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What are the horror stories?


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Ours was of my own making, sort of. We had Hydro Hot problems that our dealer could not solve. He told us when we get to Florida, find someone to fix it and they will pay, which they did. Alliance Coach in Wildwood finally got bot plugged exchangers cleared and refilled the system. $1600 dollars later our heating system worked. The original dealer did reimburse us the cost.

 

While trying to trouble shoot the problem, prior to going to Alliance, we had a couple of heat exchangers plugged due to lack of use (always run these boilers on heat at least once per month). We replaced the heat exchanger under the bed with a new style (the one we removed was similar to a plugged unit under the fridge). The old style has screwed together compression fittings, the new unit had slip on fittings with hose clamps. I did not get the hose clamp tight enough. You guessed it, in the middle of the night I smelled something very wrong, woke the wife , lifted the bed and found a terrible mess under the bed. The input hose had slipped off and dumped much of the boiler anti-freeze under the bed. WHAT A MESS! took several days and many newspapers and many rolls of paper towels and many absorbent pads to clean up the mess. Needless to say that will not happen again. I now have double clamps that are tight enough to hold through a hurricane.

GS Lifetime #822128658, FMCA #F431170

 

2012 Airstream Mercedes Interstate Extended Class B

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Ours was of my own making . . .

Good one! However, in this quest for the RV Darwin Award, I may have you beat. Here's my story . . .

 

While preparing our Class A for full timing, I decided to add a shelf in one of the basement compartments on my Newmar. However, fastening a wood shelf in place was problematic -- how to attach the shelf? I figured I could attach each side of the shelf to the basement compartment metalwork. But since the shelf was wide, I wanted to support the back of it as well.

 

Solution: I'd screw the back of the shelf into the chassis frame rail.

 

While I was drilling the third screw hole into the frame rail, I heard what I thought was water splashing on the ground near the back of my RV.

 

In the Car Talk tradition, what had I done?

SKP #79313 / Full-Timing / 2001 National RV Sea View / 2008 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon
www.rvSeniorMoments.com
DISH TV for RVs

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Good one! However, in this quest for the RV Darwin Award, I may have you beat. Here's my story . . .

 

While preparing our Class A for full timing, I decided to add a shelf in one of the basement compartments on my Newmar. However, fastening a wood shelf in place was problematic -- how to attach the shelf? I figured I could attach each side of the shelf to the basement compartment metalwork. But since the shelf was wide, I wanted to support the back of it as well.

 

Solution: I'd screw the back of the shelf into the chassis frame rail.

 

While I was drilling the third screw hole into the frame rail, I heard what I thought was water splashing on the ground near the back of my RV.

 

In the Car Talk tradition, what had I done?

 

How quickly did you plug the leaking fuel line? :D

Dutch
2001 GBM Landau 34' Class A
F-53 Chassis, Triton V10, TST TPMS
2011 Toyota RAV4 4WD/Remco pump
ReadyBrute Elite tow bar/brake system

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How quickly did you plug the leaking fuel line? :D

 

I drilled through the hydraulic line that runs to the dash heater. The green hydraulic fluid flowed down the inside of the frame and out the back of the coach.

 

Total cost = $600 tow + $600 repair. BTW, Coach Net would have picked up the towing charge if the damage wasn't "self inflicted". I'll remember that for next time.

SKP #79313 / Full-Timing / 2001 National RV Sea View / 2008 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon
www.rvSeniorMoments.com
DISH TV for RVs

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I drilled through the hydraulic line that runs to the dash heater. The green hydraulic fluid flowed down the inside of the frame and out the back of the coach.

 

Total cost = $600 tow + $600 repair. BTW, Coach Net would have picked up the towing charge if the damage wasn't "self inflicted". I'll remember that for next time.

 

Oops! I figured it was fuel or something similar. Lesson learned anyway... :D

Dutch
2001 GBM Landau 34' Class A
F-53 Chassis, Triton V10, TST TPMS
2011 Toyota RAV4 4WD/Remco pump
ReadyBrute Elite tow bar/brake system

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At least my oops was not nearly so expensive, but the mess inside the coach was most likely worse. I do not think either of us will do that again!

GS Lifetime #822128658, FMCA #F431170

 

2012 Airstream Mercedes Interstate Extended Class B

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I was running out the living room slide when I heard a terrible crunching noise. I ran back to look and saw the wall was pushed out a good inch. I had forgotten to stow our heavy, fireproof document box and during travel it had shifted into the path of the slide. It was our first big trip as fulltimers and I was so upset, certain that I had ruined the trailer.

 

Fortunately, the damage was on a metal part of the outside wall and could be pounded back in. A little foam insulation on the lower part of the slide seal and we were good as new.

2005 Teton Frontier Experience 39'

1999 Volvo 610

1988 Suzuki Samurai

2008 KTM 450 EXCR

2009 goofy Weimaraner

 

Attack life! It's going to kill you anyway.

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I read through all the "horror stories", but still IMO doesn't compare to a situation a new fulltiming couple found themselves in, which I read on their blog (can't remember which one). Basically, the story goes that they were packing up, getting ready to leave their campsite. They hooked up the black flush line but didn't realize they needed to have their dump gate open. Suffice to say, the black water came out of the vent on the roof, and covered their RV in biomass.......

 

Even though the cost for repair is worse, I'd take a dropped tranny or blown engine over this any day..... :-)

 

Oh my gosh! I did something similar. Same trip as my other horror story. (I learned a lot about what not to do on that trip!) I was running water into the black tank to build up pressure to give it a good flush and lost track of time. My husband came running around the side of the trailer yelling that the toilet was overflowing. I had the sewer hose connected so was able to pull the valve before too much came out. Hubby thought the whole incident was hilarious, even though he had to hose off the roof. He still teases me about it.

2005 Teton Frontier Experience 39'

1999 Volvo 610

1988 Suzuki Samurai

2008 KTM 450 EXCR

2009 goofy Weimaraner

 

Attack life! It's going to kill you anyway.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The devil was waiting for me when we cross the Georgia state line about 4 years old. I was passing blood in my urine. We made it the the Top of Georgia RV Park, set-up our RV took a shower and went to ER. Five days later I had my first bladder cancer surgery. I have had a total of five bladder cancer surgery and eight weeks of bio-therapy while full timer RVing.

We had a breakdown in Al. and we had to get towed off the mountain, luck for us there was a small RV park five away. The manager of the park knew a great service repair shop. This man was an ace mechanic! He replaced fuel pump, and removed several fuel filters. Then the starter failed, replace it, then the fuel pump wire went bad, he ran a new fuel pump wire. Two week late we were on the road again. We were lucky to being taken care of by some great people and had FHU and cable TV during the whole time. Never had another fuel issue with the Voyager after his repair and fuel solutions.

Living the full time RV dream in a Holiday Rambler Motor home.

Our Travel Blog is http://rvroadriders.com

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Here's a horror story. We own a 1998 Newmar Mountain Aire Class A built on a Ford chassis. We were in Chicago when I lost all the engine coolant. Our road service, after several hours delay, finally found a shop willing to tackle the problem. (It was a Friday afternoon.)

 

We were towed 30 miles back into Indiana to the shop. After a quick look-see, the shop manager said the hoses were fine so it probably was a bad gasket on the intake manifold. He said it would be Monday before anyone could look at it but we were welcome to stay in the RV and could plug into their 50 amp RV port. Well, I figured this was not too bad since we have Dish TV.

 

About midafternoon Monday, the mechanic gave us the bad news. We had a bad intake manifold. The water jacket was corroded through and could not be repaired. They would order a new manifold Tuesday morning. The only good thing at this point is they were able to work on the engine without us having to unhook from their shore power.

 

Tuesday afternoon, the manager told us the engine we had (1999 Ford Triton V-10) no longer had aftermarket parts available. They quite making the replacement parts in 2005. (Apparently, this version of the engine was only made for about six months before Ford did a major redesign of the engine. Being the suspicious sort of guy I am, I verified this info on my own. He was correct.) He had his parts manager looking for a used replacement intake manifold.

 

Wednesday, still looking. Thursday, still looking. On Friday, we were told they found one at a salvage yard in West Virginia and they would have it by Monday.

 

We spent the weekend driving the toad around town.

 

Monday afternoon, still no part. The West Virginia people apparently did not get the PO in time to ship the part. Tuesday, the part was on its way - by 3 day ground. The manifold arrived Friday afternoon. Since all the mechanics left early on Fridays, there would be no one to work on the engine until Monday. On Monday morning, the mechanic announced they had sent the wrong manifold. The shop said the WVA salvage yard was shipping the correct manifold that day. It finally arrived on Thursday.

 

Now bear in mind, we have now been parked in this shop's parking lot for nearly two weeks. We'd had a honey wagon come to pump out our holding tanks twice. We are about as tired of seeing these people as they are of seeing us.

 

Friday afternoon, the mechanic said he'd found a pinhole leak in the manifold caused by corrosion, but he thought he could "fix it" with some high temp epoxy. He made the repair and said he'd be back Monday to install the manifold. (Needless to say, I'm getting pretty steamed that these guys only work Monday through Thursday 8-5 and Friday 8-3:30.)

 

It took him a while to get the part installed so we didn't leave the shop until Tuesday noon. We are out $2,200 and two-and-a-half weeks time. Not to mention the $150 we lost at a casino.

 

We made it from Chicago to San Antonio (our home base.) Over the next week or so, we debated about just trading off the RV for a newer model. Problem is we really love the layout and the size. We had looked at many, many other Class As but we have never found one we like as much as this one.

 

A couple of weeks later we headed to Georgia for my mother's ninetieth birthday party. In Shreveport, I lost all the engine coolant. Again. On a Friday afternoon.

 

We were fortunate enough to find a shop nearby willing to take us in. The mechanic jumped on the job and around eight pm, told us the "new" intake manifold was leaking really bad. Long story short, he worked until nearly ten pm getting the manifold off. Then he ran an extension cord to us so we could have power.

 

On Saturday he returned at eight am and began further checks. He found significant corrosion on the engine block in the same spot as the corrosion on the intake manifold. He seemed to think the other shop should have noticed that when they replaced the manifold in Chicago. To make matters worse, the repair done in Chicago was faulty. They had used the wrong epoxy in the first place and secondly (in his opinion) they should never have used epoxy to begin with.

 

He spent the rest of Saturday custom building a sleeve to repair the corroded places. Sunday, he reinstalled the intake manifold and everything tested out fine. We resumed our trip on Monday. Another $1,700 out of pocket. Well, we did take $125 from the casinos in the area.

 

Because the replacement intake manifold was used salvage, the Chicago shop warranty was only for 1500 miles.

 

On the way home from Georgia, the intake manifold started leaking again. Not bad, but enough that I had to add water every day. We had some more very serious discussions about replacing the RV. Ultimately, it came down to the fact that the house portion of the RV was in excellent condition and the only thing really wrong with it was the engine.

 

We knew there would be other problems in the future, but comparing the cost of a newer RV versus ongoing maintenance costs of our older RV, we decided keeping it running made better financial sense to keep ours. We decided to replace the engine.

 

The new (rebuilt) engine cost us $10,000 and it has been, so far, money well-spent. We have 18,000 miles on it and it still runs better than ever before. Our fuel mileage increased from 7.0 to 8.5 mpg. Even better, it pulls hills and mountains much, much better.

 

I suppose the only real nightmare is I didn't decide to replace the engine in Chicago. Hind sight is 20-20, but knowing what I know now the proper recommendation by the shop should have been to replace the engine rather than just the intake manifold.

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A couple camped next to us returned from an outing and she was anxious to visit the little room. She ran from the truck to the 5er but hit her head on the awning arm. Then fell backwards onto the concrete. It was a bad fall but she was expected to survive. Return to normal if possible was expected to require extensive rehab. We have each had a hospital stay. Life in a RV is not much different that life in sticks and bricks. A water line failed in our home and 230,000 gallons of water went under our house. The bill covered by insurance was staggering. During repair we could not stay in our home.

Randy

2001 Volvo VNL 42 Cummins ISX Autoshift

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Here's a horror story . . .

 

Bravissimo!

 

Your story (in this Comparative Suffering saga) made me feel so much better, after a recent "incident" with our Honda CRV toad . . .

 

While picking up a prescription at Walgreens, Honda CRV engine fan switch went bad, fan wouldn't operate, pressure in AC system climbed, AC pressure relief valve opened up -- loud + steam (actually AC refrigerant) poured out of the engine. Great scene in Walgreen's parking lot.

 

Called Coach-Net for tow. Found out our subscription had expired. Coach-Net still found us a cheap tow (atta boy!)

 

After only about 10 minutes, a tow truck from "Camel Towing" arrived -- that's right, it's their actual name splashed all over their truck. The tow driver was a hoot.

 

Anyway, repair shop figures it's a $300ish repair. Just another day.

 

 

But again, your engine story is one for the books & the gambling made it even better.

SKP #79313 / Full-Timing / 2001 National RV Sea View / 2008 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon
www.rvSeniorMoments.com
DISH TV for RVs

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Fingers crossed but the worst experience in our, granted short career thus far, (15 months and counting) was being on the roof of our motor home on I-10 somewhere in New Mexico ripping off what remained of our TV antenna and bandaging the support and cables with duct tape. And, yes it was extremely windy and I was scared and I could almost hear the thoughts of a thousand motorists passing by in unison, "OMG, what an unlucky sod"

 

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Ok, if you can print it here, I have wanted to know some of the meanings of "sod" and/or "sod off" if it can be translated into something a redneck Texan can understand. Also why would anyone in his right mind eat steak and kidney pie unless they were starving to death? It was one of the first things I tried when I went to London on military leave. Keep in mind I have eaten possum (O'Possum) and raw snake.

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  • 2 weeks later...

........................ Also why would anyone in his right mind eat steak and kidney pie unless they were starving to death? It was one of the first things I tried when I went to London on military leave. Keep in mind I have eaten possum (O'Possum) and raw snake.

 

Ha ha.. you must have forgotten to down a few Guinnesses beforehand. Forgive me but I'm a Brit and the standard of pub food has evolved exponentially in the past twenty to thirty years. Try fish n chips next time ;-)

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That was way back in th early 70's. The fish and chips were great as were the "english" breakfasts' that I had. If I recall I had some sweet & salty type of popcorn. No doubt the proper liquid lubrication could improve any food except maybe possum.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Luckily, the worst thing that has happened to us is having three blown tires in a five-day period. All in the worst possible location, of course. Broke down and bought five new tires and fought with Goodyear until they coughed up some money for us. I figure if we can go for five years with no worse problem than that, we'd ahead of the game!

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I was running out the living room slide when I heard a terrible crunching noise. I ran back to look and saw the wall was pushed out a good inch. I had forgotten to stow our heavy, fireproof document box and during travel it had shifted into the path of the slide. It was our first big trip as fulltimers and I was so upset, certain that I had ruined the trailer.

 

Fortunately, the damage was on a metal part of the outside wall and could be pounded back in. A little foam insulation on the lower part of the slide seal and we were good as new.

 

We had a cabinet door that had sprung open in the back of the fiver and when I put out the slide, it caught and ripped the wood trim off the inside of the slide. You can bet that I ALWAYS shimmy back there and make sure no cabinets are open before I open the slide now. As they say: you lives and you learns.

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We bought our class A before we completed the sale on the house. The only place to put it was on the 3/4' minus paved driveway next to the house, there was plenty of room to walk around the coach, even with the slides out. I had about a dozen or so 4 inch thick 1 sq.foot concrete blocks and I set 4 of them down with my pressure treated wood pads on top of them, and proceeded to lower my jacks and get the coach level. Two days later it rained. It didn't stop raining for two weeks (Oregon, who knew it rained like that here?) One night, there was a loud noise, and the coach lurched.

I jumped out of bed and got dressed as fast as I could, grabbing one of the dozen (I'm from Earthquake country, I always have that many) flash lights between the bedroom and the door.

I started checking the jacks and sure enough, one has quite literally disappeared into a sink-hole.

Back into the coach, and try to bring up the jacks.

They all come up but the right rear.

The one in the hole. The deep, muddy hole.

So I have the wife start the engine. Air bags inflate, coach goes up I get blocking under it. shut off engine, dump the air, coach settles on blocking with tires about 2 inches off the ground, but the jack is still in the hole, I cannot figure out why. Repeat the procedure.

I was finally able to fill in the hole some and get a solid footing albeit temporary under that jack. It took three hours, in the dark, in the wet and cold mud, to get that jack up. And then I could see what was what.

The foot plate had completely slipped off of the jack piston, the retraction springs were a mangled mess.

Slides in, coach out to street for the night and I got a hot shower in the house. I emptied that 55 gallon water heater. I cannot remember a better hot shower...

Unbeknownst to us, 7.5 feet below grade, the sewer pipe had cracked sometime in the past, and with the rains, the ground over it had washed away...

I just happened to pick the wrong place to set my jack.

In the following days,I took down a shed used for storing wood, another for tools, and a section of fence on the concrete pad at the end of the driveway, 50 feet from the street, with a view of our pond. I moved the coach onto it, levelled, and slides out. I got the first good nights sleep in a week...

Oh, if anyone knows an easy way to get those springs on, send me a note two years ago via Einstein Express... I replaced all of them....

2003 Newmar Dutch Star 3802

'98 Ford Ranger

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Years ago my daughter got me a sign that says: The most important things aren't things. Because I have been telling her that most of her life. When I went full-time and moved from the S&B to a 5th wheeler, I got rid of 99.9% of my "things". What a relief! I am no longer owned by that stuff.

 

I hadn't really considered it until this thread, but I'm pretty sure I also got rid of a big % of the possible horror stories. Most of them posted to this thread seem to be centered on "things", motors, tires, etc. I'm not very worried about the few remaining opportunities for horror, particularly if they will just wash off.

F-250 SCREW 4X4 Gas, 5th NuWa Premier 35FKTG, Full Time, Engineer Ret.

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