travelinbob

RV, by now, we all know how well you're doing on your investments but we really don't care.  Instead why not post about the RV life ?

How did the other person try to hijack your other thread you talk about ? 

I have a F550 and my rear end is a 4:88. I travel about 62-65 mph and it seems happy there.

Using a bottle jack you will also need some Pieces of 2x10's cut to use for blocking as most bottle jacks will not go up high enough.

I only use tires made in the USA for truck, trailer and Jeep. After all that's what between your life and the road. Don't cheap out there, it's your life at stake,

My truck came with the factory mount 35-40 gallon fuel tank and was fitted for a Transfer Flow system, another fuel tank 35-40 gallon and a separate gauge that mounts on the dash that shows how much fuel in each tank and system also  pumps fuel from one tank to the other to keep them equal on gallons.  The factory fuel gauge on dash when reads half full means that both tanks are half full.

Hope this helps, have fun with the conversion.

I am on my second set of wooden steps that I use for my fifth wheel. First set was made with 2x4's for the steps and uprights and precut steps. this set was 3 foot wide.

Second set was made from 2x10's and this time made a hand railing. This set is 4' wide.

Using my battery powered drill with a socket makes set up fast and easy and is stored right beside where they are used in the cargo bay. Because all lay flat they take up little room. When assembled they are very stable and dependable for my wife and I being in our 70's.

For short stays we use the folding metal steps that came with the RV but we hate them and so do our doggies. 

Ronaldos, you should have both detectors, one mounts near the floor and the other mounts about chest high.

I run Continentals on my F550. Happy with them, my previous Michelins had lots of tread left but developed sidewall cracks. I've run Coopers on my last 2 Jeeps and have Goodyear "H" tires on my 5th wheel. All tires are made in the USA.  Wouldn't run anything else.

I have Kelderman on my F550 to haul my 20,000# trailer and its great. I attach my trailer and it puts air in the bags and the truck automatically comes back up to level. Truck came that way when I bought it used. Works great.

We too had our rig in storage since Sept 2019 when we bought our final house and left the fulltime life for good. A couple months ago we took it out for 2 weeks and all went OK. I am worried about brain fog as I do experience it a little from time to time. BUT time will come when .............

No, No, No on the corner bed.

I would recommend a portable dome of some kind. We fulltimed for years and used one of the metal dishes on a tripod and it was a PITA every timed we moved. Now since we got off the road FT we have been using a dome and its soooo much easier, should have done it 15 years ago. With ours we can only have one TV hooked up to it unlike before we had both TVs hooked up. Not that big of a problem, on the 2nd TV I hook it up to the roof antenna so we can have the local channels.

Our RV came with a filter in the cargo bay behind sliding doors. I use the cheap carbon filter to filter out the rocks in he water. At the kitchen sink I tapped into the cold water supply line and added another filter housing with a quality filter for taste along with a chrome gooseneck faucet on the countertop. Hardest part of this job was drilling hole through the granite countertop.

When we bought our exit plan home in 2019 it already had a gooseneck filter at the kitchen sink and a GE filter under the sink. Its a 2 filter system in parallel and the water is fantastic. Best I've had, even better than the RV.  Filters last 6 months and are sort of reasonably priced.   I highly recommend the GE filter system. It tastes almost as good as Dansani bottled water.

Interesting. I was a fulltimer for years pre Covid. Now that we live in a "real" house I find out that I have been accustomed to my Jetpack instead of using a landline for internet. We now have 2 Jetpacks, one for laptop at home and away in our RV at times. The other I use for my Ring Security. 

We also have 2 phones. The other day the one Jetpack was acting flakey, saying "NO SIM CARD" so I used the laptop on my cellphone. It worked but seemed to run slower. I talked to the local sales outlet where we bought the Jetpack and they said to reset the Jetpack (a little button under the battery that I never knew existed). I had to reset the Jetpack again this morning using the reset button. This is getting to be a real PITA.

I'll be following this thread...........

A few months ago a thief entered our RV Storage lot and used his CH751 key to gain entry to as many storage bays as he could. He gained access to ours but he didn't see anything of value. I'm sure glad he used his key instead of a big screwdriver. I could have changed my bay door locks many years ago but thought I would be better off to keep the 751 and save the doors.

I have Dish at home and when traveling I use a Tailgator and the Dish Wally and it could not be any easier. For years and years I had Direct TV and fought with their big oval dish and sure wish I would have changed years ago. I get the local news where ever I am by changing my service address if I go out of state. 

Only problem is that the Tailgator only works for one TV, before we had both TV's on Direct TV. Now I hook the bedroom TV in the RV up to the antenna on the roof when on the road.

16 hours ago, Lou Schneider said:

Wow.  I went through Needles yesterday going south to north.  The heat was brutal in the morning, I can imagine what it was like at 4 PM!

I spent one night in Needles at 115 degrees and my 2 a/c's barely made it livable. Never again....also filled up with diesel because it was an easy in/easy out station.......back then $5.35 gallon, stupid mistake...crossed the border a mile away and it was $1.50 gallon cheaper.

First thing that came to mind was why would anyone need or use that 4th burner. I would find it hard to understand why even that 3rd burner is necessary. I would think that even at home how long has it been that you had more than a couple pots on the stove at one time. Very few and far in between times.

Just got my renewal in New Mexico yesterday, Jeep was $51 and RV was $85 for the year.

Well, welcome to the fulltime lifestyle. You are in for a big surprise in that you will eventually not even know what time of day it is or even what day of the week it is. The best thing is you wont even care. We lived FT for around 10 years but health reasons required us to buy another home without wheels. We're both in our 70's and still cannot part with our RV. Just returned from a 2 week trip a couple hundred miles away. It's in the blood and the hitch itch needs to be scratched. Good luck and best wishes.  

Before I retired I bought and sold hundreds, maybe thousands of T&P valves. The fact that it stops weeping after the water reaches temp means that it has nothing to do with the air bubble. The fact that you already tried a replacement eliminates a defective valve. I would find out who a regional Watts distributor is and call them. Not a retailer but the distributor.

Tell them it weeps and then stops, see what they say.

Its way easier that removing and reinstalling another water heater.

Let us know........

Bob

You may have a transmission overheat problem and also a tail wagging the dog issue. I towed a light 25' TT with my Tahoe and had these issues. In the flatlands on a non windy day you'll be OK as long as no trucks are passing you.

Ha, I had that problem so I just replaced the oven. BUT not the end of story.

When we bought the RV it did not have an oven, only a cooktop. Installing a oven was part of the purchase. The oven we got included was a POS. We hated that thing for years. One day the pilot would not stay lit so I go to replace the thermocouple. The manufacture of the oven decides that it would be best to secure the thermocouple tubing to the rear of the oven with a clamp and screw. So.....in order to take the thermocouple off I had to remove the oven. 

I decided that if the oven was coming out it sure was NOT going back in.....I researched and found what I wanted. Main feature was a pilot that I did not have to lay on the floor to light it. I finally found that the only replacement was made by Furion and they just started making the oven/cooktop slide in.

Best thing I ever did.

Just a thought....make sure that the leak isn't coming from a crack in the white plastic tee. As already said replace with a brass tee. One good thing is that its out where you can actually work on it. My jobs are usually way back in where I can only use one hand to work with...if I'm that lucky.

47 minutes ago, noteven said:

Turn radius is a function of front axle wheel cut angle and wheel base. 

Wide track steer axles like most class 7’s , 8’s , and trucks like 550/5500’s have more “cut” than an independent front suspension 4 wheel drive pickup  might have.

Trailer hitch point behind the rear axle will reduce trailer “off tracking” in turns. 

Keep in mind when you are 🤔 thinking - class 8 “HDTs” pulling all kinds of semitrailers 53ft long with their wheels back where they belong get driven in and out of places where RV’ers’z are running over the shrubs and sign posts 😀

I have to chime in on this and say that 2001 F550 Starhauler needs at least a half acre to turn around. It's terrible when backing my trailer in a RV site.

I think you'll be too long for travel unless the 5th wheel is a mighty short one.

If that is a roll pin as Ray suggests then it is intended to be a very tight fit where it goes through the red on your can and loose on the chrome parts.  Maybe not defective but impossible to tell just by a photo. I've sold thousands of roll pins or split pins or compression pins or whatever you want to call them over my years working in sales for 30 years. 

JMO for what its worth. Bob