RV Basics : Instructional Video for extending a manual awning - NOT!

My first attempt as an 'actor'!  I was going to make an instructional video for something so simple as extending a Dometic RV awning. The first time is always a little tricky, but once you know how it isn't too bad. I thought it would be helpful.

This actually ISN'T the video I would want to do, but I thought it would be fun to post it anyway, uncut, unedited, and about as 'real' as you can get. I can see my acting needs some improvement too.

Love to hear from all of you. Be gentle!

RV Basics : RV Shower Caddy

If you live in an RV, like Sheri and I, you are always very sensitive to space. The shower in our RV (we can't speak for other folks) does have some molded areas for soap, shampoo, but they are small and really do not work. Also, if you think about it, the corners of the shower could be used for a little bit of toiletry storage.

What we have been using and has worked VERY WELL so far, is a little spring loaded shower caddy which we purchased from Bed Bath and Beyond. I'll put a link to something similar from Amazon here : shower caddy. It took maybe 15 minutes to assemble, is held in place by spring tension, can be adjusted to be 1 or 2 feet taller if required and holds lots of soap, shampoo, scrubby things that women like, shavers, and so forth. It has been a great, lightweight, and useful addition to the RV. It only cost us abou $10 new.

[ Other articles about the ever present daily concept of showers or showering in your rv - showering economically in an rv by setting the water temp the easy way and showering economically in an rv by using the on and off valve]

From RV Park and Campground Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

RV Basics : A story about a broken bathroom faucet

[ Update ]

We did actually do this twice. The faucet I picked at Home Depot was the CHEAPEST known to mankind. It lasted maybe 4 months.

We replaced it the next time with the SECOND cheapest faucet in Home Depot.

It pays to get just a little bit better than the cheapest.

M

[ Original ]

When you start reading up on RV's, you'll find there are lots of 'experts' who start talking about very sophisticated things like reverse osmosis water filtration systems, automatic satellite TV systems, and automatic rv leveling and rv stabilization systems and so forth.

I'm not one of those guys. I still wonder "Hey my rv faucet is broke - how do I fix it?"

And I say this because it did break! One thing we're learning is that much of the equipment on an RV is unique to an RV. So when the faucet broke - like you can see in the picture below - after the RV dealer's normal business hours we started to panic because we had to turn off ALL of our water.

I'm going to pass onto you what I've learned from this experience.

From RV Park and Campground Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

We actually decided to remove the rv faucet rather than replace the valve on the cold water side. When we took it apart, there were some numbers on the side of the faucet, which you can see Sheri's finger pointing out. I think if I knew much more about plumbing, that would have helped me, but in this case it didn't help much.

The MOST IMPORTANT information was actually that the hot/cold valves were exactly 4 (four) inches apart. That turns out to be a kind-of, sort-of standard. Read on.

From RV Park and Campground Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

Because of the 4 inch centers, I was able to locate, in Home Depot, a suitable replacement faucet for our rv. I took a chance (because I did not bring the broken faucet to Home Depot), that the new one had identical fittings underneath the sink (can you see the two plastic inlets with threading above).

And it did have identical fittings. The rest of the installation was pretty straightforward. I was able to hand tighten the fittings and they did not leak.

From RV Park and Campground Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

So here is my short summary :

• RV sinks MIGHT use standard plumbing fittings - ours did.
• A 4" center-to-center faucet is a standard - or at least you could find one in a Home Depot.
• You can make this repair for under $15.
• Take the broken faucet with you when you go shopping.

RV Basics : Towing and Weight Terminology

When it comes to RV's most people seem to assume that most terms are understood. One area that is ripe for misunderstanding is the simple terms around weight. I thought I would write a short article with a list about the different terms.

• GVWR - (Gross Vehicle Weight Rating) - maximum permissible weight of the fully loaded RV.
• GAWR - (Gross Axle Weight Rating) - the allowable weight that can be safely supported by each axle.
• Tongue Weight - The weight of the tongue as it bears down on the hitch of the towing vehicle.
• UVW - (Unloaded Vehicle Weight) the weight of the trailer as manufactured at the factory. It includes all weight at the trailer axless and the tongue. It also included generator fuels.
• CCC - (Cargo Carrying Capacity) - the maximum allowable weight less water weight and the weight of the vehicle. 
• Water weight - weight of water in fresh, grey and black water tanks. One gallon of water weighs around 8 pounds.

Formulas :

• GVWR = GAWR + Tongue Weight
• CCC = GVWR - UVW - Water Weight

Tip(s):

• It is good practice to empty your water tanks prior to travel. We will probably fill our black water tank about 1/3 full though to "slosh-clean" the tank a little when we move Puma.

RV Basics : LP Propane tank meter

When Puma the RV came new, it came installed with two 20 gallon LP gas tanks. They are mounted on the front of Puma on the hitch - the advantage being that they are easy to access, which is true.

Each tank has a hose that goes from the tank to basically a switch which allows you to quickly switch between either tank. The idea behind that is you switch to the full tank then disconnect and fill the empty tank which makes total sense to me.

On the 'switch' or LP gas control switch is a little red 'window' which I believe is supposed to help you know if the tank is empty or not. I've never seen the window show anything but a dark red color no matter what. So it either does not work... or something. Anyway, it just isn't tactile enough for me.

So Sheri and I decided to get a simple gauge, which I believe is as simple as a lp propane pressure gauge. This would help us get a better idea if the tank was empty or not. We purchased it at home depot for $16. We probably should have gotten two, but we got one instead.

We'll let you know how that goes and how it works over the course of the next few months and update THIS ARTICLE - not a new one. Unless a new article would be useful to describe a new concept that greatly changes or expands this one.

RV Basics : Black Water or Sewer System Information

We have yet another little mystery with Puma. The black water indicator is STUCK at 2/3 full and there is very little we can seem to do to get it unstuck. Well I haven't gotten it unstuck, but I will tell you some things that I've learned.

My first observation is that as near as I can tell, the sensors for the black water are a pretty common problem.

My first question is what do the black water holding tanks look like? I found a page that has many pictures of the black water holding tanks and I think this is probably very representative of what most black water or sewer holding tanks look like.

On our PUMA, I can't say for sure, but I'm pretty sure that the tank monitoring unit is from KIB and what I'm showing is an almost perfect copy of our unit :

From RV Park Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

I found the following wiring diagram on the kib web site. You can get a PDF, but I show just the section that shows the wiring of the black water (sewer) tank sensor system :

From RV Park Review videos, RV basics, and travel stories with Sheri and Marlan

(I'm hoping you can blow it up by clicking on it) .

How the sensor system seems to work : It looks like this is as simple as a wiring system that has a ground and then three wires at different levels in the tank. When the "lovely goo" level raises in the tank, it contacts a wire and then reads a lower resistance than when the substance isn't in contact with the wire. This seems notoriously unreliable. But now I have something I can work with to see if the sensor is just covered up or broken.

Alternative ways of sensing tank levels : I also think there are other methods like capacitive sensing, RF sensing, ultrasonice sensing (requires being in the tank) as well as the resistive. A quick search on the web yields several systems quite easily. 

One other thing we're going to do is to start using a little water softener in our black tank. It doesn't look harmful and it is supposed to make your tank 'slickery' which helps the debris sluice on out. This is called the geo method, or at least part of it for sure. We don't want to use many chemicals, but we thought water softener seems like a simple/good idea. This article isn't about black water tank care, but just about simple facts about black water tanks. I have found that there just isn't info ABOUT the tanks, but there is lots about caring for the tanks. 

RV Toad : Neat article on an electric cooper

While the RV is just a tent in the back of the mini-cooper, this was a really interesting article on an electric car  charging from the campground pedestal. Since it seems that there is a preponderance of very technical people who are RV'ers  (retired military, engineers, mechanics, and more) I thought this was of general interest to everyone.

Click HERE for the article about the electric mini-cooper.

More on Connecting the Sewer to the RV

UPDATE TO THIS ARTICLE : Overall, Sheri and I really believe in the universal fitting. However, the one from Walmart that is pictured here is not a good one. Here are the reasons this one is not good.

1) The elbow separates from the universal adapter. All in all that is not bad, but the mechanism for taking them apart and keeping them together is VERY FRAGILE and is so easily broken or worn as to basically make it so the elbow won't stay in the universal fitting. Sad to say, but 'made in China' probably  means 'never once tested'.

2) The universal quick attach hose clamp that attaches the elbow to the flexible hose that most people use for the sewer hose is a bunch of baloney.

OVERALL : Don't buy the Walmart universal sewer adapter and elbow. There are better ones. As soon as I find one, I'll let you know.

Here are things we are going to look for in a universal RV sewer elbow in a new one which we'll soon have.

1) I think the unit should be clear plastic. Not so as to be grotesque, but so you can get an idea of the health of your holding tanks. Its like this - you want to know, even if you don't want to know.
2) I think that a lever of sorts should be attached to the fitting so you can get it on and off without tools.
3) The hose clamp that attaches the sewer hose to the elbow should work. It should not be a puzzle for people who do not care that much.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE :


When we were at our first RV park with Puma, what we call our recreational vehicle, we noticed that our flexible sewer hose had a GREAT connection to the RV. Those connections are very standard with special hooks and a quick on, quick off release.

But the OTHER end had nothing.

So to dump our tanks, we pushed the hose down into the RV parks septic system's drain. But we knew that wouldn't work.

It turns out that Walmart has a really good RV department. When we were in that department we found a universal connector for the sewer. It was less than $10.

We immediately used it. I wasn't that impressed with the hose clamp. But we got it working. The universal fitting worked perfectly in the Llano River RV Park so we're 1 for 1 on that fitting working. This was a pretty useful thing so I wanted to post it so people knew these things existed. Also, I wanted to inform people about Walmart's little RV section.

RV Users Manual Information : Palomino Puma Users Manual

Update : You can download the PDF of the Palomino Puma Towable Users Manual from this link. I went ahead and scanned it and uploaded it to Google. Let me know with a comment if you cannot download it.


------

Puma is nearly 4 years old now. The literature pack that came with it has the refrigerator users manual from Dometic, the air conditioner user manual, the hot water heater manual, and a few other things like that.

But what it lacked was some REALLY USER consumable information that was a true users manual that addressed the question "hey - how does this thing really work?"

Sheri and I were wondering because we had an odd little problem where the hot water heater's electric start was kicking off the circuit breaker. We still don't know why, but it stopped doing it. But little things about the propane tanks gave us questions too.

So we got on the Palomino web site and they have a PAGE FOR REQUESTING PALOMINO PUMA User literature. We requested a users manual, and particularly a wiring diagram.

I honestly forgot about the request, which I made about 1 week before writing this.

What showed up was a really great document for understanding the travel trailer better. I think it would be useful for anyone, not just Puma users. I think it would even be useful for fifth wheel owners as well.

Anyway, check out the LINK I put in the area above with all cap letters and give it a try. Thanks Puma.

RV Dry Storage : Keeping Puma at the Ready

During the Christmas 2009 season, Sheri and I were going to be so busy that we weren't going to be able to stay in Puma as our weekend getaway. So we towed Puma from Llano River RV Park to Millers Creek RV Park (drive through and a REAL review both coming!). We checked out Millers Creek ahead of time so we knew it was first class.

We asked them if we could just keep it there for a month and they said yes. We paid them $40/month and things turned into 3 months, but it saved us a great deal of hassle.

We called Millers Creek and they were so very kind. They told us that they could even tow Puma from the storage area to a site so we didn't have to drive Mr. Big all the way out from Austin. So now we're all setup, we didn't even have to bring Mr. Big.

We asked them if they did that little 'tug boat' service much and they said they did it quite often. Evidently, we were not the only people that thought of that.

So here is a mini-checklist...

* RV Parks will store your RV.

* RV Parks will even move it to-from your storage area.

Nice Little Maps for Showing Where you Have Been (Web)

Click HERE  to get a site where you can create a really nice little map for putting on your signature.

I'll post a permanent link to this on my links section.

M

Very Useful Electrical Wiring Diagram for your Hitch Connector

This is one of the best electrical diagrams I've seen. I'll be using this in the future. Its all the way down to 45 degrees F in Texas right now (brrrrr) so I'll wait to do too much outside stuff.

We'll use this for our travel trailer as we need to figure out a problem with our trailer brakes.

http://www.etrailer.com/faq-wiring.aspx

Leveling our RV the NEXT Time Correctly

We just got our recreational vehicle parked at the Llano River RV Park near Mason Texas.

We're unhooked and then I tried to level the RV and got it mostly level using my own technique which I synthesized solely from my mind - via a set of my own assumptions.

But inside the trailer the bathroom door would not shut.

You could LOOK at the door and see that the frame of the RV must be flexing a little bit.

But how could it? My leveling technique was just fine, wasn't it?

And there was one question that was really dogging me : If you have leveling jacks on the four corners of the RV and you need to level the RV from left to right, what do you do about the wheels of the RV. The WHEELS were my big mystery. The WHEELS must allow for some left to right adjustment, but how?

Now I can't speak for all RV's, but I can speak for Puma (our Palomino RV Travel Trailer).

Here is the answer to the mystery, actually several answers to several mysteries.

1. The wheels DO NOT LEVEL left to right.
2. The jacks on the four corners only provide SUPPORT for sagging, not lift for leveling.
3. The jacks are correctly named STABILIZER jacks.
4. The FRONT JACK on the tow bar is the jack you should use for leveling.

So HERE is the correct leveling procedure, which I'll put in as SHORT as I possibly can so that you can see it is very simple.

1. Park the RV so that the left to right of the RV is level. You may have to park the wheels that are on the LOW side of the RV on something - like a wide board (or two or three).
2. Suspend your disbelief that there is not a better way - at least on some RV's.
3. Disconnect from the tow vehicle.
4. Crank the main tow bar hitch UP or DOWN so that the RV is level from front to back.
5. Crank down EACH stabilizer jack so that it kisses the ground, then give it a little more pressure so that it just supports the corner and doesn't LIFT it.

I might do a little video later (in high speed funny mode) to show how this is done. Its really not too bad.

Finally, make sure you have a set of wood planks with you so that you are prepared. Measure prior to shopping for the wood or you'll make two trips. Measure twice, cut once!

Hooking up the Utilities

When we first hooked up the recreational vehicle (RV) to the 'hook ups', something I had never done before, I took some pictures of the connections. We had fortunately arrived before dark so hooking things up were very easy.

One small piece of advice that I've already learned is that by sort of hooking up, you might find you want to back up or pull forward a bit for better connections OR for a better position on the site. So pull-in first, check out how things hook up, and be prepared to reposition just a little bit. I guess I would reword this as - don't be in TOO much of a hurry to disconnect your pull vehicle.

In case you are wondering, yes, I did disconnect the Puma from Mr Big and reconnect before I learned my lesson.

Probably the LEAST flexible, or LEAST forgiving of the hookups is the sewer connection. We had to move the travel trailer forward to have it line up correctly and have the shortest run possible. As you can see, the sewer connection comes directly out 90 degrees from the RV to the sewer drain. We had to stretch the sewer drain pipe quite a bit to get it to stretch, but it seemed to do the trick.

We luckily (you just don't know what you need the first time) had a coaxial cable for the cable TV. That is the line you see going to the small connector in the upper right hand portion of the photo.

We also had a water line (the white hose) for fresh water.

Finally, the trailer had its own electrical connector from the camper to the fuse box. The fuse box had two places to plug, but they were shaped differently and you can't get it wrong. I'm pretty sure the Palomino Puma is a 30 Amp connection.

One thing to note... Sheri allows the black water (sewer) and the two grey waters (kitchen and bathroom) to fill up. Then we drain the black first and the two greys then drain next washing all the black water down. I think that is pretty clever. Sheri has lots of this figured out after living the in the trailer for two years.

Leveling our RV the First Time

[ Note. This article is PLUMB wrong. This is part one on Leveling and it is an example of a bad assumption. I'm leaving it here because I think it is important to know that as you tow/park/live in a recreational vehicle, you're human and you'll make mistakes. Long time RV'ers can be very TOUGH on the newbies. Anyway, read on and excuse the EGG on my face! All details here are left so that you can say he was an honest man. ]

I'm guessing this won't be the ONLY post on leveling the recreational vehicle (RV). As you know Puma is the name we call our Palomino Puma travel trailer. It is a 29 foot Front Kitchen Super Slide (29 FKSS). Sheri bought it to live in and that is just one great thing that makes me love her. She beats to her own drum.

I can't comment on ALL RV's, but I can comment on ours and my observations. I'm thinking that many do not have automatic levelers. Right now, I don't think that is a big deal, but check w/ me after our Thanksgiving week fun.

Most, if not all RV's have to be level. Case in point : We did not have ours level and Sheri said it felt like she was walking on the moon. So, it isn't just for good water management, it is truly for comfort.

So being level matters.

Some other quick notes. An RV can only be leveled by 'just so much'. So you might really need to think about the idea of level, especially if you are 'dry camping'. For Sheri and I, we probably won't do too much dry camping because we don't have a generator. We'll save that for when we get a fancier 5th wheel or a motorhome.

Just like an RV can only compensate so much for un-level ground, it is actually very amazing that someplace that LOOKS level really isn't as level as you think. Good for drainage, but hard to get level.

When I do this more, I'll let you know more on what I learn about leveling.

So, after we pulled into the spot, and arranged ourselves on the pad the best we could, we then hooked up our utilities. As I think back, maybe we should have leveled FIRST, just in case we found out we needed to pick a different orientation. Not sure. But we leveled last.

The next thing we did, was to unhook Puma from Mr Big. Honestly, I think you can't even think about leveling when you are hooked up. I DID see a fifth wheel the other day that looked lived in AND level while parked at a friends house. But I can assure you that I don't think the travel trailer would be level by keeping Mr Big connected. Plus we needed Mr. Big.

After disconnecting Mr Big, the next thing we did was use a carpenter's level to check for the level. Sheri keeps one in the trailer and I would argue that is needed on the list of things to have with you at all times.

It told us what our eyes told us. That the front by the hitch needed lowering.

So we lowered like crazy. The leveling jacks got into arguments with the hitch jack. I think the correct thing to do is to lift the hitch jack all the way out of the way. The front lowers quite easy as the trailer leans on the hitch just a little bit.

By the way, we lowered the back leveler jacks too, just to be safe. Also we chocked the wheels so that the trailer did not roll. I don't know what other people do, but that seems like common sense to me.

What we found was that we really had to crank the back completely as high as we could go, and then we even had to get some extra boards to go higher and the front almost as low as possible. Surprisingly, we got the left/right fairly level and then Sheri checks the doors. When they close easily then you've got it. If they don't close, then the frame is warped just a little bit.

Anway, if you look at the picture you can see how high the back jack is even though the ground didn't look that level.

I can see that we need to keep 2x12 for the jacks with us at all times and I'm already thinking about electronics to help level the darned thing.

Showering in an RV

Everything you do, you might do a little differently in an RV.

It is TRUE - you DO have all the modern conveniences of home in an RV, but you have them smaller.

You only have to change your mind, just a little bit.

The hot water heater in the Puma is only 6 gallons.

The good thing is that the hot water is turned up to be very hot.

So, you run the hot water in the shower - but only as a trickle. That is the important part. The hot water is hot enough that when mixed with cold water it will be warm enough for a nice shower.

After the trickle is warm, then and only then do you turn on the cold water. You adjust the cold until the shower is a workable temperature. I would take a cooler shower than I normally would anywhere else, but my goal is to have comfortable shower that does not run out of hot water until I am ready.

The one thing you must resist is the temptation to turn up or add more hot water. This really will work against you.

So, if you're thinking about owning an RV, I've now set your expectation that you can have perfectly good showers just like home, and the only thing you need to do is just be a little stingy with the hot water.

Cheers.