We Found Our Leak, Thanks to a Frog

 

In my last post, I mentioned a huge water leak from our living room slide.  At that time, we were baffled as to how it occurred.

My dear sweet husband was on a frog hunting mission for me one night, when he discovered our problem.

I have been deathly afraid of frogs and toads for as long as I can remember.  Al knows  how afraid I am and does everything he can to keep my life as frog free possible.

For the past few weeks we have been hearing the all too familiar “barking” sound of a tree frog coming from somewhere on top of the coach.  When you’re in the bathroom, it sounds like it’s in the bathroom with you. 

A couple weeks ago, Al was doing a frog hunt on the roof and managed to catch a Cuban Tree frog.  If you’ve never seen one of these buggers, they are quite creepy.  Sorry, I can’t post a picture of one because that would involve me looking at pictures and I don’t want to do that.  :)  They aren’t native to Florida and have been eating the local frogs and lizards.  They recommend you kill any you find, but we just can’t do that.  We took him on a walk (in a container) and let him go a few blocks away.

A few days ago we were sitting outside and heard the familiar barking type sound of a tree frog. We’re wondering if the first frog came back?   Al discovered it was hiding inside the bathroom vent which is on the roof. No wonder it sounded so close from the bathroom.    Al was unable to catch it that night. A few nights later it was out of the vent hunting, but it hid under the slide topper cover and Al couldn’t catch him.  He worked until well after dark trying to catch it, but was unable to get it.

Since the frog was out of his bathroom vent, Al covered the two vents with screen so he couldn’t get back in.  If they go down into the vents, they can actually get inside and come up through the sink. 

While he was frog hunting, Al noticed that the slide topper had come out of the groove that held it to the side of the motorhome.  There was about a 3-4 foot gap in the center, where the slide met the wall of the coach. This is why we had the leak.  Both ends were still attached, so we hadn’t seen the problem until he went up on the roof.  Thanks to that noisy frog, we discovered our problem.

The next night, Al went on another frog hunt and this time was able to get the frog out of the roller tube and he finally caught him and he’s been relocated to a new home. This time, Al drove him to a new location (not as far as I would have liked but hopefully far enough he won’t come back).

I called Lazy Days on Monday, and was told the first available appointment would be mid August.  I reminded them this was an emergency since we had a leak, so they got us in the next day.  It’s an advantage if you are a previous customer and have bought RV’s from them, I guess.    We expected Lazy Days to be be pretty empty, after all this is “slow season” in Florida.  Boy were we wrong! 

The Lazy Days in Tampa has 220 service bays, and almost all of them were full!   If you’ve never been to Lazy Days in Tampa, you should visit it some day. It still amazes me every time we go there.  It’s quite an amazing place.

There is a shop on the Lazy Days property called Wade RV.  They do custom work like MCD shades, dash covers, window graphics, entry mats, vehicle wraps, solar screens, upholstering, and other things like that.  Lazy Days uses them to do some of their work.    Our toppers are made of a fabric  material that looks to me like canvas but it’s called acrylic.  Wade has the matching fabric and sews it for Lazy Days.

We arrived at Lazy Days by 9am Tuesday.  We checked in and by 9:30 we were back in a service bay hooked up to electricity with the AC running. Gotta keep the kitties nice and cool.  I had requested a specific technician, but he was unavailable so we got one by the  name of Rob.   

We decided to get our Air dryer cartridge replaced (another diesel thing) and also get a four corner weigh of the coach.  They did the weigh for $99, and we didn’t think that was too bad of a price for the convenience of having done while we were there.

Rob took off the old awning topper fabric, walked it over to Wade RV so they could match it and get the right size. They custom made the new awning topper. While Rowas waiting for that, he changed out the air dryer, and then they took the coach to the chassis department for the 4 corner  weigh.

We were a little nervous about our weight.  We have never had a 4 corner weigh done.  We weighed it at a CAT weigh station but that was only the front and rear axels, and not an accurate way to determine proper tire pressure.

Our GVWR (gross vehicle weight rating) was 5270 lbs under the maximum weight.   Yay!

I still need to educate myself a little more, but we didn’t find any major issues with our weights.  It turns out we estimated pretty closely on how much PSI we need in our tires.  The PSI is determined by the tire manufacturer and the weight on each tire. 

I’ll post more about that after I do a little more research.

After the weighing was done, they brought the coach back over to Rob.  The topper fabric was done and he had the slide topper back on before 5pm.  Since it was late, we were tired and they hadn’t gotten the bill ready yet, we decided to stay the night. 

We were snug in our service bay with 50 amp electric, water and sewer if we had needed it, and free and fast WIFI.  We pulled the coach out enough so that we could put up our satellite dish and we were happy campers for the night.

We got up early the next morning, paid the big bill and headed back to Quail Run.

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!

 

Oh No, Not Again

Wesley Chapel, Florida (high 85, low 68)

The summer rainy season has started and we're getting our afternoon showers, which often bring strong storms with a lot of thunder and lightning.  We are very anxious to get back up to the mountains.  It's stifling hot and humid here.


When we go to the Keys, we have no mobile RV repair person that we know and trust, so we always try to do repair or replace anything we think may go wrong, before we go to the Keys.

If you remember from my previous blog posts, our preventative maintenance didn't work well this year, when our our almost new RV toilet broke while we were in the Keys.   Of course we didn't have spare parts (we do now) and had a bit of a dilemma trying to repair it ourselves.

Our Thetford Aria Classic toilet is porcelain including the bowl and the base, but unfortunately, the foot pedal mechanism is plastic and poorly designed.

Well, guess what?   Not two months after we repaired the toilet, the foot mechanism broke again!   Grrrrrrrr.  That toilet was only a year old when it first broke.

We called Tim Stratton our favorite local mobile Rv guy, has relocated to North Carolina, so now we have to find another repair guy.   Grrrrr

We found another local mobile guy and have an appointment for the repair.  He's a bit young, so I hope he has enough experience to be able to handle all the potential things that can go wrong in an RV.   The bolts on the closet flange on our RV are lined up at an angle. They don't move, because the closet flange is all one piece and all a part of the holding tank.  When we tried to install another toilet, the bolts didn't line up correctly and we were unable to install it.  Just as an FYI, apparently this is quite common and there is a part you can install to make it work.   We just found that out and I don't know what it's called.

We have to decide whether to replace or repair the toilet.  He said all Rv toilets are made pretty much the same way and they all use cheap plastic parts.   We think our Aria toilet wasn't put together properly from the factory and one part isn't centered like it should be.   We were afraid to take it all apart and try to center it correctly when we were in the Keys because if we messed up, we would have been without a toilet.   Maybe our new Rv guy can do something with it because we feel that is the cause of the foot pedal breaking.   We will have to see how it turns out.  Sorry for so much toilet info, but I like to document things because for sure we won't remember in a year or two.  :)



I went to the doctor earlier this week because I've felt some pressure (if that's the correct way to describe it)  in my chest.  It felt more like a lung issue than a heart issue and since I used to be a smoker (30+ years ago) and I did a few Google searches of my symptoms,  I felt it might be a good idea to get it checked out.  They did a breathing test which I passed with flying colors, an EKG, just as a precaution  and a chest x-ray and everything appeared fine.  I felt pretty good afterwards after passing those tests.  I decided to wait and see if I start to get better before I followed up with the doctor.  We both had a pretty good respiratory bug a few months ago, so maybe it's still there a little.  I wondered if I had pneumonia. I guess the tests ruled that out.

A few days later, we met a neighbor who just lost her husband a few weeks ago.  They had just sold their house in Tampa, and were planning on spending the summer in Maine.  He felt ill, and went to the doctor.  They did a chest x-ray among other things and said he was fine.  A few days later he ended up in the ER where they did an MRI and discovered he had lung cancer and his lungs were completely eaten up with cancer.  Eighteen days later he was dead.  That just goes to prove how short and unfair life can be.  I felt  so sorry for this poor woman and her husband.  

Of course, when she told me the x-ray of his chest didn't show his lung cancer, my good results from my medical tests don't make me feel as secure as they did before I heard about him.

The breathing issues I was having seem to be better, but if they don't clear up, I will go back to the doctor.  I'm just wondering if some of the respiratory bug I had had started to surface again. I've been taking my echinacea and will definitely keep an eye on things, and although I am not  big on seeing a doctor, I will follow up if I need to.


Al is getting his annual physical today.   He also had an appointment with the surgeon as a follow up on his rotator cuff surgery.  His surgeon is the doctor for the Tampa Bay Lightning (hockey team) and they will be playing in the Stanley Cup finals starting today. He got a call from the doctors office canceling his appointment and all others this week.  I guess the hockey team has a higher priority than Al.  :)



I heard that Live Writer has partially fixed their program but the pictures still won't load.  Since my last experience posting via Blogger worked out so well, I decided to try again.

I am posting some pictures from last summer in the mountains, just to test blogger again.

BTW, does anyone know where in Blogger can you tell how many words you are posting/writing?
The word count showed up in Live Writer, but I can't find it in Blogger.

I am posting these in the large size.  I usually use medium because if I remembered right, the large were too large for my blog pages.  It looks okay, we'll see, I guess.

I think I just may stick with doing my blog posts in Blogger.

Rv Toilet Install-Part One, Plan B, and Part Two

 

Cudjoe Key, Florida (high 78, low 68)

 

TOILET REPAIRS, PART ONE

We were happy to see the new RV toilet arrive right on time Friday the 13th. 

Al has installed a few residential toilets over the years, and never had any problem, but of course Rv toilets are not the same.

We removed our Aria Classic. No problems there.  I did the lifting to spare Al’s shoulder. 

We soon noticed the closet flange on the motor home floor, wasn’t quite right as far as the bolts matching up to where they needed to be on the new toilet.

This is a picture of a similar product, however the one on the floor is apparently cemented in. You can’t remove it, and you can’t turn it so that the openings for the bolts are where you need them to be.

As it turned out,  the OEM toilet Monaco used doesn’t attach to the closet flange at all.  The seal fits into it, and that is all.  It’s attached with two lag bolts, which are much further apart than the bolts on the closet flange.

What was Monaco thinking?   Why didn’t they install the closet flange so that if you ever needed to replace the toilet, it would match up to other toilets. 

One good thing is that our Monaco motor home has a wonderful feature in which you can turn off the water for each individual item. It’s extremely handy to be able to turn the water off  just for the toilet, and still have water elsewhere in the coach.  It was nice to be able to wash our hands while working on the toilet.

We were extremely frustrated and after a lot of research and head scratching, we came to the conclusion that the new toilet was not going to work for our motor home.  We considered drilling new holes into our closet flange and using lag bolts to mount the new toilet, but the base wasn’t as wide as the old toilet and it would have been wobbly anyway.

 

 

PLAN B

By this time, we were tired and frustrated.    We decided to go with Plan B, although we weren’t exactly sure what that was at the moment.  Shortly afterwards got an email saying part for the old toilet was now available.  They had been on back order and no one knew when it would be available.

At that point, we decided to re-install the old toilet and wait for the parts.  At least we would have a toilet, even though it had to be flushed manually.  At this point we were thankful for that much.

There may be a way to make the new toilet fit without a major ordeal, but since the parts were on the way, we decided to stay with the old toilet.  It’s actually a much nicer toilet and is a solid one piece of porcelain, instead of the cheap plastic base like the new one.

 

So…..it looks like we have made an expensive mistake, and learned an expensive lesson.  Anybody want to buy a brand new porcelain Thetford Style Plus toilet?  We’ll give you a good deal!

PART TWO

The new parts arrived, but we were dreading it and  procrastinated a few days.

We finally got brave enough and tried again.  There are a lot more parts on an Rv toilet than a residential toilet and the instructions weren’t very clear on how to replace the foot pedal, but al figured it out.  As it turns out, the original toilet had some parts that weren’t attached quite on center, which causes the foot pedal mechanism to rub against the side of the toilet. He tried to remove that part, to see if he could center it correctly, but it was tightly bolted down and he was afraid he would break the porcelain if he kept at it.  We would really be in trouble if he broke the porcelain base. He decided to file away the porcelain area that rubs and hope for the best.

Next step was to reinstall the toilet.  It’s much heavier than the one we had ordered and it’s a lot harder putting it back in than it was to remove, but I managed.  Al couldn’t even help me because there is no room in our tiny bathroom.  Al screwed it back into the floor with the lag bolts.

The next step was to reattach the water line, and this is where we had the problem.  For some reason the heavy duty blue water line had shifted a little and didn’t match up to the back of the toilet, although by feel it felt like it was in line.  It doesn’t bend much and only goes up and down a half inch or so.  We both tried and tried and couldn’t get the darned waterline attached.  Of course you’re doing it blind because it’s behind the toilet and only one hand will fit behind the toilet.

Again, we were happy to have the separate water disconnects in the motor home. We had water to the sink in the bathroom, and could turn off the supply to the toilet.  We now had a working foot pedal, just no water supply, but we were better off than we were before!

So, that work around worked for about a week with us both trying again and again to get the waterline to attach.

Finally, Al suggested I try to take a picture to see if we could see why it wouldn’t screw on.  I did, and then he saw the water line was a little high.  He managed to shove it back down a little and was finally able to attach the water line to the toilet! 

 

So….my advice for you all is to buy spare parts for your toilet, because if/when they break, you’ll be very glad to have them on hand.

What an ordeal!

Uh-Oh-Big Problem and no RV Supplies Nearby

 

 Cudjoe Key, Florida (high 82, low 75)

Time is passing quickly. 

We picked the boat up from it’s storage lot on Big Pine Key.  Al is doing some annual maintenance on it, a little at a time. and he’s already managed to hurt hit shoulder in the process. 

It’s been pretty breezy and the seas are pretty choppy, which is pretty typical for March.  Our days are very warm with day time temps usually at 82.  Luckily, our site is close enough to the ocean that we almost always have a wonderful sea breeze.  By about mid afternoon, we’re needing a jacket when we sit outside.   The sea breezes are nice, except for boating. 

We’ve about decided not to put the boat into a high and dry marina.  We’re hoping some of our many neighbors on canal lots will offer us a place to dock the boat….but we’re still waiting.  :)

Fellow blogger friends Rick and Kathy recently arrived and are staying at a nearby KOA.  We met them at Mangrove Mama’s for happy hour,  and again at the Square Grouper for lunch. I neglected to get a picture both times, but I’m sure we’ll meet again, and I’ll remember to get a picture.

We got a rather unpleasant surprise last Friday, right before we were heading out to meet  Rick and Kathy for lunch. It made it a little difficult to enjoy our lunch date, as we had other things on our minds.

You may remember that we had our Thetford Aria Deluxe toilet replaced about a year ago.  It was the push button electric model and it gave us problems from day one.  It was brand new when we bought the motor home.  We found it’s little sister, the Aria Classic which has the regular foot pedal flush and nothing electronic.  The Aria models are the only ones we could find that have the porcelain base and bowl.

The new toilet, often had problems with the pedal flush mechanism sticking.   I intended to buy some replacement parts, but I never did.  Big mistake, because Friday afternoon, all the way down here in the Keys, with very few Rv parts options,  the darn flush pedal  broke!   The beautiful solid porcelain toilet has PLASTIC parts and one of those parts broke off.   There are a few things you can live with out, but a toilet is not one of them!

I have to tell you, we were both in a state of panic.  Yes, we have bath houses here, but none of them are real close.  I also have been dealing with a UTI, which means I’m needing to go more often.  :) 

There are not a lot of options here in the Keys for RV parts.  The nearest Camping World is 280 miles away! We are actually closer to Cuba than Camping World, or even Walmart.

We decided we needed to get something ordered that afternoon, since it was a Friday, we hoped at least it would get shipped before the week-end.

I checked with PPL Motorhomes in Texas. They have a great parts department and knowledgeable people.  We’ve ordered rv related items from them several other times. They didn’t have the parts in stock for our toilet, and as it turns out neither did other parts places we checked.  We decided to go with the recommendation from PPL and we ordered a Thetford Aqua Magic Style Plus toilet.   It has a porcelain bowl, but plastic base.  This is not exactly what I wanted, but at this point, I didn’t care if it had a plastic base or not.

Unfortunately, according to PPL’s website this is that we found: 

NOTE: Due to Fedex and UPS hazmat regulations, expedited shipping is not available for toilets. Standard ground transportation will be used for all toilets.

The Hazmat rules are due to the small amount of toilet chemicals packed inside all rv toilets.

It turns out that since porcelain toilets have to be specially trucked in because UPS and FED EX can’t ship them without breaking them.   The shipping cost was $120.  Yikes.  The price you pay for being in paradise, huh?   The new toilet is scheduled to arrive Friday (the 13th)   Uh oh……   They tell you that you have to open the box and confirm there is no damage before you can accept the package.  Once you accept it, it’s yours.   Yep…it’s arriving on Friday, the 13th.  :)

In the meantime, we have discovered a way to manually flush the toilet with a screwdriver.  It’s not ideal, but at least we can flush.

We love the Florida Keys, but it is one of the worst places to be if you have any problems.  We don’t even have a Walmart within 100 miles.

Still….we are very happy here in the Florida Keys.

Still Waiting and Watching

 

Blairsville, Georgia (high 63, low 34)

 

It started drizzling yesterday morning, which gradually led to heavier rain that lasted well into the night.  I did get a chance to crawl under the coach before the rain started and checked for leaks. I’m a little lot more flexible than Al, so I am trying to save him some of the crawling underneath.

No little green drops were found, but I felt some dampness near another clamp. Of course it could have been just dew.  I think I may have smelled some coolant when I touched the area, but was not completely sure.  Just to be on the safe side, Al wants to put a double clamp on that hose as well.  Boy, there are sure a lot of hose connections for the coolant.  You would think there would be one in and one out, but we keep finding more hoses, leading to different parts of the engine.  On the plus side, I did get a nice tour of underneath the engine of our motor home.  :)   I didn’t see any signs of rat, mice, or bird nests.

We did manage to find some of the off brand rescue tape that was the better quality, so Al will tape up the new area before he puts the other clamp on. 

We are planning on heading south tomorrow.  It looks like we should have a few good weather days. 

We have some extra coolant on hand in case we need it.

Paul, of  PDD fame, sent us a very helpful link from RV Cruzer,  regarding what types of coolants you should use for a diesel engine.  It explained in fairly simple terms why regular automobile anti-freeze was not to be used in big diesel engines.   If you have a diesel engine, I would recommend you read the post.  Thanks so much Paul, for the excellent link.

The home page of the RV Cruzer webpage, has some very good information not only on diesel engines, but rv travel, modifications, and much more.  There was a good article on installing MCD shades.  After reading it, I now think we could do it ourselves.  Check it out.  It’s a good web page for RV’ers.

 

Our hearts go out to the victims of the tornados in Illinois. I sure was glad it didn’t come this way, but I kept a close eye on the weather last night.  Later in the evening, some of those storm bands started heading this way.  I didn’t go to sleep until I was sure everything was quiet.  We got about 2 minutes of strong winds, and then it was gone.   Thank goodness.

 

Thanks to all of you for your advice on our little leak.  We’re hoping we have it resolved and that is is over kill, but we’d rather spend a few bucks on clamps and tape than a new engine.  We’ll be watching the temperature very closely.

 

****  Pete and Jean****   I didn’t get an email from you and I couldn’t find your email address.   Can you re-send it?   rvtravels2@yahoo.com

Watching for the Green Drip

 

Blairsville, Georgia  (high 65, low 53)

 

We’re watching the weather since there is a possibility of a tornado outbreak today in the Midwest.  We are expecting to get some of the storm front here in Georgia, but it is not predicted to be anything severe.  (hopefully)  Of course, being the weather wienie that I am, I will certainly keep an eye on things.   No storms will sneak up on us!   :)

 

Thanks for all the advice, tips and well wishes on yesterdays post.

I really think the cold weather may have caused some of these problems.  Jo Beth said her Dad says it often happens to his tractors after a cold spell, and if I remember right her Dad owned/owns a John Deere dealership.  Thanks JoBeth, that makes me feel much better.

It just reinforces to me what others have mentioned and that is to check all nuts, bolts, and fittings periodically and tighten them as needed.

So….yesterday,  Al crawled under the motor home and saw what he thought was where the leak was coming from.  He tightened a loose bolt and we bought some more of the Wrap it repair self-fusing silicone tape.

We had a few rolls of this stuff that we had bought at the Tampa RV show, and it’s come in handy a few times.  It is wonderful stuff.  It sticks to itself, it stretches, and it holds up to very hot and very cold temperatures.  We didn’t have much of the stuff from the RV show left, so we went to O’Reillys Auto Parts and picked up one roll of a similar product.  It seemed to be even thicker than the old stuff we had.  It worked great.  Al wrapped all around the pipe and then he put on a second clamp.   We let it sit and still got a few drips.   Crap.

We went back to O’Reillys Auto Parts for some more tape and another clamp.  We planned on getting a few rolls, but they only had one roll left.  It was the same as the first roll we had gotten from them.

This is the stuff we got.   Part number 82110.  No mention of it  being made in America, right?

We we went across the street to Auto Zone to pick up another couple rolls.  Overkill maybe, but better than being on the side of the road.

This is what we got.

It looks the same, right?

Notice it says proudly “Made in USA.”

The part number is the same, everything appears to be the same.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t the same stuff at all.  It stuck to itself (notice the stuck piece I pulled off).  It tore when I tried to unstick it and it was wayyyyyyy thinner. 

In other words, it was junk.

We had also found some more of what appeared to be the same type of self-fusing tape at Home Depot.  

It’s supposed to seal under water, plumbing, high pressure hoses, and in extreme hot and cold temperatures.

Guess what?  It was the same thin crap that we just bought. 

GRRRRR.

Fortunately, we found another roll of the stuff we had previously gotten at the RV show.  I distinctly remember the guy there telling us that other places sold this stuff, but it was not the same quality.    He was absolutely right.  I will go online and order some once we get back to Tampa.

Rescue Tape is the stuff that we had from the RV show.  We will definitely buy some more.   Al has used if frequently on water hoses, the metal spray wand on his pest control gun, and many other things.

 

Anyway, Al worked on the leak, and he thought he had it fixed.  He didn’t find a bad hose, and thought the loose connections were the main problem. 

He was getting a little tired of crawling under the motor home, so I volunteered to go and look for leaks.

I was disappointed to crawl under and see the tell-tale little green drop.  It was on the bottom of a hose and not near a connection.  I felt the hose and examined it as well as I could.  I didn’t feel any damage so it made me wonder what was above that little drop.  Mind you, I know nothing about engines, so I don’t know which hoses lead to which part, but when I looked up directly over the little green drop, I noticed another little green drop.  

This drop was near another connection that apparently is another place the coolant travels through the radiator and engine.  I pointed it out to Al and he had to crawl under again.  : (

He found another loose heavy duty hose clamp.   He tightened it, we wrapped it in more tape and hoped for the best.  We started the engine, ran it a while and saw no leaks.  We turned the engine off, waited a half hour and checked again.  No more drops.

This morning, we checked again and saw no green drops.

So….our next step is to go have Sunday Brunch at the all you can eat buffet, then we will start the engine again and see what happens.  It could be that we have the problem solved, or it could be that we have taped up a leak that will eventually start to leak again.

We’re sure hoping it’s solved.

We have some extra anti-freeze and will keep a real close eye on the engine temperature as we drive. 

 

I have another question for all you experts out there.  According to our Cummins engine manual, we have to use their anti-freeze.  It has to have the correct additives in it….blah blah blah.   When we got the anti-freeze changed at Lazy Days last year, they apparently used Zerex brand anti-freeze and we have about a gallon of that left over, all mixed up and ready to add.  Al asked the guy at O’Reilly’s and he sold him another Zerex type antifreeze that was supposedly okay for Cummins and Cat diesel engines, with all the additives.  You just need to add the water.

Al thinks I’m being paranoid, but noting knowing nothing about these diesel engines, I worry that we’ll put the wrong anti-freeze in and blow up the engine. 

If we use this anti-freeze that says it has all the additives needed for a diesel engine, will we be okay?   Unfortunately, Cummins is closed until Monday, or we would call them.

Al has changed anti-freeze and radiator hoses on many cars, but a diesel engine is so different, and he doesn’t want to do anything to cause additional problems.

Business Sold & Al is Officially Retired (almost)

 

Wesley Chapel, Florida  (high 93, low 72)

 

The past few days, I had been freaking out worrying about the possibility of a hurricane coming to Florida.  Tropical Storm Chantal was predicted to head this way with the possibility of it making landfall on the east coast of Florida, and  cutting across the state and back out into the Gulf of Mexico.  There were some computer models that were showing the possibility a Cat 2 hurricane.   Yes, we are on the west coast of Florida, but I know from experience that it would have still been strong once it went over the short distance from east coast to west coast.  We saw that time and time again in 2004 and 2005.

Our plan has been if a storm is coming, to head north and get out of Florida even if it’s just a tropical storm. Since Florida is a peninsula, there is only one way to go to escape, and that’s north.   The weather forecasters are pretty good about predicting where a storm will go, but not good about predicting the intensity.  We don’t want to be in a motor home in a hurricane.

Since we don’t have PDD  or Eldy DD, if we’re going to leave the state, we need to head out early.

This week was the worst timing for a storm because Al has to be here to wrap up the process of selling his pest control business.

I was literally making myself sick worrying about the possibilities.   I never used to be such a weather worrier, but then again, I used to live in a nice solid concrete block house, instead of a motor home.

I was very relieved when the NHC (National Hurricane Center) reported the storm had died out. Of course there are some remnants from the storm that will bring us some rain, and there is a possibility she will re-strengthen.  I’m trying not to borrow trouble.

Sigh of relief…..

Of course, it’s still hurricane season until the end of November, so our plan is to leave Florida as soon as possible, and we’re working on that.

 

On Tuesday, we signed the paperwork for the sale of the business.  Al is no longer the owner of the business, but one of the terms of the contract was that he would go with the new technicians to transition the customers over to the new company.

That is turning out to be a bit of a mess.  What the owner told us would happen is not what is actually happening.  One of the guys riding with Al was so sloppy spraying chemical that Al refused to have him go with him again.  You know how Harley Davison owners are with their motorcycles?   This guy actually sprayed chemical on the motorcycle, and the owner saw him do it.

The new technician shows up with no business cards, so the customers don’t have any idea who to call if they should have a problem.    The reason we care, beside the fact that these are long time customers and Al has a good relationship with them, is because we didn’t get all of our money up front.  We get paid for the next year for the accounts they do. so it’s to our advantage for the customers stay with the new company.

In the meantime, we’re trying not to stress about it.  We’ve done about all we can do and what happens, will happen.

Between the hurricane and the sale of the business, we have consumed a lot of beer and wine this week!   :)

The good news, is that we are working through the transition and we may be able to head back to the beautiful Georgia mountains pretty soon.

I really need to see some waterfalls, mountain streams and trails.

 

 

By the way.  My suspicion that my washing machine was still leaking turned out to be correct.

Some comments said that was the reason they didn’t have a washing machine in their Rv.  That’s your choice, but in my opinion is that it’s well worth having.  I’ve done it both ways.  With and without a machine and I much prefer having an onboard machine. I hate having dirty clothes around.

Washing machines break in a house too, and you have to have them repaired or replaced.  Granted, they are a little easier to work on in a house, but they still can malfunction. I’ve done a ton of laundry in this little machine and it’s worked just fine.  It’s 11 years old, so I should probably just get a new one, but after putting the new water pump on, I don’t want to do that.

I washed several loads of clothes and no leak.  I had about decided the leak was gone, but decided to check once more, when I found a small leak.  He came right back out and found water inside the foil dryer vent!   He found a water line that was loose and wondered if that was where the water got inside the dryer vent.   I don’t know, but nothing else makes sense.  It hasn’t rained in a few days so I know it didn’t come from outside.   I plan to do a search on some Rv forums today and maybe even call Splendide (the manufacturer).  I have heard they have great customer service.

I called the Splendide hotline and spoke to a tech.  He thinks our cold water valve is bad and they don’t make them anymore.  We will either have to buy a new machine, or switch the hot and cold lines and use only cold water.  I think that is what we’ll do for now.

Blue Ox Baseplate Install Issues

 

Wesley Chapel, Florida 

As I mentioned in a previous post, we had a problem with one of the base plates on the truck coming loose. We tow our Nissan truck behind the motor home.  Base plates are installed onto the front of the tow car to connect with the Blue Ox tow bar, which is attached to the motor home.  It’s critical everything is connected and mounted properly.

When we were getting ready to leave Georgia, Al noticed one of the brackets mounted on the truck appeared to be loose.  Upon checking, he found a problem with two of the three bolts on the drivers side.  One was broken off, and one one was stripped so that it couldn’t be tightened.

We had the original face plates put on last August, at a place nearby in Clearwater, called  Rentz Trailer Hitches.   We had some issues with them, but ended up getting everything resolved and we were happy.  You can read about that here.  There was some sloppy work to be dealt with.

One of the problems was the owner was rude to us when we wanted some problems resolved.  I don’t like spending thousands and getting rude treatment just because I want the job done right.  They had a new tech working there and he was making mistakes.   When Tony, the shop manager got involved things improved.

Anyway, we have been traveling all this time thinking everything was okay.  Al checked the brackets and tow bar occasionally and all appeared to be fine until last week.

When we got back to Florida, we called Rentz to tell them about our problem and make an appointment to bring the Nissan in to have the base plate fixed.  Al was told by the owners son, that they no longer took appointments and it was first come, first serve. That’s nice in theory, but what if the technicians haven’t finished their work from the day before?  You could arrive first thing in the morning and have to wait all day while they finish up.   We chose not to do that, because it’s a long drive over there with no guarantee that anyone would be able to look at your vehicle. They also didn’t seem to be too concerned about our problem.

We decided to go to Rv Medic here in Tampa to have the work done.  They are where we should have had the work done in the first place.  In order to get at these bolts, the entire front bumper cover had to be removed.  Vaughn, the mechanic showed us what the problem was after he got it all torn down.

Apparently,  these bolts were put on without using “RED Lock tight.” They became loose, which was what caused them to eventually break.  Vaughn said in the instructions from Blue Ox, clearly state that RED Lock tight must be used on these bolts.  

Vaughn showed us the bolts and there was NO lock tight used at all.  Apparently, it would still be visible on the bolts.

Vaughn wanted to check the bolts on the other side as well and he found a broken bolt there as well and one that would break when he tried to remove it.   No Lock Tight there either!

$400 later,  we left with the problems resolved. Vaughn was very thorough and we trusted his work.  Sure wish we had used him in the first place!

Vaughn saved the bolts for us and they wrote up exactly what they did and the problems that were  found.  It was his opinion that not using Lock Tight was the cause of the entire problem.

My guess is the new technician at Rentz never read the instructions for the Blue Ox faceplate install and no one ever checked his work.

We are going to contact Rentz on Monday, but from our past dealings with the owner, we aren’t expecting much.  We will try to deal with the shop foreman Tony if we can.  

We feel they should cover the entire cost to repair their error, but we’re not too optimistic.  Now that it’s over, I’m glad we didn’t bring it to them.  I have no confidence in their work at this point.

If we don’t get any satisfaction from them, we will be spreading this story out all over the RV world and internet.  We will also be making a call to Blue Ox, since they were on their website of recommended shops. 

We can cover the $400.  That’s not the most important thing. The main issue, is that our lives (and others) were put at risk because they didn’t read the manual.  (RTFM is one of my favorite sayings).

Our recommendation to everyone that tows a vehicle behind your motor home is to check all the brackets before each trip.   Check tow bar itself and then also check the face plate brackets. 

We’ll see what happens when we call Rentz on Monday, but in the meantime….just in case, any recommendations of where to spread our story?

Stay tuned to part two!

A Good Reminder to Add to Your Checklist

 

Ohio Key, Florida (high 87, low 79)

We were shocked to wake up this morning to the news about the explosion in West, Texas.  As bad as it is, at this point it looks to be an accident, rather than something intentional.  Our prayers go out to all those involved.

 

Today is the last day we’ll be able to take the little boat out and we were hoping for crystal clear water and flat calm seas.   I’m checking my weather app and I see 18 mph easterly winds.   Not exactly perfect conditions, but we’ll probably go out and do some fishing under the bridge near Sunshine Key Rv Resort.

Yesterday, we launched the boat at Bahia Honda with the intention of fishing in the deep channel under the bridge.  Al fished a while, but we saw no fish on the fish finder and he got zero bites.  We moved around a few times and had no better luck. 

The good news is that the boat ran great.  We picked it up from Andy the boat mechanic yesterday morning. We dropped it off to him at 5pm the night beofre and he had it ready first thing the next morning!  He did some preventative maintenance work.   That was some fast service.  Thanks Andy!  Great job!

This next picture is a picture of Andy and his cute little 6 toe’d Hemmingway kitty.  The kitty likes to help Andy work on boats.  This is his boat and it was in the water.  Kitty jumps down into the boat.

 

A few days ago, we were out for an early morning walk along the fishing bridge.  We were on the road which is higher up than the campground.  Looking down into the campground, we noticed a motor home leaving with toad attached.  We heard a loud noise.  Evidently, the toad came unhooked from the coach and the toad actually rear-ended the motor home when the motor home stopped.  We heard loud scraping noises and saw the toad raise off the ground a little.

We walked down to see if we could help.  Evidently the pin holding the hitch into the motor home had been stolen.

That little pin is the only thing holding the tow bar to the motor home.   Dewey, a Sunshine Key employee  happened to come by and had an extra pin which he gave to the man.  This man was in a real big hurry to leave, so without checking anything out, he proceeded to re-hook the toad to the motor home.   If it had of been us, we would have checked that hitch out very well before heading out.

I convinced them to check out the car first, because I had seen it lift off the ground.   Also, the tires  were turned the wrong way indicating it wasn’t tracking correctly behind the coach.   He reluctantly released the cords and chains and gave the toad a 5-6 foot test drive back and forth.  As soon as he confirmed that the car was okay, he immediately hitched the toad back up to the motor home.  The hitch needed a little work to get the arm to extend properly, but he got it done and left.  That indicated to us that the hitch may have been damaged.

I was worried about them.  We certainly would have done some more checking before we left, but he was in a big hurry and was gone before I had time to think and remember that he probably didn’t even know the toad rear-ended the motor home, and I also wonder if it ran over a part of the hitch.  Possible tire damage?  

It happened so fast, I wasn’t really sure what I saw, but it wasn’t good.  I wish he would have stuck around long enough for these things to come back to me.

Anyway…..he took off.  I hope they arrived at their next destination safely and hopefully he will have every thing checked out.

The point of the story is to check all connections before each and every trip.  We believe these hitch pins should have a lock on them.  People will steal these things, if not because they want them, then because it’s “fun.”   When I was a claim adjuster, I remember getting a claim where someone else had a pin stolen.

We also had a hitch assembly stolen off the back of our truck in the Wal-Mart parking lot in south Georgia.

Al locks everything down that he can.   It’s not just the fact that you have to buy a new hitch pin, but it’s a safety issue.  You should also check these pins regularly to make sure they are solid and not rusted out.

This next picture is some of the options available from Amazon.  The one on the top left is similar to what we use.

How about you?  Do you have a locking hitch pin?

One other thing we do before we leave, is that after we check to confirm the brake lights and turn signals work, Al drives the coach up a  little while so that I can confirm the toad is tracking correctly.   We learned to do that one time when we forgot to make sure the toad front wheels were turned correctly and we drug the toad a few feet.  Fortunately, that was in loose dirt and we didn’t have any problems, but it taught us a good lesson.

 

 

There are restaurants here where you can bring your freshly caught fish and they will cook it up for you.  How nice is that?

They give you all the sides you would get if they supplied the fish.  The trouble is, it cost about as much as if they supplied the fish!   Evidently it’s a popular thing down here because most of the restaurants do it.  If I’m supplying the fish, I sure don’t expect to pay $18-20 for the rest of the meal.

 

Last Sunday, we decided to head up to Islamorada.  It’s another of the many islands (keys) in the Florida Keys chain.

They advertised a festival that looked like it might be fun.  There were supposed to be sand sculptures and crafts.

It turned out to be a big mistake because the traffic was horrible and it took us forever to get there.  Normally, we don’t mind driving up and down US 1 because it’s such a beautiful drive over the “overseas highway.”

We finally got to the festival and saw this scuba diver floating over the area.

 

It was particularly hot that day and the humidity was stifling.

We walked through a few of the craft booths, saw some pretty things, but bought nothing.

We got down to the beach about the time the band started playing, but it was so stifling hot, it was hard to enjoy it.

Had we known there was a nice beach there, we may have been better prepared.

 

There were only two sand sculptures.  I should have known.  There is not much sand here in the Florida Keys.

The heat got to us, so we cut our losses and headed back home.  There were a few cool old cars, including this 1940 Lincoln.

Al is off getting boat gas, so I’d better be ready to leave when he gets back or I’m going to be in trouble!

Bio Diesel, yes or no?

 

Sunshine Key Rv Resort, Florida (high 82, low 69) thunderstorms

We didn’t take the boat out yesterday because the winds were predicted to be up and we figured it would be choppy.  As it turned out, it was nice and calm and we missed a good boating day.  Al wasn’t feeling great though.  I think he’s trying to get my cold, but so far has managed to fight it off.  I am feeling a lot better, no more coughing, sneezing or any other disgusting symptoms of a cold, but I  am also feeling a bit tired.

So….we decided to run into Key West to pick up some new  tires for the boat trailer.  Al had called and gotten a price for new tires and a new rim so we’ll have a spare.  When we got down there, they told us the price was just for the tire (not what they told him on the phone) and it was way too high. 

We stopped at a NAPA dealer in Key West and picked up two fuel filters for the motor home.  More on that later.  There is another one we need, but of course they didn’t have it at that particular NAPA, so we’ll be running into Marathon for that one.

We stopped at a few other tire places and had zero luck locating trailer tires.  It seemed to be the story of our day.

On the way down to Key West, we ran into the couple that had stayed in the site next to us in Midway.  He was nearing the end of his walk across the country.

He (Arthur) started in British Columbia and over the course of two years has nearly made it to Key West.  They were taking a break on the side of the road, so we quickly stopped and talked to them.  We had only met his driver Valerie before so it was nice to meet the walker himself!   He had less than 25 miles to go, and is killing some time until his grand entrance into the southern most point in Florida on the 14th of April, where he will meet his son.  We hope to bet there to see him complete his journey.   It’s for diabetes, cancer and veterans.

 

The reason for picking up new fuel filters for the motor home is because of the reading we’ve been doing on the bio diesel fuel.

We’ve  heard that bio diesel fuel can clog up your fuel filters, and until recently were able to avoid it.  When we fueled up before we got into the Keys, we were forced into using bio diesel, for lack of other options.  The station that we always used, now only carries bio diesel.  We checked with the station near Tampa that we fill up with on the way back and discovered the same thing.  In doing a little checking, it appears Flying J has gone strictly to biodiesel and no longer carries ULSD.

So, what do you do?  Run out of fuel or use bio diesel?

Our engine is a Cummins 370 ISL engine.  Al called three different Cummins service centers, and basically got three different answers.

The first guy said to “plan on spending a lot more on maintenance.”  He said there was no additive that would help.

The second Cummins guy said you could use a fuel additive called “fuel prep” that would help.  The problem with that is that if there was a lot of gunk in your fuel tank, it would clog your fuel filters really fast.

The third guy was from the Cummins facility in Spartanburg, SC.  He seemed to be more knowledgeable about the issues with bio diesel fuel.   He said the lower the % of bio diesel the better.  5% is better than 20%.   Once you keep using it, you will clean out your fuel system and the coach will run better, however you may go through some fuel filters in the process.  He suggested we sign up to register to Quick Serve Online, which would keep us up to date with any new information, and any new service bulletins.

While Al was calling the Cummins service centers, I went on line to Rv Net Forum and posted the question for others.  Of course, you have to understand that these are only opinions and you have to weed through them.   The link for my thread is here.  I got some good responses.

Here are a few of the responses I got:

 

Biodiesel caused issues with the injectors in our 2006 F-250. Had to replace several while it was still under warranty. Part of the problem was cold temperatures in our area, but it was not fun.

 

Call Cummins direct, as I did and they will tell you 5% bio is all they recommend. Make sure if it is going to set for awhile, that you use a biocide to counter any algae growth from the condensation that will form.......Luckily around here they do not use bio diesel, so no problems.

(the problem with this as I see it, is that the pumps are labeled to be anywhere from 5% to 20% and you won’t know what percentage they use)  You have no choice.

Checked the Department of Energy website. If I am reading them correctly it says that the move to ULSD had the unintended consequence of causing "lubricity" problems and that bio-diesel blends solve this problem with blends as low as 1% bio diesel. But the bio-diesel had the unintended consequence of plugging fuel filters and other forms of damage, especially to older vehicles not designed to tolerate bio-diesel. They also admit that your vehicles warranty might not be any good if you use bio-diesel. What they do not admit is that this mess is all their fault. Idiots.

This next one I thought was interesting

Here is Cummins official position on Biodiesel for your ISL (per bulletin 4971288):
"ISL engines that are certified to EPA '02 and later regulations are approved for use of B20 biodiesel. The appropriate ASTM standards must be met."

I haven’t been able to check the service bulletin out for myself yet, since I need the ESN for our engine before I can complete my registration at Cummins.

 

The problem with Biodiesel is that it dissolves any gunk that has accumulated in the tank and lines and that is what clogs the filters. The other problem is that the "Bio" part might cause some older fuel lines to dissolve, just like ethanol does. As long as it doesn't sit in the tank, you should be fine. If I have to fill with anything over 5%, I will make sure to run that tank out before putting it away for any period of time. I've had to have several outboard motors rebuilt because of ethanol gasoline, and numerous primr bulbs and fuel lines replaced on small engines. I now have a 110 gallon tank at my house for non-ethanol gas.

(we can confirm this about ethanol)

The reason bio-diesel plugs up the filters is because it cleans your whole fuel system, which a good thing if you carry spare fuel filters and can change them yourself. As stated, bio-diesel has superior lubricity benefits over ULSD and you may notice your engine running smoother and quieter. I've read that bio-diesel will gel quicker than ULSD though, so maybe not a great option in the winter months. I personally like bio-diesel and will use it in the summer months when convenient, but I carry spare filters.

 

So…..those were a few of the comments I got.  There were others if you care to read them, just go to the link I posted earlier.

 

It appears the consensus is:

1.  carry extra fuel filters

2.  don’t let the engine sit too long

3.  don’t use it in cold climates

I have signed up for the Cummins Quick serve website, but haven’t been able to enter all the coach info they need yet, so I cannot get any further.   I will definitely check out the service bulletin someone mentioned on the forum.

 

What are your thoughts on bio diesel?  

Yes?

No?

Or do you just pump diesel fuel, never knowing exactly what you’re pumping  like one of the commenters said?  Do you avoid it?   Have you filled up with ULSD lately?   In which state?

Do you carry extra fuel filters?

Since, it appears here in Florida they will no longer be selling ULSD, I guess we’ll be forced to use bio.  There may be some small service stations that sell ULSD (like the one near Sunshine Key), but we tend to avoid these stations for two reasons.  One is they are more difficult to get into and two, we worry that the fuel sits too long and may have condensation in it or contaminated.

We’re debating whether to go ahead and change our fuel filters before we leave here, or wait until we’ve run more bio diesel and do them back in Tampa.

Tony Saved the Day

We got a call from Tony at Rentz Trailers, about 8:30 yesterday morning.  He had already been on the phone with Lazy Days and they gave him some good advice.  They said this coach has had some problems with water getting into a tail lamp bulb and it causes a lot of problems.  They told him to replace the entire switch and they felt certain that would fix the problem.

We packed up again and drove all the way back to Clearwater.

Again, we had pretty sunny skies and a nice trip over the water.

Once we arrived in Clearwater, Tony removed the socket and replaced it with a new one.  We were hopeful that was the solution.

It wasn’t.

By this time we were getting prepared for another long day.  Tony looked all over the coach and checked all bulbs and connections. He kept looking and trying different things.  He discovered we had power on the right side to the front mirror and marker light, but it stopped at the rear tail lamp.

After more looking and thinking, he finally discovered the bulb for the right mirror was shorted out and that had evidently caused all of our problems.  It’s working just fine now.

Yes, Tony is our Hero!

While Tony was looking around, I was snooping around under the engine, looking for any other issues.   Al always does this when he checks the oil before each trip, but this time I found a big problem.   The serpentine belt (which drives the engine) had a small little knick in it.  You wouldn’t see it unless the belt stopped exactly where it did.  I showed it to Tony and he said that belt would have blown very soon.    Thankfully, they would be able to change the belt.  We also had them change the a/c belt while they were at it. 

We decided to have them do an oil change while we were there.  It had been on our to do list, but living in your home make it difficult to get these things done….especially when you have critters!

So…..as it turned out, all the problems with our braking system and lights turned out to be one of those things that “happen for the best.”   Had we not been over there, we would probably not have seen the bad belt until we were stopped in the middle of  I-95 in rush hour traffic,  in the rain, running away from a hurricane. 

Okay….now that all is said and done.  Our opinion of Rentz Trailers.   I probably should wait a few days for it all to sink in, but I know if I do that, I’ll never get back to it.

I want to be fair in my assessment.  Yes, we had some problems.   Yes, some of them were their fault.  One of the major things and Tony said we should have had the coach over there.  He said Joe should never have told us they could do the work getting the truck set up for towing without having the motorhome to check all the connections.  That was their error.

We got  some bad attitude and rude treatment from the owner.  We certainly didn’t appreciate him trying to blame us for everything that happened, especially when they hadn’t even checked our truck.  They made their share of mistakes.

Yes, they connected the vacuum hose up wrong.  They should have caught it when they moved the truck.  I certainly realized the problem immediately.

Yes, the driveshaft disconnect disengaged on  its own after they said it was working fine.  As it turns out, Tony told  when we asked them to put the truck back on the lift so that we could see it, they should have never lifted it the way they did.  It needs to be on a whole vehicle lift otherwise the cable that moves the connection gets stretched.  Tony was upset they did that.  He personally re-checked everything and re-adjusted the cable.  That was their fault. They are the experts.

Yes, they cut the electrical wiring on the old truck.  Tony said the guy thought we didn’t want to use that vehicle to tow any more.   If that’s so, why did we leave the tow bracket on.  That was definitely their error.  Tony said he will fix the wiring for us, all we need to do is call him and schedule a time.

The problem with the Air Force One is a little tricky.  It was working fine before they took it off.  Did it get dropped or mishandled, or was it just a fluke.  We’ll never know.

The lights not working were definitely due to some electrical issues in the motorhome.  This is a 2003 model motorhome with lots of time for dampness and weather to corrode circuits.   They would have caught these things if they would have had access to the motorhome.  We took Joe (the owner)  at his word that they didn’t need the motorhome.

So, would we recommend this shop again?    In our opinion Tony should be running the entire place.  He has more customer service skills than the owner, or at least more than  Joe showed to us. 

Tony went above and beyond the call of .  He only charged us 2 hours labor for at least 4-5 hours of labor.  Of course some of that electrical diagnostics should have been built into the price we paid.  The two hours included  the labor for the oil change and the two belt changes.

The problem here is Tony is not really a mechanic anymore.  He is the shop foreman.  He is the one they go to for questions and he keeps the shop running.  He appears to be a good mechanic and we trust him implicitly.  Unfortunately, he normally isn’t the one doing the work.   The other one working on the coach was Benny.  He appeared to be pretty careful, but he didn’t have the same knowledge or skills as Tony.  I was happy that Tony changed the belts and checked the oil after it was done.  If Tony would do the work or at least check up on the work done, I’d be a lot more comfortable.     All in all, it’s probably no worse than most shops and most of the problems we had were due to the motorhome.  The thing that was wrong with the tail lights was only occurring when we had the headlamps on.  We rarely use the headlamps and this could have been going on for a while.

So, the afternoon thunderstorms were starting.  It was starting to thunder and lightning as we were hooking up.  We had to hook up the truck to the motorhome for the first time with our new Blue Ox hitch, and our new driveshaft disconnect….all in the rain!

We felt pretty comfortable by this time that everything was working as it should.

We headed back over the bridge and again this is what it looked like.  Look familiar?

This time we left about 2:30 so at least we weren’t in rush hour traffic.  Of course with light traffic the idiots could go as fast as they wanted.

Here is a result of that.  Idiot number one.

Idiot number two.

I neglected to take a picture of idiot number three, but there was one. 

It used to amaze me in my days as a claim adjuster.  People would call to report an accident.  They would tell me it was raining like crazy and they hydroplaned.  “how fast were you driving”  Oh, I was doing the speed limit.   “what was the speed limit?”  70.   “oh, so you didn’t slow down even though you said it was raining like crazy?”   Idiots.

grrrrr…

We got home, pulled into a pull through site, extended the slides and felt right at home again.

Now, on to the next problem…..

Have you see the hurricane forecast?   Yep, we are in the “cone of uncertainty.”  That means soon to be Hurricane Isaac could come right up the center of Florida.

We are definitely not going to the east coast as we had hoped.  No sense trying to do any snorkeling over there.  The seas will be high no matter which way the hurricane heads.

So, where do we go?   If we head straight north into Georgia, the storm could go into the gulf and make landfall in the Florida panhandle, and we’d be in the line of fire.   The worst place to be in a hurricane is on the right side of the center.   Many times, these storms make landfall and then take a sharp right and head towards north and south Carolina and then right up the coast.  We’re trying to determine our best course of action.  We do not want to be in here, that’s for sure.  Right now, the storm is expected to make a slight jog.  When it does,  that will determine it’s future path.  If it’s sooner it will head one way, later it will effect a completely different area.   What to do….what to do?

Maybe we’ll join Eldy and Jeanne in Maine!

In the meantime, we’re trying to get things wrapped up around here.

We bought a 4 inch drop receiver for the motorhome.  As you can see in the picture below, it looks perfectly straight.

The problem is that it’s a bit too low and when the motorhome hits a bump, the hitch gets very close (or drags) the ground a little bit.  We need to raise it, but not too much.   Another little issue to work out.