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RE: Wondering why ...
I agree that many times a question that seems to be a "stupid" question by someone that has knowledge or experience in the subject to that person that does not have such knowledge as of yet shows the lack of their stupidity by trying to learn, gain knowledge and understand whatever it may be they are asking about.
You are never to smart to not be able to benefit from learning more!
Raise your hands..How many people here have learned something that:
1. You thought was too stupid to ask and didn't because it was so stupid that you should already know it just by being smart enough to breathe?
2. You learned something that you weren't smart enough to even know you didn't know enough to ask about in the first place? (yes, that question makes sense, read it again...IOW, to be blunt, you were so stupid you didn't even know you were stupid)
3. Sat in a classroom in grade school or college and didn't want to look completely idiotic so you sat there. I mean it's a question about basic stuff that everyone already knows..Then someone raised their hand and asked your question...then after class, every single person in class caught that individual and said thank you for asking what they didn't ask and should have?
<--- hand goes up. Who's next?
FWIW: The dumbest series of questions over multiple university level classes I've ever heard came from someone in my undergraduate classes. A few years later she seems to have managed to graduate with a 3.99GPA..The diploma mentioned something about a doctorate degree.
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Southwind85
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12/01/08 11:51pm |
Beginning RVing
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RE: small sidewall tire cracks
Tread condition is only a valid measurement when the tread is worn off, not for tire integrity.
Cracks plus brittle? Drive it straight to the nearest tire shop that has the correct size tires available and no further. It's a matter of when and how you spend the money. Tires now or tires and damage repair later.
A couple scary stories:
Two years ago I had a few sidwall cracks about the same size you have on two dual tires. A few 1/4" to 1/2" long cracks around the sidewalls. The rubber was only moderately stiff from age, not brittle at all. I run at around 10,000lbs towing a 1300lb trailer. I forced myself to stop every 100 miles to check them. The cracks were breeding like cockroaches and just kept getting bigger and Bigger and BIGGER and deeper. I watched them like a hawk for 850 miles at 50-55mph before I wimped out. A 2000+ mile trip just wasn't going to happen, no way, no how. They just weren't going to make it. I had no idea how much stress I was under by constantly worrying about those danged things until they were off my vehicle. That was the best $350 I've spent in a long time. It was worth the $350 just to get rid of the stress even if the tires would have lasted another year or two.
Sidewalls, tread depth and tire age is what most people and tire shops look at. What is not being looked at when inspecting that way? Think about it for a minute then read on.
This year I thought my 8 year old trailer tires were reasonably ok. They passed my picky preflight inspection with no problems just 150 miles from my destination. No reason to worry at all. No cracks, no obvious rot other than typical nothing overly bad aged look to the sides, good tread, good rubber down between the treads all the way around and on both sides. That's right, you need to look down between the treads where most people never think of looking. At the destination where I'm at now they still passed my picky inspection except there was a couple little teeny ho hum woopie doo cracks in the rubber between the treads in a few places on one tire. The other tire looked ok. Driveable, but something to watch. 50 miles of driving later..!!!!!Sheesh!!!!! Short of a serious emergency, that trailer is NOT rolling one inch further until I put new tires on it in a few months. The tires still look ok on the side walls and have good tread....at least they look ok until you look down between the treads. Go visit the grand canyon and you'll have a pretty good idea of what I see down there for about 1/4 to 1/3 of the circumference of both tires between several treads. Really scary looking stuff. Right now with it just sitting there at 700lbs and 25psi, I'm half expecting both tires to explode every time the barometric pressure drops.
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Southwind85
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11/30/08 08:44pm |
Tech Issues
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RE: What do you DO?
The RV is a way to get to places and see and do things...without having to ever come back.
One week I'm working my tailfeathers off. The next, my house is parked who knows where or in a state park and I've gone hiking and seeing things most other people will never know exists. Often I'm out having fun and working at the same time.
I often have the same question about people in rabbit hutches, um, houses. I drove through a sort of residential area a few weeks ago and I could see cars parked in the driveways and absolutely no signs of life even in the back yards. What could they possibly be doing that would ever be any fun inside those places day after day, year after year, decade after decade? I mean the don't even go out in the yard from the looks of it other than to cut the grass or to go to/from their car. Same box, same view, same area around them, same job, same friends. Static world, no changes.
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Southwind85
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11/30/08 07:33pm |
General RVing Issues
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RE: Living in Cold Winter Months
I have a white hose with the blue stripe. I was told the heat tape would melt it? true not true?
Blatantly false.
Someone told me that too. I ignored them and put it on anyway. That was 2 years ago and a friend has been doing it for 8 years. We've had no problems at all. Heck, I even have a second one taped to the bottom of my holding tanks and dump plumbing/valves inside the pennytech insulated holding tank box that I built. Even on the coldest days (-25F) you can hold the heat tape in your bare hand and not come even vaguely close to burning yourself. Heat tape gets warm, not hot. It takes way more heat than that to melt a hose or holding tank or plumbing/valves. (Think about it, if it was hot enough to melt a waterhose, it would certainly melt the insulation off the heat tape wire first..which it doesn't)
Has anyone who lived in -20 and so forth had any problems with the refrigerator?? We were told that in very cold temperatures that the refrigerator will freeze up and we should put a light bulb on the outside by the vents to keep it warm. Anyone heard anything like this or done it???
I've been to -25F with no problem or modifications. I have seen a circa 1970 fridge shut down around 0F because it thought the inside of the refrigerator was cold enough. The heat probe line metal line ran out of the back of the fridge into the cold ambient air before going to the electrical hardware and it fooled the circuit into not turning the fridge on. I simply put a piece of cardboard across 3/4 of the vent cover and it ran normally after that. Just remember to take the cardboard out when ambient conditions warm up again.
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Southwind85
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11/29/08 07:22pm |
Full-time RVing
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RE: Wondering why ...
Look at it this way:
If someone has no experience with a RV, there are quite a few mysteries built in. An RV and it's systems are only superficially like a house or a truck. Even if the dealer or previous owner takes the time to walk them through and explains things carefully the zero time new buyer will hear something like this: "If the stove won't come on blahar eaghier gqiasskeruoib asdlra and presto it fires right up no problem got it, good, now onto the fridge with 2 running modes one of which is related to the abaser baernbasdr and the other asalskdfu lkbmlesra basdorn, dirt simple and fun isn't it...now for the furnace..." In the meantime the new owner is still has something like this going through his mind: "What did they guy say about which lever to push first on the pooper and what was that about which switch halfway across the RV that had to be turned on before touching the levers but make sure the something outside was open or closed first?" Remember they only hear how to run something exactly once and they have NO background working with any of this hardware. Three weeks later when the guy is in a campground all he can remember is 400 little pieces of apparently disconnected information all scrambled up.
Give the new guy with zero experience a break. Unless the person has experience or designed and built it himself, he's not going to know something very basic on a regular basis. It only becomes annoying when the same exact person asks the same exact question 5 times in a row over 2 days with no indication they're learning anything.
I certainly can't snub anyone who is a beginner that doesn't know how to dump or how to add a second propane tank. I have 40+ years of experience camping and traveling and I've pulled nearly everything from a little red wagon to a 150,000 pound airplane...yet I'm planning on asking some pretty seriously stupid questions concerning toads and triple towing in a few months.
If I don't know it all by now, there's no way a zero time beginner can hope to know even a tenth of it.
Do your homework. Read the manual. I you're still confused or something doesn't make sense, ask away. No one person knows it all however between the whole lot of us, we should be able to come up with a working answer.
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Southwind85
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11/28/08 04:59pm |
Beginning RVing
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RE: Frozen pipes or inlet issue?
I'm assuming it's only doing this in sub freezing temperatures and everything works normally when it's above freezing.
Does water come out of the hose when it's disconnected from the RV? If so, it's probably something related to the inlet area. I've run across quite a few RV's that the water stopped and it turned out to be a frozen inlet since people seldom heat that connection. A short loop of heat tape that's keeping the hose warm around the connection plus a little insulation fixes the problem. Water usually starts flowing again after about 10 minutes.
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Southwind85
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11/20/08 03:26pm |
Tech Issues
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RE: Just Curious
I'm a Nomad. I have no fixed location to call home other than a regularly changing location on the Earth. I'm where I am at any given moment.
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Southwind85
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11/20/08 11:01am |
General RVing Issues
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RE: Anyone fulltime in a small trailer with single axle?
Antisieze? Why?
Unless the design specifications require a lubricant, it's a really bad idea to change the process without adequate research. If you're going to put any liquid on threads (lug nuts or any other fasteners) that should be dry, please use blue or red loctite.
Dumping your hub on the ground and grinding to a stop is one things. High velocity opposite direction wheels are very seriously DANGEROUS. Think about it.
I have well over half a million miles of driving and haven't lost a tire yet and they all come off rather easily when required. Everything I've had (for wheel attachment) has stated dry threads no lubrication.
Thought before action...if one has time.
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Southwind85
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11/19/08 09:21pm |
Full-time RVing
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RE: Gas prices!!!
I think we all need to contact our congressman to let them know how we feel!
Don't even think about it. What they don't know won't hurt us. Personally I have a problem with calling criminals to ask why they quit robbing me.
Until the last few weeks I've been regularly filling the motorcycle up for the same price I use to be able to fill the jeep up. Heck, I use to fill up the airplane for less than what it took to fill up the jeep this summer and that wasn't that long ago either. I put $400 in the gas tank multiple times last summer and it wasn't even empty. A friend put over 10,000 miles in her RV over 8 months. I'm terrified to see her gas bill (she's afraid to look at it too) but between the two of us, we should have been able to buy Montana.
After the treasonous boogalooing I've been getting over the last few years at the gas stations, they can let the prices drop like a rock and stay there for a long time. I do not feel sorry for them in the least. I'm all for 50 cents a gallon if they'll let it drop that far.
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Southwind85
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11/19/08 08:57pm |
General RVing Issues
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RE: LP Regulator Freezing
That sounds like a relatively easy fix. We talking 100w or 60w or smaller?
What would the permanent fix be? How do I get that moisture out?
I had a similar problem though I seem to be chasing a series of annoyances on a 23 year old system. (I'm down to a single most likely problem at the furnace ignitor that's a $20 fix that I better get done in the next couple weeks or I'll get what I deserve)
On humid days a little below freezing I was getting ice on the outside of the regulator and low flow rates that was directly proportional to ice build up. I put a 15W bulb next to the regulator and installed a very very leaky box around the bulb and regulator - just enough to slow the local air flow down. The problem vanished instantly for a while.
One not so cold day I disconnected the propane hose that goes from the output of the regulator to the fixed plumbing. It seems the loop of hose had some of the oily gunk built up in the low spot which wasn't helping things when it got cold and turned into syrup. I drained the hose and suddenly the furnace problems vanished and the 15W bulb wasn't having to be used as often. In the spring I replaced the regulator with a 2 stage regulator and opened the old one up out of curiousity. It was flooded with the oily gunk thus most of the problem. The outside of the 2 stage regulator loads up with ice occasionally on humid sub freezing days however I turn the bulb on to keep that to a minimum.
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Southwind85
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11/18/08 09:49pm |
Tech Issues
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RE: Securing Items
I think deadly force is the right step to take when it comes to thieves.
While that may sound a bit extreme, there is a substantial amount of good sound logic about it.
A terrified criminal is an honest citizen.
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Southwind85
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11/18/08 05:30pm |
General RVing Issues
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RE: Have you found that lately you're getting....
How often do you setup and take down? IMHO it's about familiarity and experience.
So far I've been doing it regularly about 75 times a year and that's going to triple or more next year. Once you have the process down as instinctive habit, you just know if everything is ready to roll or not.
Comprehensive checklist? That's probably half the problem. It's an easy fix. Throw the checklist away.
Figure out what's actually essential and put only that on any checklist you have. I found a long time ago that while flying, a long tedious checklist on short simple stuff just makes you wonder what you missed and will actually increase the chances of missing something essential. A RV is just about as simple as a CE150. Flow patterns are much better for making sure everything is ready for departure. (Ex: For the interior, I start at the front and go aft: Pilot seat area clear, slap cabinet doors closed, window curtains open as needed, clear the table, put messy stuff like liquid soap in the sink, switches off, then closing the potty lid, DONE. That's about 20 seconds, one minute tops if I had a mess - no checklist and I don't miss anything important either. If I made a full detailed nit picking checklist, it would easily be 100 items and 30 minutes of effort to check everything off)
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Southwind85
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11/17/08 07:12pm |
RV Lifestyle
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RE: Are we facing a recession or something far worse?
$5+ a gallon for regular unleaded and constantly increasing prices for anything and everything is NOT the happy days.
Overall I'm actually doing considerably better now that the economy has supposedly gone toes up than a while back when everyone was raving about how great things were.
Just a different point of view. YMMV
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Southwind85
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11/17/08 06:44pm |
RV Lifestyle
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RE: What is your opinion on this quote??
Last statistics I saw were that 18 million households had a RV of some sort.
The problem with counting us is that we're highly mobile and often don't have a fixed home base that the census counters can go to in order to count us from. (IOW, 18 million PLUS the rest of us) If they take a few days to do the count, they'll either miss us entirely or double/triple count us...that's assuming we're stopped anywhere they would expect to find us and can count from in the first place. (I know that when I'm on the road, and one of my friends as well, we are completely off the radar except for a few random days when we need to dump and recharge batteries)
In two years I've run across about 300 fulltimers though I tend to not camp where lots of people are. I have no clue how many there are. Maybe a million or more. Could be a 100K.
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Southwind85
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11/17/08 06:34pm |
General RVing Issues
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RE: Anyone fulltime in a small trailer with single axle?
take the lug nuts off put a little grease on the threads and retighten , good and snug , that way IF you have a flat .you;ll be able to get the nuts loose
Just be really careful doing that. Lubricant on the threads changes the torque loading on the fastener. The nut could spin off...or overstress the bolt. If the bolt is not overtorqued without lubricant, you should be able to get it off as long as you're physically capable of pulling a little more than the prescribed torque value.
Air powered tools don't touch my equipment for any reason. No way, no how. The last guy who did so years ago while installing new tires on the jeep snapped three of the bolts and cracked two others. I think he had the thing set to "overtorque propeller nut on battleship."
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Southwind85
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11/15/08 11:01pm |
Full-time RVing
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RE: Unbreakable Dinnerware
And when it does its a mess, shatters into a million or so little shards of glass. Now, I'll admit that most folks are probably not as destructive as my children
Children have nothing on me from time to time when it comes to breaking kitchen stuff.
The filtering process: If it can't be tossed off the top of the RV onto the pavement without breaking, it's likely unusable and replacement should be anticipated.
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Southwind85
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11/15/08 10:39pm |
Beginning RVing
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RE: Anyone fulltime in a small trailer with single axle?
Pull over, stop, change tire, drive away. Works with 2 tires or 6 or 10 or ??.
I always recommend making sure you can do it yourself and that you have the right tools available: Using only the tools you always carry, jack the camper up, take the wheel off, put the spare on just like you would expect when traveling. Then reverse the process and put the spare back on the carrier. Works the same in a campground or on the side of the highway in the middle of nowhere.
Important note: Make certain the tire tool you have for the lugnuts is the correct size. It usually is however a long time ago, I'm guessing that the local tire shop apparently dropped a nut and it rolled under a bench somewhere so they stuck another one on out of a bucket of nuts with the same threads...problem was that the head was a different size thus the tire tool wouldn't fit. You gotta love the big 4 way tire tools that fit nearly anything when you find that out the hard way in the middle of nowhere.
As for being worried, proper tire maintenance goes a long long way.
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Southwind85
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11/15/08 01:33pm |
Full-time RVing
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RE: Bombs away or lay it down gently in the bowl.
Ah!!! nothing like winter time on RV.net!
And it`s only just begun.
When a thread starts out in the crapper, it can only go downhill from there.
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Southwind85
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11/15/08 01:15pm |
RV Lifestyle
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RE: What is "low Frequency"
Unless the park is generating their own power, a low frequency alarm has to be bogus.
Locally voltage and frequency problems are not necessarily bogus at least in the summer evenings around large hot cities.
One evening last summer in the east Dallas area (residential area) I got a low voltage warning from my fridge so I plugged in the multimeter. It was showing 105VAC at 49-51Hz coming from residential power plugs. (That's flip the breakers or yank the plug territory in my book) I called someone I knew about five or six miles away in a brand new residential area (assuming good wiring in that area) and they were showing nearly the same numbers. A couple hours later it was back to 120VAC at 60Hz. It did similar things almost every evening for the month I was there though the frequency usually stayed above 55Hz. I don't know how the grids are wired or anything on a large scale or how local grid power sources work beyond basic electrical theory however that's what was coming out of the plug based on 3 seperate multimeters and several miles separation. Overnight was reasonable however the rest of the day I kept the breakers off or ran off the genset.
Distrust and verify.
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Southwind85
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11/15/08 11:42am |
Tech Issues
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RE: Just curious
I am at home and on the road. I'm where I stop except when I'm going and I'm there too.
<---- 2+ years fulltime Nomad.
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Southwind85
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11/14/08 10:17pm |
General RVing Issues
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