A Few Motorhome Repairs

 

Wesley Chapel, Florida (high 92, low 72)

We have been hanging out, visiting Mom, and working around the coach on things we have been neglecting.

It’s hot every day from morning until evening so we haven’t been inclined to do anything outdoors.  If it’s not storming, we manage to sit outside on the patio in the evenings for a few hours, but usually we need to run a fan due to the heat and humidity. 

The otters have been entertaining us and last week we saw a mother deer with two new born fawns.  They chased each other around for a while, but I didn’t have my camera with me so I didn’t get any pictures. 

This morning the otters were again chasing around on the bank.  I think they were getting ready to mate. 

The larger one was digging in the dirt and acting kind of strange. 

We never did see any mating, and soon they got back into the water and frolicked some more.

Some people walked up with their dog and the otters were checking them out. 

 

We have been working on small repairs on the motorhome.  Small things have a way of adding up, and they never end up being easy, do they?

We have been lucky until recently and never had a string break on a day\night shade.  Our luck ran out and a string broke on our small bedroom shade.  I guess I’ll finally have to learn how to restring these things. 

As I posted earlier, we had another problem with our Thetford Aria toilet.   We thought the foot pedal broke again after just replacing that same mechanism not two months ago.  It’s extremely frustrating.

On top of that our favorite, and only mobile Rv tech moved to North Carolina, so we were forced to find someone else.

With some recommendations from campground neighbors, we chose The Toy Doctor.  It’s a man and his son in law working together. They both seemed to be good and the older man had a lot of experience working on airplanes, boats and RV’s. 

Using a mobile Rv tech, you never know who you’re getting.  Is it someone who just went through 2 weeks of Rv maintenance school and thinks he is a qualified Rv tech. We were happy with their work and will use them again.

They removed the toilet and discovered a new problem.  The cable that operates the flushing mechanism broke.  That was about the only part we didn’t have on hand.  We thought we had  any and all parts we may need, after our last fiasco in the Keys, but apparently there are still a few additional parts that we didn’t have.

Fortunately, they had a replacement cable but it was a tad longer than our old one, but they made it work.  We had them replace the blade mechanism also while they were there, so for all intents and purposes, we have a brand new toilet.  (hopefully)

One problem we discovered last time was that the main mechanism was not installed correctly from the factory.  They corrected that issue, so hopefully we won’t be having this problem again.  The foot pedal seems to be a lot smoother now, so hopefully we’re done with toilet repairs for a long time.

 

On the way home from the Keys last month, we noticed the blower on our dash a/c was only working on high.  We figured it was only a matter of time until high speed quit working, so we decided we’d better try and fix it.  Apparently, this is quite a common problem.

Al removed the blower switch which was located behind the controls on the front dash.  It was a Ford part so he took it to the Ford dealer, who told him it could only be two things.  It was either the fan switch or the resistor. 

We were happy to have found the exact part we needed, and it was relatively inexpensive.  Unfortunately, it turned out not to be the fan that was causing the problem.  We really didn’t expect it to be that easy.  :)

Al was able to locate and remove the resistor which is in the outside front generator compartment near the firewall on the passenger side.  Ford had no comparable part and recommended we go to NAPA.  They had a similar part, except the little connector plugs were a little smaller than the one we had.  He felt they would grab on when we plugged it in and would work.  The part was about $25 and not returnable, but we took a chance and bought it. 

It worked!  Yay……we again have a three speed blower.  In the process of getting this done, we got some feedback from the Monaco owners group and they gave us some places to go find the part, should it ever go out again. 

Merikay and Craig posted an interesting blog about their problems with a dirty radiator and engine overheating.   You can read about it HERE.  If you have never cleaned your radiator, you might want to read their story.  I think we’ll have it done by a professional at Cummins when we get our oil changed.  A lot of people do it themselves with a special Simple Green cleaner, but I think given the importance of this part, we’ll go the professional route.  We’re hoping since our engine has easy rear access it won’t cost as much as theirs!