2019-5
 |
| Blue Springs, Madison Florida |
Live Oak Florida
meeting up with Elaine and John K
Campground: Gibson
County Park. About a half dozen sites with 30 amp electric and
water. All back in sites. $22 per night. Along the Suwanee River,
steep boat ramp to river. No over the air TV, no Verizon signal at
the campground
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| Gibson Country Park, about 6-8 campsites |
The Good, The Bad
and the Ugly
The Good
Well now, the good
news is as you may remember from last week, the new axle arrived
early and was installed in time for me to head out and meet up with
my good Rv friends Elaine and John.
On Thursday morning,
I looked out from my stunning Gulf of Mexico site, watching the
fishing boats head out for another day of fine fishing. I did my
normal packing up, closing the bedroom slide, then the Kitchen slide
and wait, what’s this, the big dining room slide won’t close? All
the DC power was NON existent.
 |
| last views of the Gulf of Mexico and fishermen going out for the day |
With a lot of effort
I manually closed the big slide using a flex connecting rod with a
power drill. My two batteries for the electric drill quit way too
early with the slide only closed about 1 foot in. I had asked a
local fisherman if he could help me with the manual slide. As it
turns out, someone has to hold the slide button in the “IN”
position while the second person climbs up on top the slide and
begins using the drill to slowwwwly close the slide. Said fisherman
came through a second time in that he had an electric drill with a
powerful battery in his vehicle which completed the job. Last slide
closed.
More good news,
before heading out to meet up with John and Elaine, I thought I’d
do a google search for Rv maintenance. Luck was on my side and I
found a small Rv dealer in Perry Florida which is along the route
I’d be taking today… and come to find out he claimed to be an
expert regarding electric systems.
An hour later he’s
checking out my electrical problem, quickly identifying a bad breaker
switch.
The Bad and the
Ugly:
I had pulled into Rv
service shop with very crowed parking lot, filled with a dozen Rv’s
and a couple employee trucks. He mentioned a couple of times that I
needed to back out of the lot and re-enter backing in a remaining
spot between two other Rv-s. I asked if one of his employee’s
could preform the moving and backing in procedure as I didn’t feel
comfortable doing it. The owner decided to perform the move
procedure and I forgot about the quirky issue with my Chevy truck,
that being that the rear-view mirrors automatically tilt down when in
the reverse mode. It’s a very annoying feature that I need to have
turned off the next time I check with a Chevy dealer.
Long story short, it
set the shop owner off but good. Talk about a temper tantrum! I
don’t recall ever seeing someone get that upset , yelling,
screaming and cussing at the top of his lungs. His face got all
blotchy red and angry eyes shooting daggers. Keep in mind he is
behind the steering wheel of my truck. As calmly as I could I asked
him to step out of my truck. He not only got out of the truck and
quickly increased his rhetoric against Chevy trucks, a piece of s.
etc. You get the idea. Then added, “I can’t take it, get the
h#$% off my property”. No problemo I left as quickly as I could,
with one of his employees quietly apologizing for his bosses actions.
Sure glad I didn’t have to work with him, yuck.
Now you would think
I’d be really upset as well. A bit frazzled for sure, but headed
out to lunch and another hours drive I arrived at my next campground,
Gibson Park.
refrigerator
wouldn’t work (even though in runs on a/c or propane the control
panel runs on DC power), led lights didn’t work, and of course I
couldn’t open the slides.
Climbing around the
camper with closed slides was quite the acrobat feat. Fortunately I
had easy access to the rest room and bedroom.
After sort of
settling in, I started to make a number of phone calls to Mobile Rv
services. Found about 4 or 5, called all of them leaving messages
requesting a call back. The next day bright and early one called
back and arrived to fix the DC power problem not an hour later. A
couple of hours later, the errant breaker switch was replaced and all
systems are go. A Side note, everyone I had called the previous day
called me back asking if they could help. Thanked all of them for
their call backs.
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| circuit breakers being replaced |
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| completing the repairs, the slides are Open! |
Back to the Fun
Stuff:
In between all of
this I enjoyed a wonderful evening with Elaine and John who had me
over their place for a grouper dinner, yum.
Steven Foster State
Park.
 |
| The Steven Foster Museum |
 |
| Elaine and John, front row |
Continuing the
conversation on camper breakdowns:
Now your first
impression might be, what the heck is going on with all the stuff
going wrong with Doug’s camper. Well, if you’re a full time
Rv-er, which I am, the camper has a lot of miles put on it and of
course that can take a toll on the whole unit. Repairs and upkeep are
important. Taking care to make those repairs quickly will ensure
more damage doesn’t occur. But at the same time I like to look at
what’s been fixed and repaired as having a camper that’s back in
the same good shape as when I purchased it new.
-
Axle replaced
with a slightly beefier one making my travels that much safer
-
The issue
with the solar charger not functioning. A tech support from Blue
Sky walked me though diagnosing the problem and it’s now fixed and
good as new
-
The
flickering lights and issues with the DC power failing and not being
able to open/close the slides resulted in finding the source of the
problem which was due to a circuit breaker. Issue identified,
replaced and knowledge learned to properly maintain the system.
Life is an adventure
and I get to enjoy it from different locations all over the country.
Now that’s living.
 |
everything's working, slides are out
and the views are just fine |
RV REPAIR TIPS:
Having had a number
of repairs while traveling across the country here are a few tips
I’ve learned along the way.
-
When in a
remote area with the nearest service 30 to 50 miles on down the
road. Discuss your Rv issues needing repairs with the locals in the
area. They may know a local mechanic who can do the job in a pinch.
At Horseshoe Beach, I talked to the folks at the local marina and
found Little Buddy who is a shrimper and all around mechanic. Did
an awesome job replacing my axle.
-
Use your
Google Maps on your cell-phone or tablet search for Rv service/
repair shops.
-
Often Rv
shops have a backlog of months before they can get you in. let them
know you are on the road traveling and often they might be able to
squeeze you in.
-
At Rv shop
make sure they know you will be staying in your rig if possible.
They will hook you up to water and electric and will be more
diligent about getting to your repairs and on your way.
-
I find Mobile
Rv Repair services to often be the best. While needing to get my DC
power working quickly, I used Google maps search to find “Mobile
RV Repairs”. I found about 4-5 within a 60 mile radius. Called
and left messages with all of them. The first one to call me back
got the job. Note: service calls costs are no more expensive than
Rv sales/service centers and they come to you.
-
Finally, if
you can learn the basic systems on your Rv, you might be able to do
a number of repairs yourself. YouTube is a great resource for doing
basic repairs yourself.
Fun Adventures
Continued:
Elaine, John and
Doug visit Madison Florida and Blue Springs
Finally heading out
of Florida into Georgia/Alabama on Monday.
More Photography:
1 comment:
Doug you are a trooper for persevering through all the full time rving issues. The slide out issue was a bugger!
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