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@Hokieman Not sure what to explain in regards to the shackles and wet bolts being heavier duty than Dexter parts. They simply appears bigger/larger. Once you get over the fact that the wet bolts could possible spin over time due to no spines in the shackles, all is well, I guess. As to why Oliver is using Dexter parts with Alcan springs, I'm not sure. If they are, I can only think of a few reasons why: They have tons of Dexter spare parts and want to use them up & save $$$. Or they are making a less than desirable decision to save $$ and use Dexter parts with Alcan springs. 🤷‍♂️ The parts will be fine I'm sure. Most of those bolts & shackles had held up pretty well. Oh sure, a few reports of broken ones over the years, but only time will tell with pure Alcan parts. Again, a business does not stay in business since 1971 if they make crap parts, I would think. Us men can be so darn anal detailed oriented with our data-point comparisons that it surely creates super long threads. 🤣. It's like our chess games but with RV parts. 😉 I spend much of my time in recent years ensuring I know how to retire and if I did a good enough job with the portfolio (I think so). And now whether or not I want to go thru a full RV Tech school to have a better foundation, or simply goof-off in early retirement. Decisions, decisions.

If you get in an accident and it causes $10K damage to your trailer, immediately get in another to total it. Just kidding. Best of luck. FWIW, we use Progressive.

Take a look at Good Sam Insurance.Agency.

Sounds interesting

With our delivery date on the horizon we are currently looking at insurance options. We have already received quotes from USAA/Progressive and Geico and waiting on a call from American Adventure Insurance. Our biggest concern is how any insurance company will respond if the Apex were to be damaged and who the insurance adjuster would assign to handle the repairs of the fiberglass and/or frame and how much push back we could possibly get from requesting it to be repaired by Oliver, of course, reading the entire policy to include the small print might give a little more insight when answering that question; however, any thoughts, recommendations, or suggestions would be welcomed especially from those that have had damage to the frame and fiberglass. We searched the forum and have read what was available. TIA. Hull #1738 in the making, delivery date September 14, 2026.

I’m graphene coating the Oliver, just completed the roof. Basically following the CG Detailing method, which they graciously provide if you dig for it. They don’t come out West so I need to DIY which is a ton of work but satisfying. If there’s any interest I’ll provide details and tips

tried them, via his eBay listing, but will try him direct. Major RV parts company bought Norcold and supposedly re-manufacturing parts again, just can't get a sense of target date or computer is just showing backorder, with big void behind that.

I second the PITA! I did figure out on our recent trip I can fold the mattress from front to back (with bedding in place) and the frame on the window blinds will hold it in place while I get into the front compartment.

A little hot, but beautiful. IMG_8019.heic

Check with Tim's RV in Erving, MA They boght a lot of parts from companies going out of business or stopping making models.

Nova Kool Left-Hinge Availability? Due to the lack of Norcold replacement parts, membrane control panel in my case, I may be doing a fridge replacement. If you replaced yours with a Nova Kool, where did you source it? I’ve found few in stock, but more critically they are all right-hand hinge. Left-side hinge models are 4-6 week order time from the factory. My tech and I, along with ChatGPT, have search with no luck for both the membrane and board, and for the Nova Kool left-hinge.

On all the models? Last I saw it was mentioned only for the Apex. Yeah as I talked about on the other thread, watching the suspension in action for a good hour its pretty obvious that while the 1750's are sufficient, they're not adequate. They're working but it looks like there's no extra margin, hit a good bump and they quickly bottom out.

I have been very unhappy with the Dexter leaf springs. I have towed my trailer 15-20,000 miles since purchase in 2021, 99% of the time on pavement. Last year 2 of the leaf springs broke and were replaced along with the shocks, since they bent the shaft on the shock when the leaf springs broke. This year I had another leaf spring break. I contacted Oliver and they told me they are now using Alcan leaf springs, starting with the 2027 models. I am thinking that's because they have had a lot of problems with the Dexter leaf springs. Reading through this thread it seems like many have had problems with the Dexter leaf springs. I have ordered Alcan leaf springs so we will see how they do when I get them installed.

I looked over my footage, not worth uploading. I was holding the camera, there’s too much camera shaking from holding it to be useful. Second it’s not long enough, you’d need an hour of watching the footage to see it, and ideally you’re also seeing the road too. In other words, ideally you’d be watching it while driving. It’s not something that jumps out at you, it’s not obvious as first glance. Initially I was thinking “move along, there’s nothing to see here”. But after 45 minutes or so of watching a story emerged which I wrote about above. It took that long to see the pattern, which I’d characterize as … Trust your suspension. Baby it, inspect it, religiously do your maintenance and inspections. It’s doing its job but is taking a hell of a beating. After this I’m going to religiously inspect before every drive. Upgrade it with the best components you can (Alcan) Factory suspension is clearly undersprung (Alcan) And now I am going to carry all these Dexter parts as spares on the road Trust your trailer, don’t underinflate your tires The Oliver is built like a tank - that’s why we bought it right? As detailed above the aircraft carrier is the best description. I’ve seen other suspension drive videos with conventional trailers and you can see them rattling and moving. In fact there are RV tech videos talking about the need for those panels to move relative to each other, ideally with a good angle bracket covering the edge. The Oliver is nothing like this from frame to body. Nothing is meant to move, it’s stiff like crazy, and from what I can see at best only very high band/high frequency vibrations make it through. But in a fiberglass four body trailer like this they’ll just damp themselves away. Avoid porpoising as best you can All the shaking going on inside the trailer? It’s that. Comparing that from the side mirrors to the underbody cam was night and day. Clear that any internal trouble comes from that Somewhat related, I had my Anderson installed from the factory. They recommended slightly slack chains. It’s bothered me ever since, how could these possible be doing any weight distribution? Didn’t get any response here about it but consulted Gemini which was clear that the chains need to be tensioned for WD to occur. So this trip I tried it, lifted the truck back end a couple inches, tightened the chains and then lowered. End result was the truck towed a bit better. I run a heavy trailer with a 700 lb tongue.

In case you’re not following my other thread where I mounted a trail cam such that I can watch the suspension Based on my observations of the Dexter in action, run, don’t walk and get yourself set up with five leaf Alcan.

Towed it back home after a trip. The following observations are preliminary pending what I see after I install the Alcan. They’re not scientific or measured in any way, but my impression from watching the trail cam for an hour over a variety of road conditions. Having said that I’m pretty confident of the patterns I’m seeing. I’ll try and post good video captures before/after so you can make up your own minds (I got some video from this trip but I really need a phone mount), but for now here are my impressions … Suspension Run, don’t walk and get yourself set up with a set of Alcan 5 leaf! For reference I started as an Alcan skeptic to agnostic, now I’m a raving convert. The stock suspension is undersprung, I’m convinced of it. Confident I’m seeing that the springs have too little travel and bottom out too quickly. After this I can’t unsee it, just sitting there parked they’re too compressed. Alcan’s assessment that for this trailer you need five leaves is 100% accurate, and for an engineer to say that is as strong an endorsement I can make. The stock suspension works, that’s the best I can say, but they’re not performing as they can (or should). I’m really curious to see the Alcan’s in action but I have no doubt it’ll be better than this. Five springs? All the way. Tire Pressure Stop underinflating your tires! Its ruining milage and stressing your tires. It’s perfectly clear the suspension is doing what it’s supposed to do and absorbing the bumps and rattles. Whatever makes it through that doesn’t matter and there’s little you can do about it anyhow. This is most obvious on hard, quick impulse hits like going over a pothole. That suspension is getting brutalized! But it’s taking it, I can see it rattling around like crazy but I’m not seeing an ounce of rattle making it to the hard mounted camera. Think of it this way, imagine a 7 thousand pound weight going down the road. Lots of mass and momentum right? Hard to get it to move out of a straight line according to Newton, correct? But it’s got a spring connecting it to the road which is designed to move and quickly. What I see is 100% clear - the trailer plows ahead like an aircraft carrier that doesn’t care one bit about the road, while the suspension is getting beat to hell. By the way I’m able to judge the trailer vibration I think by how ‘steady cam’ it is, and compared to the road/lines/etc as a reference. Basically it looks like an actual steady cam, while the suspension is rattling away and moving all over the place, while the trailer just isn’t seeing it. If you see stuff getting knocked around inside it’s the porpoising. That’s the biggest trailer movement I could see, with a little minor waddle, but road rumble isn’t making it up there much as far as I can tell. Tank drain Kind of an interesting one. I opened the fresh drain valve and it continued to drain intermittently for over an hour, from 30%. Going from a stop would always get a gusher. Anyhow FWIW - feel free to keep your Dexter’s and low pressure, but I wouldn’t touch it after seeing it in the real world.

Yes of course, it’s always operated correctly but two times at night it had this issue, only in high cold temps That’s what I’m doing? 😅 Sorry but that’s the point of this, I’ve taken care of other pressing tasks on the trailer and am getting to it (along with my breakaway controller which isn’t charging) JD I’m trying to to diagnose this, of course it could be the 12V but 32 years of debugging tells me that’s not the first thing to look at. It’s a rare event that only occurred in a couple special circumstances so it’s not like I can test and measure. At any rate I live near the Pacific ocean where temps don’t get cold enough to test. … a bunch of good points brought up, thanks … The nearest Truma center is 4 hours away and want you to leave the trailer until they can look at it in their queue. Not optimal. I know this because I’m chasing an issue with the blower fan intermittently rubbing. At any rate I’m looking into this now and gathering information so that IF I need to take it to the Truma repair I have conclusive evidence of an issue. I guarantee that if i took it now they’d say it’s fine, because it might be fine. At any rate with this thread I’m also looking to see if anybody else has experienced this.

"Couple times" did it ever run correctly? "Low nighttime temps cause the propane to contract" Have you tried it when it's warmer out? Why not take time now to fix the actual issue? It's August now vs. March so certainly no need to heat tanks this time of year (if ever). And you can work on this middle of the afternoon, not waking up middle of the night. Get error codes if present. Don't assume12V at the ignitor just because of a "max battery pack." Are you hearing ignition? Test for 12V+ and actually see or at least hear the ignitor clicking for actual verification. Then are you getting gas? The heater fan will blow to "clear out the ignition chamber" as a process step whether LP is present or not. Is your LP regulator supplying LP at the correct pressure? Gas in the lines? We usually light the LP stovetop to clear the lines of air but you may have an induction cooktop. Is the hot water heater working correctly? If you have the rear LP port run something back there to verify good gas flow. We had issues our last trip out with LP keeping our older 3-way fridge running overnight. It ran fine on DC and I was worried about the new LP regulator I had installed. While parked at home this August, I ran all LP appliances to be sure (stovetop first, then the furnace, HWH and fridge). Cleaned the sail switch in the Atwood furnace which barely needed any cleaning. They all tested/worked well when at home, so my conclusion was that the old fridge will have issues running on LP when at 7600 FT elevation like our last campsite. Now is the time to get yours fixed when you're not out camping. Some of our members from up in Montana or Minnesota can chime in, but unless you are camping regularly below 20F a heater blanket should not be necessary. LP will not vaporize at all when -44F but certainly will for occasional drops below freezing (32F). Your Truma should still be under warranty, so you could schedule repair service. You will want to go through testing steps regardless, know that you have LP and 12V+ present and record any error codes if possible.

Couple times on our March trip back from the factory the cabin heater got stuck. No heat, loud fan blowing. Consulting with Gemini I found the following, that its probably a lockout state caused by an ignition failure. The heater is running the fan full blast to clear out the ignition chamber of unburned propane. Can be caused by a low 12V line (not the case here with the max battery pack), or a propane line drop. Low nighttime temps cause the propane to contract and lower the pressure, explaining why it only happens then. Another possibility is moisture in the tank. Being new to the trailer and it being middle of the night I didn’t catch an error code, but most likely due to this. Possible fixes to prevent are to … Go to a place that can put a little methanol in the tank prior to filling to act as an antifreeze (a bother) Wrap the tanks (30lb on mine) in a heating blanket (expensive at $500+ each) The propane lines are set to 11” pressure by RV regs, so increasing that isn’t an option. Being out West we frequently travel between temperature extremes so I’d like to be generally prepared to prevent this from happening again. I’m wondering if there’s a low cost way tank heater blanket solution? Or other ideas, we have 30 lb tanks.

I believe if we were ever to mooch-dock with family, I'd use the wet bath inside or better yet borrow the family shower in the house! 🤣 I use the outdoor shower boondocking when miles away from others, and yes we're always "in the dirt." I thought of an outdoor shower mat, not like the one Steve showed but something perforated. But the issue with either kind is afterwards you have a big dirty shower mat to clean. Too much trouble. I wear water shoes when showering outside. They get a little dirty on the bottoms and I take them off as I'm stepping on to the camping carpet. When they dry out, just rub them together to remove the dried dirt and put them back in the truck. Also, where we generally camp the shower water is absorbed very quickly in the ground, rarely creating puddles or mud. 😎 I also use water shoes in public showers at campgrounds for health concerns.

I was little off on my post last night. It was the length that I left a little extra meat. OK here are the dimensions of the shackles I built. 1/2 thick x 1-1/2 wide x 4-1/4 long. The distance of the centers of the holes is 2-5/8 which is 3/8" longer than origianal. As far as materials, I called Alcan and found out what they used, and then got the closest material from my son at the manufacturing place he works. It was a hot rolled steel is all that I remember. Here is my original post: https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/9996-made-in-usa-leaf-springs/page/23/?&_rid=4210#findComment-113853 My son is a welder for a company that makes the equipment for the wood mills that turn logs into wood products. He has been a great source of materials: hot rolled, cold rolled, Stainless Steel, and Aluminum, and UHMW. We try to find scrap materials first, if not we get new. We pay for the materials and they get bag of smoked Cheese twice a year for their troubles. Cost me about $100 a year in Cheese. Not a bad deal, no cutting charge, and the prices are at their cost.

A friend of ours frequently uses an outdoor shower with his teardrop trailer. He has something similar to this underneath to direct the water away from the trailer, and to keep the shower pan clean. Another simply uses a teak shower mat similar to the ones many of us use inside the trailer. I think I'd prefer the first option, so as to not need to store a wet, dirty platform somewhere onboard. https://a.co/d/06PyWIjw

Nifty solution. I’ve been mooch camping at a relatives out in the country a lot this year and have been working with grey water similarly. I charge the house batteries off the truck, fresh water from a garden hose off the well and since we’re composting it’s just a grey water dump of biodegradable dirty water into a ditch. Super easy and convenient, if we had a black tank toilet it’d be a big problem with lots of long drives to a dump station. Anyhow about an outdoor shower, especially with dispersed camping and such, aren’t you taking a shower in the dirt? We’re camping in a mowed field essentially under a big old oak tree, I’ve got the ground pretty well cleaned up, but I have to be careful with the water hoses and such as any water into the dirt creates a muddy mess. I’m happy with the wet bath and just squeegee and towel dry it down, but an outdoor shower would be a dirty mess unless I had some kind of raised platform. Even then I’m still creating a mudbath around the trailer.

Welcome to the group. Cool name!

@2008RN what are the dimensions of your shackles and what material did you use? Bill