2018 Forest River Puma problems, complaints & recalls
Most-reported problem areas: Wheels (1) · Tires (1) · Structure:body (1)
Safety recalls (3)
Equipment:recreational Vehicle/Trailer:120/240 Vac Electrical System:charger Low Voltage Battery 2024-06-04 · campaign 24V395000 · 41,353 vehicles
Defect: Forest River, Inc. (Forest River) is recalling certain 2004-2024 Cedar Creek and 2006-2024 Puma fifth wheels trailers. The overcurrent protection from the trailer battery may have been incorrectly routed, allowing the wires to be pulled out of the junction box.
Risk: A loose wire can cause a short circuit, increasing the risk of a fire.
Fix: Dealers will reroute the wires to the protected side of the mini-beaker, free of charge. Owner notification letters were mailed July 10, 2024. Owners may contact Puma customer service at 1-574-642-0588 or Cedar Creek customer service at 260-593-4000. Forest River's number for this recall is 51-1786.
Equipment:other:labels 2017-11-06 · campaign 17V699000 · 8 vehicles
Defect: Forest River, Inc. (Forest River) is recalling certain 2018 Puma recreational trailers. The Federal Placards indicate incorrect tire load range and tire pressure (PSI) information. The placard states a tire size of ST205/75R15/D requiring 50PSI, however the installed tires are size ST205/75R15/C, requiring 65PSI. As such, these vehicles fail to comply with the requirements of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) number 110, "Tire Selection and Rims," and they also fail to comply with
Risk: The incorrect tire information can cause the operator to over-inflate the tires, which can cause premature tire failure, increasing the risk of a crash.
Fix: Forest River will notify owners, and dealers will install a corrected Federal Placard, free of charge. The recall began on December 4, 2017. Owners may contact Forest River Customer Service at 1-574-642-0588. Forest River's number for this recall is 425-0560.
Wheels:hub 2017-10-09 · campaign 17V635000 · 742 vehicles
Defect: Forest River, Inc. (Forest River) is recalling certain 2018 Puma recreational trailers. When installing and tightening the wheels on the trailers, the wheel center caps may have interfered, preventing the wheels from being properly tightened.
Risk: If the wheels were not properly tightened, they may loosen and detach while the trailer is moving, increasing the risk of a crash.
Fix: Forest River will notify owners, and dealers will remove the plastic wheel center cap and install a different center cap, free of charge. The recall began on November 1, 2017. Owners may contact Forest River customer service at 1-574-642-0588. Forest River's number for this recall is 420-0537.
Service bulletins (2)
Technical service bulletins are repair instructions manufacturers send dealers for known issues. Unlike recalls, the fix is not automatically free — but naming the bulletin at the service desk can save diagnosis time and support goodwill repairs.
Equipment:recreational Vehicle/Trailer 2018-09-28 · 510780 · Service Bulletin/Repair Instructions
per the service bulletin from dometic ?dometic corporation has identified a visual cosmetic defect that has occurred on our dometic dm2652 refrigerators up in the freezer compartment. this does not occur on all units, but may be present on units with serial numbers starting with mb between 805xxxxx
Equipment:recreational Vehicle/Trailer 2018-04-24 · 4250668 · Service Bulletin/Repair Instructions
the monitor panel incorrectly displays the level of fresh water, gray water, black water, etc. and is required to be changed with a replacement monitor panel.
What owners report
2022-07-11 · Tires“tire blew out. tread coming off inner tire and metal wire every where. less than 4k miles on the tires…”
2021-02-12 · Structure:body · 6,000 mi“the underbody of the 2018 puma rv had rusted so badly that the front of the rv tore off while exiting a gas station. this type of thing should never have happened, particularly since it's only a 2018 model. luckily they weren't on a highway traveling at 55 mph.*dt*jb*dt…”
2020-05-21 · Wheels · 3,000 mi“castle rock st225/75r15 blew out at normal operating pressure. the vehicle was operating at 65mph on i95. the tire passed pre trip inspection and pressure check. after approximately 200 miles, the tire blew out on clean pavement. the tire had approximately 3000 miles of use on time of blow out. the side walls were no compromised and many of the "ni…”
Excerpts of consumer complaints filed with NHTSA, lightly truncated. They are owner statements, not verified findings.