Brad & Jacolyn

Thanks for the direction guys. It looks easy to do now I just hope to find the problem in the switch. That should be easy to remove. Rocky they also have videos for removing the entire mirror assembly. Hope you are getting all healed up. I hear that takes longer when you reach your advanced years.

Good morning, My passenger side mirror has stopped moving. It will move manually but I'm afraid to do that for fear of breaking something. The only thing I have done so far is check the fuse and it is good. The drivers side moves. I checked the resource guide and did not find what I was looking for. I have to admit I have not tore into things yet to start checking wires and electricity etc because I have been moving down the road. But I thought that before I started that I better find out any tricks to remove the mirror back. Who knows this may become a WCR project. Brad

Hi Dave, It may be real interesting to see what you could come up with in your shop. It would appear that our reckless youth does catch up after awhile. But the drag racing and motorcycles and the other silly stunts we pulled sure are fun to look back on aren't they. At home it was a bit of 'Hold my beer and watch this' Brad

Comments like that is why I have a limp today.

I'm afraid not. We are headed in the opposite direction. We will be at the WCR and the National though. Brad

If MPG is a determining factor then RVing is probably not the hobby for you. Besides I thought the question was what engine and why. I have a 12 liter Volvo engine. That is what came in the truck when I bought it. Not bothered by the 8 MPG. Beside that is only when towing. The smart gets 40.

What are you going to use for transportation when you arrive at your destination. We used the HDT for 2 years but left the bed big enough to carry a smart car( which we have now done for 8 years). Just because you don't intend to carry something now don't limit yourself in the future by making changes that will be hard to reverse later (like making the bed to short). 😀 Brad

Just made our reservation for the WCR. See Y'all there. Brad

Hi Chad, Have not signed up yet but as soon as I get a few minutes I will. Time to come to Idaho again and see the west coast folks. Are you going to bring Jen this year? Brad

Jim that was the rally 2 years ago. Mr. COB tried to organize getting a group discount but I don't know how many took advantage of that. Rocky already had the unit and I installed both of them at the rally. (After Rocky finally located his). Guess he put things away to well. It is not a hard install just be sure to follow the directions carefully. And double and triple check the plugs in the box before using the little zip tie to secure them in the box. Brad

Dennis you don't need to replace the collets unless they are broken or a leg (??) is bent up badly (you can do that removing they). Just be sure that you have at least 1 spare for when you drop one because they are next to impossible to find. I had an extra thanks to Mr.Seas and I needed it. Now I carry spares. Changing is just like Carl said. I did find that on a hard O ring that it came out easier if you use a small screw driver and cut the O ring. Then fish out the pieces. Brad

If the cruise will not engage the first thing I would try is to lift the brake pedal with my toe and try to engage the cruise then. If that works it is an adjustment of the pedal (I forget what the switch is but if the pedal is to low the cruise will not engage). I had that problem and I put a small bungie cord around the pedal to hold it up until the adjustment can be made. Just a possibility. Brad

Thank you and we are definitely enjoying it. I was afraid I would get something to thick for the slides so I contacted NUWA and asked what they used. They told me that the box said .32" plus they used a pad. The handy dandy internet conversion said 8MM was .314961". So I felt safe using the 8MM with the pad already attached. Brad

3 1/2 days on my knees and they were barking. On the edges of the slides where it met the carpeting I left a strip of carpeting the width of my level. Then I removed the padding under the strip and folded the carpet back under itself so the slide carpet edge covered it and stapled the carpet back down. I also put some staples into the edge of the planks where they bumped against the carpet edge that I just described. Other than that the floor is all floating. No glue. Before I started I read everything I could find about installing these floors and I found something about this particular flooring and it said not to put it under cabinets. So I was going to just float it up to the edge and then cover with 1/4 round (just for the record the trim is not in place yet but I have it and when I get someplace where I can rent a chop saw AND my knees quit barking I'll install it). However, when I removed the original kitchen flooring it ran under the cabinets and then cleats were added inside the cabinet frame. When I pulled out the original flooring the cabinets stayed up on the cleats so I just slid the new floor into the space left by the old floor. I will put trim around that also. One big trick that I learned. If at all possible lay the flooring in the direction they recommend (groove to the wall and then left to right). My problem was the flooring ran under the kitchen slide so I had to start there instead of in the back corner on the same side of the rig. My big fear was that I would not be able to slide the material under the kitchen slide (I was right. It was a real bitch as it was). Then I had to lay the kitchen floor out to the edge of the cabinets and then extend the floor back until I cleared the cabinets so I could measure to the wall and try to extend a line all the way to the back of the rig. So I had to work some pieces backwards. The locks work about twice as hard coming in backwards. Once I got the alignment correct (there was a lot more worrying than there should have been) all the way from the back to front the rest popped in quick because I was working the locks in the proper direction. What did I learn? 1) Depending on the brand the WEAR LAYER is different. I used 8mm planks with attached cork padding. The wear layer is 20mil. Thickest I found. 2) DON'T go cheap. I ended up paying $4.49 per sq. ft. 3) DON'T rush. You will get aggravated at some point. Walk away and take a break. Otherwise you will get frustrated and make mistakes. 4) This one is JMO. When you buy the install tools (you will need spacers, and tapping block and a pull bar) don't buy the kit. The pull bar in my kit was thin and soft. The bar bent easy and will fight the entire job. Spend a little more and buy individual tools. You will probably be happier in the end and have less buggered fingers. 5) Measure carefully. I figured on having a 1/2 box left. Turns out my waste fell good enough that I had a full unsealed box left. Now they are telling me it was special order and won't take it back. If you have any questions I'll try to answer them and no I won't install yours. Brad P.S. My knees have recovered.

Yes Rocky it is plank flooring and it is supposed to look like tile. It came in 12" X 24" planks and all the edges snap together. Brad

New floor

New floor

Well the new floor is in. We decided to go with Vinyl plank flooring from US Floors. I'll try to attach before and after pictures after I resized them. Well no luck so I'll post 2 - 3 posts to show the floor. This is old floor

Bring your stuff with you Chad and we will have a seminar and figure out how to replace your planks. I'm sure we will have lots of opinions. They will get more creative as the evening and cocktails progress. Jen may not agree but you have to live with her and we don't. Brad

Thanks Chad. This gives me another reason to look forward to the WCR (as if I needed more) Brad

Good morning everyone, I know this is not HDT related but we have so much talent and experience on this forum I thought I would throw it out here hoping some have done it. I intend to do this myself. This may get rather long so please bear with me especially if you have done this job before. I’m in the process of gathering all the information (I hope) so I can put a laminate floor in our 2008 Champagne. Here is what I have found out from NUWA, various forums and watching Youtube. I’m just throwing this stuff out and hoping someone has already done this and will confirm I’m doing things correctly or can warn me if I’m not (I’m always willing to learn new things.. I have a floating floor in the kitchen and there is a 99% chance we can’t match it. So we will do the kitchen and the living room. Any material I use should acclimate for 48 – 72 hours before starting to install. The material they use at NUWA says .32” thick on the box and the underlayment is separate. Now according to the internet conversion tables 8MM = .314961“ or 5/16”. 7MM = .275591” or 9/32”. The kitchen floor is under one side of the base cabinets and the stairs and floating on the other end. I intend to loosen the screws holding the base cabinets and the stairs and ease the old stuff out and ease the new stuff back in like it is now. This starts me at the frig slide directly across from the door. I have to start here because the floor runs under the frig slide for about 6” and has a molding against the wall which says floating to me. When I get out as far as the edge of the island (and where the carpet starts I will extend into the living room and when I clear the island I will have to work backwards toward the starting wall and easing the laminate under the island along the side where I removed the carpet. Then complete the room working towards the door. I have read ‘Don’t go cheap. You will regret it’ so I’m trying to heed this advice. Now my questions : Do I leave some carpet along the edge of the slides for the slides to ride on? I will put new carpet on the slides so it would cover the edge. If so how much should I leave? How do I secure the laminate at the slide edge? Can you recommend a brand that will stand up well or do I just go to Lowes and get some Perrigo? We have 3 small dogs that like to play. What do you do to protect from scratches when the slides are retracted? Back to acclimating for a minute. We spend winters in Texas and it gets a bit humid. I was thinking about waiting until next winter to do this. However, we are spending the summer in UT, OR, WA, MT and across the top of the country and then back down to TX. It is much drier in those areas (at least in UT) and I was wondering if when I install it will make a difference OR if I do it correctly and leave enough space (1/4 – 3/8”) that will take care of the expansion and contraction properly? Really curious about this one. I guess that is it for now. Please feel free to extend any advice or words of warning. Thanks. Brad

One other suggestion. On mine I can see the air line running to the fan (it is on the passenger side) and there is a connector in the line. I disconnected the fitting and applied air pressure directly. If that does not make it cycle have someone else tap on the clutch while the air pressure is applied. If it works then it would point to a bad solenoid at least to me. If it is the solenoid a fan rebuild will not correct the problem and the solenoid is much cheaper. Good Luck. Brad

Just my 2 cents worth. I have a D12 Volvo and the fan clutch was stuck A dealer got it unstuck but it stuck again later. Another place replaced the fan clutch. It stuck again later. Turned out to be the clutch solenoid. I took it apart and it was rusty inside and would not slide reliably. I had another solenoid in the bank that was not used but cycled so I swapped them. Did not work reliably. I replaced the solenoid with a new one and it has worked well now for 2 years. I would try changing the solenoid first (that is assuming your trucks air system is set up the same as ours. Mine has a bank of 5 solenoids under the truck. On mine the green air line runs the fan clutch. That would be about a $100 fix. If you pull out the solenoid you could also open it up to see if the plunger is stuck. Not a hard thing to do. That was my solution and the repair places kept overlooking the solenoid because it was fairly new and they said unlikely to be the problem. Now that is the first thing I check. The fan running all the time will not hurt anything except your fuel mileage. Brad

I have Coachnet and have used it 3 times. It costs me $149 a year and covers the Volvo, Smart and Hitchhiker. Of course I have fad the service for 8 years so that may help. The last tow was both the Volvo and Hitchhiker. We had unloaded the Smart or it would have rode also. Brad

The ABS is on solid, no blinking. Brad