[Richard]

I thought I might relay the issues I dealt with in the recent 4000 mile tour. Before I start keep in mind that the coach had not seen any use in the three years we have lived in West Virginia due to narrow twisty roads, family health challenges, and a trivial little thing called work. So a lot of the little things you would fix with regular use I expected to deal with on the road. That was not the case at all. I had a handful of new to me issues.

Problem one, Splendide washer pouring water into the catch pan. Thanks Newell for the drained catch pan or otherwise a flood ensues in the coach. My initial reaction was,that I had not properly winterized the washer and the containment pan below the washer tub was split by frozen water. So out comes the washer. I discovered that removing the pantry shelf above the washer makes it much easier to remove the washer. After I disassembled the washer I discovered a simple problem, the rubber drain hose had simply slipped off the containment box. Sweet easy fix.

Second problem was too ironic. After a last minute failed attempt to get bill appels genie going I returned to the coach to leave for Wyoming only to discover my gennie would not stay running. I held the fuel solenoid open and Rhonda told me none of the gennie gauges were moving. I suspected a ground issue so I wiggled all the grounds at the engine and voila, it cranked. I recrimped the grounds and cleaned and tightened the ground bolt.

Ok, so far, frustrating but not too bad.

Then a minor disaster struck at one of the Wyoming campgrounds a few minutes after plugging in. I was still setting up the outside stuff when Rhonda called me into the coach. She said I heard a loud pop, and I could smell burned electrica
l smell. The noise and smell was in the overhead console but I could not find the source. The micro convection oven was dead, the front DVD player dead, and worst of all the coffee bean grinder was dead. I took to the oven out and removed the cover but saw nothing obvious on first glance. It was late in the evening so I gave up. The next day I removed more parts until I got to the printed circuit board for the control panel. I had the shop manual for the oven so I started tracing continuity with the voltmeter. There was an internal fuse but it was intact. Then I noticed something that looked like a big capacitor that was charred. Hmmmm, schematic says it is a varistor. Keep in mind I'm in the hinterlands of Wy with no Internet access. So stop right there. When we got the Jackson hole a few days later the radio shack had ONE, so I bought it and replaced the exploded one on the board. Nothing. Nothing at all. Well, seeing that I'm working on this outside and it's about a 100 degrees, I was a little plunked out. However the back of the PCB had some discoloration. My best interpretation of the schematic was that I should have power between two points on the board and I didn't. Insure was wishing for Tom or Russ to help me read the schematic right about then. So, taking a slight risk, I soldered a jumper across the area. Voila, oven back in business.

DVD player had a simple fuse. Five minute fix once I removed the cover and found the fuse. I did notice the plug on the DVD was discolored. That got me to looking at the surge strip all the up front electronica was plugged into. Yep, found the "pop". The surge protector was smoked. I took it apart for curiosity and found two exploded vaistors inside. The Internet now tells me that varistor a are used as surge protectors.

I was not so lucky with the coffee grinder.

So I will buy a surge/power protection unit for the coach, but I am not sure that the campground caused the surge. All of the impacted devices were on the ac circuit powered by the inverter. It makes me wonder if something went nuts with the transfer switch in the inverter. I was lucky I did not lose the sat unit, tv, and sat receiver. I am thinking to permanently install the power monitor in a way that feeds the inverter power, gennie power, ans shore power through it.

Toward the end of our trip I heard a metallic rattle coming from the front dometic basement air. Knowing that couldn't be good, I dove into the unit. For those of you with domestics, you understand what I mean by confined space. Anyhow, the squirrel cage fan was loose at the hub. The hub was not loose on the shaft, but the fan itself is flexing and causing it to hit. I could not fix it with what I had, so I crossed my fingers. It made it home. Good, cause the girls in the coach like it cold.

No issues at all with the engine or tires. Sliver leaf says I averaged 7.7 mpg. Of course that does not take into account gennie and aqua hot. Real live tank to tank fill ups showed an overall 7.2 mpg. I drive about 66 on average. My engine temp ran from 194 to 205, and my tranny ran steady at 216.