RV III - The Return

[Wingnut]

well, Bird, sorry I didn't get a chance to drop by even if I was somewhat in the neighborhood ... but it was a rather rushed trip. I managed to pry a week free even though everyone on my current project wailed and bawled excessively. That little Renault perfomed much better than I expected and I didn't need to use my AAA card, or pray ... just drive slower than I'm used to. Due to time constraints (too much work, too little time) I didn't get the ground problem affecting the rear lights ... nor the dead fuel gauge ... fixed. I grabbed some insurance ... a one gallon gas can ... loaded the wife and mother-in-law and left town. Since I had told my wonderfully procrastinatling wife I wanted to be on the road well before lunch ... we finally managed to pick up the mother-in-law from her apartment at 1:30 PM. I HAVE to learn to tell her some time at least 5 hours before I really want to leave!!
Figured I would stop at 180 mile intervals to give them potty breaks ... give my butt a brief rest and get gas before it got too low. The first stop was at 183 miles ... and I managed to pump 14.78 gallons into the tank (it holds 15 gallons!) I guess I should have ensured it really was full before we left!
Drove from Midland to 30 miles west of St. Louis and then stopped at about 1AM. Slept for 5 hours ... guess I was more worn out than I thought. Made it through the Ozarks to Poteau OK by noon ... and was actually quite impressed by the way the little 2.2L 4 banger Renault handled those hills.
After another day in Poteau (that stop was the deadline ... my mother-in-law wanted to be able to attend her sister's 90th birthday party which started at 3PM on Saturday ... made it with 3 hours to spare ...) we headed out to Dallas ... it handled the freeway (late rushhour) traffic quite well. The next day we cruised on down to Buffalo ... and the following day over to Nacogdoches. Stayed there 2 days. On the way over my wife had noticed the brake idiot light flickering weakly occasionally ... so I popped down to Wal-Mart and picked up some Type 4. Opened the reservoir and topped it up ... checked everything else.
The next day we headed back to Dallas (to drop of granddaughter we had picked up on the way through) and the doggone brake light was still flickering occasionally.
Got a couple miles from our destination and had to make a u-turn (darned stupid freeway signs! ended up in the outside lane when the signs suddenly indicated a left turn ... with 3 lanes of traffic beside me!) ... and had the most g**awful squeal from the steering pump. Got to her son's ... moved the motorhome to the least obstructive place in the driveway ... with lots of lock-to-lock wheel turning ... and the squealing was MUCH worse. And, of course, when I got out there was a large puddle of ATF on the ground (which the Renault uses for steering fliud). Cleaned up the mess and decided to leave it until morning to investigate ... it was HOT!
Imagine my chagrin when I checked out the manual the next morning and discovered that I was a total idiot! I had poured half a can of brake fluid in the steering pump reservoir! My only defense is that I have never before seen a separate reservoir for steering (always part of the pump) and this one looked just like my Toyota's brake fluid reservoir.
I purged the system as best I could ... poured in more ATF to dilute it, purged it again ... and then filled and added a half can of tranny stop leak. Amaingly ... no real leaks on the way home ... so maybe I just need to replace a few seals.
I think I now have all you "I just did the dumbest thing ...." contest enterees beat! That surely has to be the dumbest!!!!
Anyway ... the heat and humidy had both women begging to leave early ... and I had so much work staring me in the face back here ... that we left a day early ... blasted through Little Rock ... 4 hour power nap ... then made it through Memphis, Nashville, Louisville, Indianapolis and finally had to pull into a rest stop across the Michigan line just short of Coldwater .... 3 hour power nap and home 25 hours after leaving Little Rock.
I think that's enough driving for a few weeks!
Fuel mileage was pretty acceptable ... especially considering this is an RV, albeit rather small. High of 18 and low of 13. Strange thing is that I think the heat and humidity affected the mileage more than the hills ... got 17 cruising from Nashville to past Louisville (seriosuly hilly) ... but only 13-14 from Dallas to Little Rock (pretty flat).
Now to find time to crawl underneath and start working on the ground, fuel and brake-fluid problems ....
No thoughts of changing out the engine yet .... it soldiered on pretty darned well!
Oh ... hey ... I have another "stupid people tricks" entry too .... last night I got our the small tiller (can't get the L3710 through the backyard gate) and cleaned up some weeds for the procrastinator. When I finished, I noticed some plastic along the fence ... picked it up and ... discovered one end of what had been a perfectly functioning satellite TV cable. Needless to say .. that impressed her ... as well as me. Guess how hard it is to find C-Band cable these days ....
Am I having a good week or what ....

too bad that common sense ain't

 

[Bird]

Hey, Wingnut, that trip was entirely too easy. I usually manage to break or screw up a lot more than that on a trip that long./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif/w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif Glad to hear that Renault did as well as it did. I never have cared for the heat and humidity down here myself. I get up about 4 a.m., get an early start outside, and when the temperature hits 90, I usually just come inside and quit this time of year. Only have a little more than 3 months of it left this year./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

Bird

 

[RobertN]

Gosh Wingnut, my trip almost stopped before I could load up!

I went and bought a new Dodge truck. I was all excited to haul my 9.5' camper down to the coast for a week. I didn't get a new Ford or Chevy, becuase the older campers don't clear properly, on the bed and cab top.

Well, low and behold, they don't clear the Dodge either! The bed comes in an extra two inches on either side, in front of the tail gate. It interfers with the camper by about 2".

Fortunately, I still have my old Ford, which the campers fits nicely. Man, I was, and still am bummed. I looked, and there appears to be no reasonable way to remodel the camper to fit the new truck. Looks like I'm selling the old("89) Ford, and the camper...

RobertN in Shingle Springs Calif

 

[Alan L.]

I was warming up the tractor Wed morning, fooling around in the shop, when I noticed a large wet spot under my Ford pickup. It was coming out front and so I reached down and touched it - it was water. Hmmm. So I open the hood and check the coolant level - OK. I squat down and look up under the truck and see a drip - coming from way back there somewhere. I got to the drivers side of the truck, get on my hands and knees and finally on my back and crawl under the truck to see where the leak is coming from.

I find that water is just beading up on the bottom of the truck and dripping down. Its pretty hot and dry, so it couldn't be condensation, and the truck hasn't run all night. About that time the BOSS comes out. I'm under the truck and mention to her that the water is beading up and its COLD.

What happened to the ice you picked up last night? Oops.

Three bags of ice in the rear floorboard of the truck. Those things keep a whole lot better in the freezer /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif.

Alan L., TX

 

[Bill_Ryan]

Alan...LOL...very humorous.

Ain't it the truth tho, it's always our wives which catch us in these embarassing moments prior to us figuring out our own bonehead obvious mistakes.

Bill

 

[patrickg]

Don't give up too easily. I had to cut a 1 ft by 4 in by 18 in piece out of my bed (service body) to accomodate my new camper. Made an armature for the removed piece and attach it with three wing bolts when camper is not on truck. Need that part as it has the termination for the cable that holds the tailgate. I also had to add a 2x4 on edge all the way around the new camper to clear the top of the bed (intermediate cross braces as well for more floor support). Fits real good raised those 3 1/2 inches.

Patrick

 

[RobertN]

I'm a lookin at how I can do a little mild remodel. We really like this camper, and it's paid for /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

RobertN in Shingle Springs Calif

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Wingnut,

You're not one of those guys that thinks "oil is oil", so just shove it into whatever hole you can find. /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Seriously, I just though of something about Renault engines. My wife had a 1.7 and broke the timing belt. Bang! No more engine. You might want to check on your engine to see if your timing is belt driven and the belt's condition while you're crawling around under there. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif Timing belt breaks, and the pistons slam into the valves. As I recall, valves were real expensive. Thus, no more engine.

SHF

 

[RPM]

We had some friends over a couple of weeks ago - similar problem to Alan. They had parked their van in the drive here and someone noticed an ever increasing pool an hour or so after they arrived. Bags of ice had melted in the back of the van - the water had run all along the floor pan and was exiting through a wiring grommet/pass-through - running along the wiring and dripping at the back of the engine compartment.

That had their pulses racing - brand new van too! Was a cool day, so we knew it wasn't the A/C.

 

[patrickg]

Robert, I really know what you mean. Several years ago (late '80's) I gave a '69 Falcon 6 and 500 bucks for a large OLD cab over camper. I just loved it. Then in '97 we got the biggest camper then made by Lance and I didn't want to burden my '84 Ford non-turbo diesel HD 3/4 ton with it. In 97 Ford did not build an extended cab dually 1 ton diesel so I am now a Dodge man (mostly).

Typical full sized pu bed is about 48 1/4 - 1/2 between wheel wells with about 56 between bed walls. My new camper has a lump on its side that depends on the wider dimension behind the wheel well. New truck has service body with no internal wheel wells but is only 52 1/2 in wide. NO fit! Soooo a tad bit of custom was called for. Maybe you can do something similar. I used a HD steel armature in the cut out piece. Damn heavy. Would do it over with aluminum, might still when get time.

Here are some dig pix of it.. First is with custom piece "IN" and tailgate shut. Next is with tailgate down. Next with custom piece out and tailgate down. And last, I couldn't help it, the devil made me do it, the truck. '97 1 ton Dodge dually with 19 1/2 inch Alcoas, custom bumper with winch, service body etc.

Patrick