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After 2 years of planning and waiting...I'm all in!!! Hull #259

We like to read or play cards. We were camping in Cody WY area less than 5 years ago on 9/11. Woke up and it had snowed 4 to 6" overnight. That stopped our exploring plans for the day, so we visited the Buffalo Bill Center of the West Museum, spent the complete day there and really enjoyed it. We had not planned to visit the Museum and happy it snowed changing our plans. https://centerofthewest.org/

Just returned home from camping at Stone Mountain SP NC. The weather was perfect for hiking! Widow's Creek Falls: Stone Mountain: View from top of Stone Mountain:

Pure rain water in theory may be non-conductive. I personally would not try it with a live wire. A raindrop would not have to travel too far to pickup enough impurities to be quite conductive. If there is a chance that water might be able to enter a molded on plug through the cord end, which I would think unlikely, I would rub a little silicone adhesive on it. If the plug in end was dry, I would plug it in repeatedly, to shine the contacts. Then I would put some dielectric grease into the openings,(as a major vehicle manufacturer recommended when addressing the 'trailer disconnect' issue). I would change to an openable plug only as a last resort. There are so many more chances of moisture intrusion with them...

We've all been there. That beautiful blue sky turns chunky and grey, or worse. For a mild rainstorm, we crank the awning in to a valance, or all the way in. I don't enjoy tv, so I grab a book and an LED lamp. Paul may watch a movie, or grab a nap. Seems like every time we have tent campers at our NC property, we get some rainstorms. Lots of fun to crowd 8 or 9 people under a sliver of the Ollie awning. Lol. What's your foul weather plan? If it's a long range rain forecast, we just hook up and go. The trailer has wheels for many reasons. Sherry

This morning I looked out and had these lights illuminated on the Oliver. They had came on sometime in the night without a tow vehicle hooked up or other input to make it happen. I looked at the schematic in the owner's manual. No clue there for a source of power except maybe at the plug. We had a long soaking rain fall yesterday. I looked at the plug, nothing obvious for water intrusion. I whacked the plug a couple of times on the trailer frame and the lights went out. For prevention I sprayed some WD40 into the plug to displace the moisture and will keep it covered from now on. Darn plugs can be a problem with moisture and or corrosion.

We have had the Airstream since 2014 and have over 40,000 miles on it just from exploring the US and spending holidays with my family on the east coast. The 4 years of ownership and many miles have given me much time to figure out how to optimize RVing for how our family and uses the RV and our growing/changing needs. If I new then what I know now, I would have purchased a customer upfitted shorter wheelbase 4x4 Mercedes Sprinter that was dialed in to my exact needs and had an Oliver from day one!!! Live and learn.

Great question! My boys were little when we purchased the Airstream in 2014 and we all fit from a sleeping stand point until they became teenagers and are both approaching 6 feet plus tall. This way we have the flexibility to decided based on the current travel senecio what our sleeping/camping needs maybe. If we are just going from Home to a destination (say my parents house) we can take the Airstream with up up to 9 people with a bathroom and a fridge. But if we be needing mobile hotel room while going from Texas to the East Coast, we now have to seperate sleepling accomidations and can sleep up to 5 full size adults with now 2 bathrooms and 2 refrigerators and plenty of storage. If it is just me and the 2 boys and we are going to go camping, fishing, or hunting, I’ll hook the Oliver up to the back of my Ford F-150 Raptor and we are set. For me, I already had the Airstream and I wanted more modular flexibility that the Oliver gives me with longevity and quaility being the key! BTW the Airstream averaged 13 MPG from Oliver Factory in Tennessee back to home in Houston, TX, not to bad. Thanks for asking!

Rideandfly - is that the first Oliver in your pictures above? ScubaRx should know in that he is our historian and was around back then. Bill

There are those times when a rainy day is actually welcome - after a really long hike the day before, after many days on the road, after 5 or 6 straight days of slogging up a mountain stream in search of trout. It gives one a chance to listen to the forest, read that book, watch a movie, listen to books on "tape" (which always leads to a nap or two), clean house/repair "stuff", actually cook a decent meal, etc. However, after one of these days I'm more than ready to get going again - one way or the other! Bill

And the real adventure begins now! Welcome! Bill

Congratulations and Welcome to the family!

Go Truma:) We love ours! Congratulations :)

Looking good. Welcome to the Club.

David has the right idea. But elbows are seldom needed since you can bend the PEX to fit in most situations and end up with a less restrictive and better setup. Straight brass barbed fitting are very useful. I like and trust the brass way more than the plastic. When using PEX, think in PEX and bend it whenever you can. Stainless pinch rings are also very good in place of the copper rings. They are available at Lowes and the tool can be made to fit almost anywhere. If you need to remove one, the ring can be easily removed. Sharkbite is a quick fix, but it's just for emergencies as far as I'm concerned. Then fix it right when you get home.

Now, bring the campfire in and you'll be all set. No need to go outside at all! ????

We were going to do this but the chair kept falling into the hot tub. <grin, sorry>

Where’s Ollie? Ollie went on a trailer caravan trip to Olympic National Park with his cousin Casita! This was a long trip, two weeks. I now define a trip as a long trip if you need to plan a laundromat stop in your itinerary. My sister and her husband live near Bend, OR, and they have a Casita. We met up in Yakima, WA, where we spent a day wine tasting before heading to Coupeville on Whidby Island, where we driveway camped at my other sister’s college roommate's home. I sense that there are a lot of automotive aficionados on this forum. Our hosts are fans of Packard cars, and they have a number of old Packards that they have restored. Ollie and Casita then rode the ferry across Puget Sound to begin their adventure on the Olympic Peninsula. Ollie had to pay the 40-to-50 foot fee for the ferry, while economical Casita got away with the under-40-foot fee. Size does matter! Olympic National Park is truly spectacular! Mountains, rivers, waterfalls, lakes, oceans, rivers, and rain forests! We camped at Lake Crescent, Neah Bay, Hoh Rainforest, Kalaloch Beach, and Lake Quinault. Two nights camping at each location, mostly in National Park campgrounds without hookups. These are rain forests, with a lot of downed trees, and I enjoyed photographing the fungi. I even got black slugs lounging on mushrooms. We ate very well. We bought fresh salmon and black cod from a fisher on the dock at Neah Bay. Susan acceded to my wishes and we tried our authentic Paella recipe on our camp stove. Really delicious! Neah Bay was particularly enjoyable. The Makah tribe has an amazing museum there. The hike out to Cape Flattery is definitely worth doing. Cape Flattery is the northwest-most point in the continental US. It was fun travelling with others, and we each learned a lot from each other’s camping tools and tricks. I think Amazon is going to be busy with deliveries to my sister’s house… We had one major plumbing problem, which I will post in an appropriate thread. I have some questions which I will post later, and I already posted my trick for Cellular Boosters. I will end with some sunset photos: Happy Trails, David

While I do not disagree with any of the above, here is a product that will help keep dirt and rain/snow out of the plug: At about $8.50 it is way expensive for what it is, but it does work. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01AMON6HM/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 I attached a fairly short length of thin elastic cord to mine and when I disconnect from the TV I cap the cord and then place the elastic cord around the front jack. Bill

John is absolutely right in his post above ! His post is the reason that I thought a follow up posting about assembling a simple PEX repair kit was in order.

The tools used above were "field expedient" and worked. However there is no better way to cut PEX than with a tool designed for that, and the sharkbite fitting is immediately ready to apply because the cuts are so clean. Here is a look at a later repair. This is the damaged part removed: Some may notice that the cuts on the ends of the removed PEX section are not exactly perpendicular or at 90* to the pipe. Even though this was in a tight place and cutting the pipe was not exactly straight, the sharkbite fitting still worked flawlessly ! The orange horse shoe shapped plastic tool is for removing the sharkbite fitting, if needed. The PEX cutting tool is readily available on line. Here is a current eBay auction photo where the tool is listed for $8.90. Cost at the time of this entry about $15 for a sharkbite connector and a PEX cutting tool. Now, that's great because they take up little space, add little weight and there will always be mice in campgrounds that are looking for a nice warm home to Winter up in.