many troublesome reviews

We are strongly considering a new 179 but are discouraged by all the negative reviews we've found on line regarding the shoddy quality of construction.  Thought?  

If you want something with impeccable construction, go for a high-end RV such as one from Airstream or Bigfoot. Of course, you would be paying almost as much as you would for a small house in doing so. If youi want something light that can be towed easily, even by a mid-sized pickup or an SUV that does not cost a small fortune, you will need to be willing to accept that there may be some trade-offs involved. Larry-D's advice is good. I second the advice to make sure all plumbing is tight. On ours, the kitchen sink drain was not tight enough and it leaked on our first trip, damaging two cookbooks we had in the drawer under the sink. The rest of the items that got wet could be washed and dried and they were okay. Make sure all trim pieces are attached well and no staples are sticking out where they shouldn't be (like in the storage compartment under the bed.

On the newer R-Pods, Forest River has addressed some of the quality issues. For example, I understand that the suspension for the sewer and gray water drain lines has been reworked to be stronger. The one area that I would especially check though is the tank supports. Industry standard is to use screws. They only work well if they are fully tight and there is no gap between the support ends and the frames. I ended up installing stainless steel bolts, washers, and nuts. I put one in each attachment point to make sure mine would not fail. Mine did have a gap.

We purchased ours in December 2015. I've made a number of modifications since. At the price point of our R-Pod, I  feel comfortable about making such modifications. They have been useful in our travels which have included two cross-country trips and trips from NC to VT and NY. The R-Pod tows well and because it is compact, can fit in places a bigger trailer wouldn't.

You will read a lot of negatives. People post about those. Good experiences aren't written up as much. Don't let the negative reviews prevent you from checking it out for yourself.

I've heard about the sawdust/debris stories, but ours has been clean through and through. This is either a manifestation of which factory the R-pod came out of, or perhaps a reflection on the dealer. Ours has had a couple of very minor cosmetic things that were easily fixed with interior trim. NBD. We still love it.

We have just completed our first full year with our 2017 179. We took it to Mt. Rushmore and Lake City, CO and several closer in weekend trips here in Oklahoma. We've had a couple of minor issues with it that required a return trip to the dealer (a piece of trim around the slide came loose and the heater cover came loose on the highway) but they were both remedied. We love it and could not be more pleased with our choice. We are ready for the weather to warm up enough so we can hit the road again!

The first rule of Internet reviews is, for every 10 reviews on a good-but-not-perfect product, 9 of those will be negative.