabs to stick very well. With the other trailer, it had aluminum ripple siding so I had to attach an aluminum strip for the Airtabs to stick on....

On the 5th wheel, I noticed a big improvement on stability, My combined weight of this unit is 23 K and I averaged 10 MPG......On a dirt road even at low speeds, I noticed the rear of the trailer was relatively clean so I know the suction action is canceled out....

Here are the pics as well as some of the whole unit.

Eric B.
Salt Lake City, UT

Jack,

Here's some photos that you are free to use as you wish. After driving cross country I'm amazed at the increase in stability and the reduction in turbulence. Pictures were taken at Quartzite AZ Jan 2006.

Chuck C.
Managing Director
South Windsor CT

Hi All, Margie and I just got back from a few days in an RV park in Monroe MI.During that time, I installed the Air Tab Kit which was ordered on line. Came with two installation templates and 80 Air Tabs. 80 Air Tabs is enough to complete the sides and top of the Alfa. Trip back was verification of straight-line stability improvement. The rear of the coach is glued to the ground unlike the trip down when the buffeting made it feel like the back of the coach was wagging back and forth. The coach stays solid and straight, no buffeting etc. Bonus is the Toad stays much cleaner too as the air is smoothed around the Toad too.

If the fuel improvement comes as indicated, it will be a bonus as the stability improvement is worth the $200 for the Air Tab Kit.

Best,

Phil & Margie S.
Green Valley, AZ

Light Truck Engineering
Light Truck Motorsports
Ford Motor Company- Retire

October 5, 2006

Hi Jack

The Airtabs surely have a dual function on the gently radiused tail of the egg-shaped Casita trailer. In addition to their familiar role with abruptly truncated bluff bodies, the Airtabs almost certainly pull the airflow farther around the large bend radius at the rear of the Casita (which is shaped much like an Airstream trailer). I estimate this to be about 10 degrees greater turn angle than the standard baseline 10 degrees before the flow separates. In other words, I'm now benefiting from a 20 degree turn angle of the flow off the roof and sides rather than only 10 degrees. This results in a smaller wake with less cross-sectional area. It is as if the trailer had less frontal area than any other Casita. My best previous fuel mileage for 1,000 miles was 19 mpg. With Airtabs, it improved to a hair over 20 mpg. Roughly 5 percent better mileage on same route and weather conditions. (1,000 miles is the longest distance I could drive on the Interstate without being forced to purchase 10% gasohol which degrades fuel mileage by about 3 mpg!)

Stability was excellent, but it was fine before Airtabs due to the good original aerodynamic shape and vehicle proportions (small rear overhang so the aero center-of-pressure in side winds is very close to the trailer's center of gravity).

Naturally, when the airflow is turned through a greater turn angle, it carries any clouds of water spray with it. In rainy weather, the road spray from the tow vehicle and trailer tires is now pulled 20 degrees toward the centerline of the trailer's wake, leaving a totally clear view aft in the rear view mirrors. The clarity of the view is remarkable ! Nearly the same as in dry weather.

After our 6,000 mile trip around the country, the rear face of the Casita was unquestionably far cleaner than normal. Barely needed to be lightly washed. Other RV'ers were surprised to hear we hadn't washed it once.

Cheers,

Gary
Washington State

October 2006

Both my previous 05 and current 06 would have a wind noise coming through the drivers side window when crusing speed was obtained. A while back one of the forum members mentioned he had placed airtabs on the outside ahead of the driver's mirror. This eliminated most of the protruding sound. Being an airtab distributor (by a few weeks) I naturally had to try it. It worked.

Now for the reasons. The air flow passing the mirror becomes a turbulating airflow as it passses between the mirror mounting and stem and the coach side. Sort of a venturi effect. Airtabs are tiny vortex generators which, when placed ahead of the drivers mirror, will align this turbulating air flow thus removing much of the offensive air noise.

So far, everyone who has purchased the airtabs for this purpose has been very satisfied with the noise reduction. The attendees had a great discussion about this at the Tucson rally last week. I hope this has answered your question. Also, I have posted in the Photo's section a few pictures of the airtab placements: at the back and at the mirror location. Any more questions just send them my way.

Ron Dierlam

Received July 16, 2009

Hello Jack,I wanted to share with you photos of our RV with AirTabs since it has ribbed siding.First we fastened (with pop-rivets on the high point of siding and auto-body tape on high points as well) smooth aluminum. We disconnected the running lights and re-attached on top of smooth aluminum. We attached AirTabs as normal and sealed it off with silicone caulk.We took our first trip (1,200 miles) last week since installing the AirTabs. The trailer is 31' long and sway was a problem before, especially when being passed by semi trucks. Now, I can still feel a little "sucking in and pushing out" when being passed, but it is greatly reduced (75% less or so). Also the trailer recovers stability much quicker. I also noticed an improvement in fuel economy and felt there was less drag on the trailer when accelerating. Overall, I am very pleased with the performance of the AirTab product.Thanks & have a great day.KurtWest Lafayette, IN

September 16, 2009

Jack,

I read about the Airtabs in the September 2009 issue of Family Motor Coaching and I purchased some for the back of my motorhome. I managed to install them prior to our road trip. The first thing I noticed the rain didn't foul my rear camera and backside, in fact, our Jeep's (towed behind the motorhome) windshield was even much cleaner than before. Preliminary fuel numbers indicate I'm saving about 1.5 mpg while towing the Jeep (4600 pounds), about 2 cents a mile (and the back of the coach is fairly clean after 1800 miles, and that's after half a day driving in the rain in Utah (red mud)). Another benefit I see is that small stones or sand was not thrown against the Jeep's windshield when in tow. I could see a "line" where the "wake" hit the Jeep, just six inches inside the edge of the windshield. Before the installation of Airtabs, the windshield was totally covered in muddy spray and left a mess that had to be cleaned before driving off.

I am enclosing a picture. If you want to use the picture and/or my comments on your web site please do so.

Bill, Idaho

October 19, 2009

Jack,

I have made only one trip since applying the airtabs. I can not comment on any potential mpg change because the trip was not the usual long trek at sixty mph and above. The most noticeable change was the difference in the turbulence when the big trucks come even with the rear end of my motor home (there was none). Wow, what a difference! Also, the motor home seemed to be affected less by the winds.

Installation was a breeze (after the painting) and took less that an hour. Thanks to the instructions, I managed to not install them backwards.

Art D.
Winter Springs, FL

November 9, 2009

Airtab, LLC

Jack,

WOW!! That was our reaction after we installed your product just prior to our heading to the West Coast. When the first tractor-trailer passed, my husband was amazed that he felt no buffeting. When they passed us on the Interstate, we didn't experience any suction wind. Now when I'm driving I don't have to hold my breath when being passed at high speed by the truckers. We had 25 mph southeasterly winds between Arizona and California and the control was much better than other motor coaches we saw.

Also, to my surprise, our tow vehicle no longer has the black diesel soot all over the hood.

Thanks for a great product. We both feel we have more control and will highly recommend Airtab to everyone.

Sincerely,

Ralph and Sharon H.
Niceville, FL

Airtab,

We installed Airtabs on our 36 ft. diesel pusher Monaco Windsor prior to our trip to Mesa, AZ in early November 2009. It was too windy to calculate any mpg increase with 95 - 100 KM per hour (59 to 62 MPH) winds from Central Alberta to south of Helena MT. The Coach handled as if it were glued to the road which was a real treat with the head and crosswinds we encountered. Buffering was egligible when meeting semi's on two lane highways or when passing or being passed on four lane Interstates. Our Monaco is a fairly low riding, easily handled coach but the Airtab are the best investment one could make for increased stability.

I would highly recommend Airtab to any Motorcoach owner.

Allan H.
Canada

Received March 30, 2010

Jack,

I purchased Airtabs last year and finally installed them on my 2008 Monaco 40' Diplomat Motorhome late in 2009. Not really believing all the hype I'd read about the tabs I was skeptical to say the least. To my amazement these things are amazing. I didn't really notice much, if any improvement in fuel efficency, but all of my travels are in the west where the roads aren't flat, but more up and down. Where I saw improvement is when a large vehicle passes me either from the front or the rear it is almost like they weren't there at all. I used to really prepare myself for a passing truck because they nearly blew me off the road before. Now I barely feel them. I've also noticed a much more stable drive just going down the road. I used to have to really drive my rig or "be on it constantly" because it would wander all over my lane if I wasn't careful. That has gone away and the rig handles almost like my pickup truck does.

I don't have any pictures but I put 96 tabs on the top and sides of the rear of the coach. I painted the tabs to match the color of the coach so they are nearly invisible. This was a very good choice to put on the Airtabs.

John N.

Oregon

Tom from BC reports: Airtab performance pretty much as advertised. Noticably better stability when passing or in X-wind conditions and a .3 mpg improvement. Was getting 8.6/8.7 now 8.9/9.0. This year 8.9 over 3700 miles. This is from the engine computer.

The details:

2007 Trip: (w/o Airtabs): 4191.9 miles/485.3 us gals/107.53 running hours/38.8 avg mph/8.6 mpg
2010 Trip: ( w/ Airtabs): 3710.5 miles/415.6 us gals/79.5 running hours/46.7 avg mph/8.9 mpg.

The route was similar in both cases...I-5 south and across to AZ and reverse on the way home.

I don't know what other feedback you've had from the MH crowd, but it seems to be that it does keep the back of the MH a bit cleaner (mine was never particularly bad this way) but I think the airflow comes back together about where the TOAD is and I think deposits a bit more gunk on the car. To me, this isn't a big issue since you have to wash the TOAD regularly anyway and it makes little difference whether it's a little dirty or a lot dirty.

Trevor & Judy Gray from New Zealand were amazed at the difference Airtabs made to the rear of their Motorhome. Realy improved the stability in gusty conditions and returned home with a clean rear. No tar and dirt.

Motorhome "Graysaway" NZMCA#8365