All Activity

RV owners should know the height of their trailer or rig. For the last ten years 9’ 7” has been in my brain just in case we encountered a low overpass. My thinking has always been if it’s under 10’ I’m turning around! Some years ago we came to an overpass on a back road somewhere that was 9’6”, there was no traffic and I was able to easily back up turn around and find another route. On our trip home from Hohenwald a couple of weeks ago we were on I-35 South between Dallas and Waco when our GPS showed a red road ahead and recommended we exit and take back roads. That’s what we usually do anyway so we followed all the other folks doing the same thing. We started out on normal county roads but after a half hour or so we were put on a small, unnamed road for a few miles before intersecting with a major highway. We were one of many, there was a big boat and two long travel trailers ahead of us. The road soon narrowed to about a lane and a half. Basically one way traffic unless you moved over to be half off the road. There were a few oncoming vehicles, so we slowed and moved over. We could see the highway ahead so we ventured on with everyone else. When we got close to the highway we saw that we had to go under the highway, make a sharp left and continue on the access road before merging onto the highway. As we got closer we could see a big sign on the overpass - 9’10”. The boat ahead went right under. The 30+’ travel trailer stopped and two guys got out, scratched their heads, rubbed their chins looking at the overpass and their trailer while traffic is backing up behind us. They turned around and announced they couldn’t go under and would back up to get out of the way. This is on a 1.5 lane road, with a curve and a line of traffic. Cars started to scrunch over and he proceeded to back his long trailer with his big dually pick up. I put my truck mirrors in, there was about 12” clearance as he went by, slowly. Once he passed the guy in front of me came back and asked me “how tall are yew?. I said 9’7”, how tall are you? He said he had no idea and wasn’t about to measure now. He said I could just go around and then he’d do the backup thing too. When I looked at the line of traffic behind and the narrow road I estimated that it would be a better choice to break my 10’ rule and go for it. We pulled around the other long trailer and moved slowly to the overpass. Carol jumped out to watch and I was checking my mirrors. We had at least 2” to spare. I heard cheers and “he made it!” being yelled as Carol jumped back in and were were quickly on our way. Worst case I figured I might have to replace my noisy Dometic AC, but alas it is still there! Mike

Hello Oliver tire experts, Gary with hull 994 here. The old tires were at there expiration so I took off the 4 tires and brought them to discount tire and dropped them off. I had bought in advanced 4 new tires. They called me and said some that there was a mix up with the order, but they had 4 compatible ones. ( This was last fall and has not been on the road yet). So I told them to mount up the new ones, Good year endurance ST 235/80r16 Trailer tires. The Question is they are supposed to be 80 PSI, can I run a lower PSI like 55 or 60. I can not find anything on the google machine that supports a lower PSI. Did I get robbed on these tires and have to deal with the rock pounding they will produce. I also have the 4 ALCAN springs ready to go on when the Minnesota weather lets me.

It is"t uncommon for the Girard to not close flush. This requires a slight adjustment. No way that will lead to it opening.

Read my posts in this thread. I used a Lippert tinted glass insert because the door is a Lippert. Be sure to get the frame release clips and a new inside and outside frame because you will break some tabs while removing the frames. The new frames will also have new intact seals. After installing the clear tinted glass I wanted a blind that could be operated without having to open the screen door. I had a friend that sews make me a blind out of heavy curtain material and used 2 spring rods to position the blind in the screen door frame. The top spring rod can be lowered to allow a viewing area at the top.

I have heard of no Oliver / Garret awnings unfurling. My friends were in an Escape (Canadian) trailer. I don't recall the brand of awning but they were electric. I decided to do this after I noticed our curb-side awning was a slight bit ajar while on the road. It was not fully embedded in the housing after some high winds while camping. After I adjusted the motor, all was fixed. Yes, I should have done a more careful walk-around prior to leaving after the high winds. I also adjusted the wind/motion sensor to be more sensitive. Was not trying to suggest any problems with our Garret awnings. Just one less thing for me to worry about - hence my "suspenders and a belt" comment. Or, one is none and two is one. 😀

Nice job, Mike. Shame that this happened but given the age and torture that we put these rolling houses through, I guess that it should not come as a big surprise. I'd guess that you are now good for another ten years or so. Bill

We smelled an acrid odor one time. When I found it, very similar wiring failure connected to the Surburban Hot Water Heater, too.

Something very similar happened to us, except they used Wago connectors in the j-box instead of wire nuts. One came loose and the Wago melted.

I'm aware of swing out roller style awnings opening while traveling but I've never heard of this type of box awning doing that. The mechanisms are very different.

Strange. We have a 2022 and haven't heard this. With the wall panel switch off, that shouldn't happen. You can also push the lock button on the remote. Just don't see how that could happen. Never seen a post on the Forum or Facebook. So what awnings do your friends have? Are they power awnings or manual? Never heard of the Girard experiencing this.

Edit AI search shows the APP sleep mode can be set via APP sleep mode is not a complete shutdown but is a low power mode designed to conserve battery use so its sleep mode you want to set on your APP ——————————————————— For sure Need to review the APP to confirm this because my mind and memory are not 100% anymore. Plus I only played with it for 3-4 evenings i can get mine out tomorrow and double check

So, is this true? It would be great to power down the Mini via the Starlink app! I would do that each night from bed and would then have ample battery left for the next morning! 😎

We just got our mini and activated it from our home base, then switched the subscription to pause so I am not too swift on the operation but I thought I saw the option on the phone APP to turn off the mini via IPhone so I thought it could be turned off by APP without us streaking in our camp site also on ETSY and EBay are some pretty cool offerings that accommodate two batteries and have a small shroud cover that covers the batteries and holds the mini giving the batteries a small amount of weather protection look pretty neat to me

A couple of weeks ago we took a short trip to Tennessee (battery box repair at Oliver). Our hot water tank worked fine on the way there, when we picked our trailer up after a day at the Oliver service our hot water wouldn’t work on shore power. Propane worked fine. At first I thought maybe the repair guys had done something but it turns out they had nothing to do with the problem. Before the trip I installed two new Epoch 300aH batteries and in my zeal to turn the PD4045 on to equalize I hooked up to my home 30a forgetting that I was winterized, empty hot tank but the switch left on! The heating element burned out. I ordered a new element, replaced the burned out element, problem solved. So why did I not have hot water with a new element that was working fine for a week? So, I started checking. First was the new element, measured resistance across the two terminals with the wires disconnected and got about 10.4 ohms, so it was good. Then I took the cover off of the thermostat switch and measured resistance for it and the ECO (emergency cut off) switch and they were both good. You can remove the cover for the heating element but if you want to take the element out you must remove the gas tube in front of it. To remove the cover for the thermostat switch I had to loosen the propane inlet tube that covers the bottom cover screw. Behind the cover is a thermostat switch and ECO for the 120v side on the left and the same set up for the 12v/propane on the right. I popped out the on/off switch and measured across the two terminals and it checked out okay. So, I turned on shore power and measured voltage across the terminals on the back of the heating element. I got a variable reading that bounced around between about 60v and 80v. When I touched ground (tank mounting screw) the voltage went to a steady 120v. So now I had to find the loose wire that was causing the low, fluctuating voltage. I started at the fuse/breaker box under the dinette. I checked all the connections, everything tight. I found the cable connected to the hot water breaker and followed in down to a bundle that ran under the pantry, bed and around the back of the trailer, under the furnace and up to the hot water tank. It looked like a continuous run so I took the cover off of the junction box where the cable connected to the tank. Bingo! The cable has three wires, a bare copper, a black and a yellow. The bare copper was connected to the ground screw, the black wire was connected to the tank black wire but the wire nut was melted through to the coil in the nut. The yellow wire was totally burned and not much was left of the wire nut. It appears the wire nuts were not properly installed during installation, it was the first time I removed that cover. Pictures below. There was enough slack in the trailer cable to get to new wire. On the tank there was no slack so I didn’t have much to work with once I cut back the burned wire. The tank had solid wire, the cable was stranded wire. That can be tricky. I made sure I had a bit more of the stranded sticking above the solid so the nut would grab both. I did a serious pull test when finished. Hot water restored. Fortunately I had help during this process. Ken @mountainoliver was answering my texting and offering sage advice while I was scratching my head and rubbing my chin trying to figure out what was going on. Bottom line, don’t be afraid to tackle issues with your trailer! Also, if you have a hot water tank, it might be a good idea to check your power connection. It’s one screw and easy to do. The simplicity of the Suburban hot water tank makes it fairly straightforward to troubleshoot and repair. Plus, there are a bunch of YouTube videos that go over everything. Here’s the mess I found in the junction box. This box is on the upper right side of the tank as you are looking at it from the back bed opening. The cover is held on with one small screw. Another view… One more… What was left of one of the wire nuts…

Here’s a thread that has pics and instructions for replacing the glass (and adding shutters). Window shutter thread

I replaced my Opaque door glass with a clear tinted one from Zarcor. Really like it. Make sure to order the glass specific to the door used on your Oliver. There were changes made over the years that affect the glass specs. Their Airstream shades also have my attention.... https://www.zarcor.com/rv_products/rv-door-window-kit/spare-parts.php Dave

There are a number of "install" threads here on the Forum where owners have installed a "clear" glass (usually tinted to match the other windows in the Ollie plus a blind that can be operated from the interior without opening the door. Many of us have used THIS GLASS and BLIND Note that if you want this AND you want a white interior handle you will need to call the company direct and ask for the white handle. Bill

Has anyone replaced the door window with clear glass?

Having seen and talked with owners (non-Oliver) that have experienced awning unfurlings at 60MPH, I added some inexpensive safety straps to our awnings. (As Justin Wilson use to say, "I wear a belt with my suspenders 'cuz I'm a safety engineer"). The actual straps work great. The buckles will start to rust after a year or so but are inexpensive to replace. UV will also likely reduce the strength of the straps so it's on our recurring maintenance replacement list. The "lock out" indicators help me from opening the awning with the strap on, which assuredly I would do! Parts used listed below. Straps from Amazon Red Velcro for "Lock Out" indicators Small Circular White Velcro Dots w/ Adhesive

On occasion when I have to locate the SLM away from the Oliver I simply place it on the TV, via the magnetic mount, and park as close as possible to the Oliver for clear skies. A 100Ah portable power station is used, rather the the TV’s battery, so the SLM is continuously operational. I get great reception inside the Oliver with this setup configuration; no cables, no power concerns, no reception issues, no worries! Generally however, I just use a dedicated sectional pole with suction cup mounts to strategically position the SLM anywhere around the trailer where the best exposure at a break in the tree canopy is found.

Congrats from another Hoosier, Hull #1045, Jolli Olli.

Yeah, you’d want to be plugged in, if this is a regular occurrence!

hehe, well now @jd1923 you are just trying to make me sound really lazy 😉 The absence of a cord is really convenient, but when I need to wake up at 5 AM for a work call, I try to be quiet so I don’t disturb my wife. This becomes challenging when I have to open and close the door. So far, I've been using the AC adapter and turning the inverter on and off as needed. I'm considering options that don't require the inverter to be operational, so I can keep it running continuously. Still trying to weigh cost/effort/reward. So far using AC adapter has been fine and I have never been short on power.

Yes, the DeWalt XR 20V 10Ah batteries we use do go dead every night, sometime after we fall asleep. Early on we had an older 6 Ah battery go dead once and fail, but it was date coded over 5 years old when that occurred. Our new 10 Ah batteries, date codes 2025, turn off a few hours before we change them out the next morning and they recharge in an hour or two. We've done this without issue for more than 20 overnights. Regarding your point #3, if you cannot climb out of you trailer day or night, then you're back to a wired solution, at that point you could bury the cables and stay in bed for weeks! 🤣 Chris takes our dog out every morning and/or I'll go outside, soak in the sun with a morning cup of coffee! First one out usually swaps the batteries. We much prefer this over laying out and winding up the 50' cord every few days. And if you're going to a wired solution, why not just use the supplied Starlink power cord with 30V AC adapter, but you do need an inverter for that. If going for the DC wired solution, get a quality DC-DC 12/24 charger, like the Victron @Snackchaser used and I installed (I might use it some day)! For about $20 more it's not the Amazon/China cr@p! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01D082AX8/?th=1

Happy 4th Oliver Anniversary to Sherry and Patti, and their travel companions Momo and Franny 🎉 Sherri & Patti are experienced campers, first as backpackers and tent campers, then as truck-camper and travel trailer campers. Since they got their Oliver, they've camped primarily in the Northeast, and their favorite annual trip is out on Cape Cod, MA. Now that they're both retired, they're planning to take longer trips to other areas of the country 👏🥳 "On our way home from Hohenwald after delivery, we camped in the Great Smoky Mountains for a few days. This National Park was the first place I ever camped as a young child, with my family in a pop-up trailer. Mostly, I remember the campfire and s'mores, seeing bears, and the smells of camping in nature. I was hooked! I've loved camping since then, and was thrilled to get back to the Great Smoky Mountains NP, my camping roots, as an adult." - Sherry We wish you many more years of traveling and adventures on the road 🌟 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2Fji0-G6cQ