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and, all around the town, we're barraged with gift ideas... With my daughter's help, Paul got me a Dyson v6 car and boat vacuum, to replace the black and decker. Black friday great price, about half. Great little machine... no, its not a surprise, but thats ok. I'm really happy to have a machine that will remove our little dog's hair, that runs on battery. I swear she sheds and grows a new coat monthly...</p> I dont really have much on my list, but thought this might be a place to share ideas? Harvest Hosts is raising its price next year from $49 a year to $79. If you like the idea of camping at vineyards , farms, and museums, for free, consider that gift. If you go in under technomadias fb post, you can save another 4 or 5 $... roughly 600 sites around the country for self contained campers, one night only. One item i use a lot is my tea kettle. Its rusting, but i think my daughter is replacing it. I know i posted it before, but good sam roadside has a great deal for new members. If everything here seems too practical, sorry. Its kind of what we do, at our house... Wants and/or needs? Last year was big for me. I got my new all electric dc truckfridge... plus the microwave cabinet, plus a drawer. All oc which, i love, though the install finished in February... lol. Sherry

Cheap often costs more and most people will save a nickel to lose a dollar. Oliver is about quality. I would never finance one personally, but my mindset differs from many.

I'm happy with the Tri-Metric and think Oliver should offer a monitoring system as a upgrade.

I’m not crazy about the front end, but the interior and features are attractive. As is the base price, though I bet it could get above $100k real quick. Also, I’d be very nervous about going with a new company. Tesla has shown that the key to success is less in the design as it is the manufacturing. I don’t know if it’s time yet for an all electric truck for towing, but certainly it’s far past the time that all the manufacturers offered hybrid versions. A small gas or diesel turbo for cruising with electric boost for acceleration and steep grades should be a killer combination. Of course, I also think it’s past time for powered trailers with independent stability control so that you don’t need a big honkin truck to tow.

Good information in this thread. I use the adjustable unit pictured above with the gauge. I would caution you to not leave the regulator in use or stored in freezing weather. Water gets into the spiral pressure tube, also known as a Bourdon tube. Should it freeze, the Bourdon tube is distorted and the needle is no longer accurate. (Trust me on this - experience) The only other item I'll mention is that I always install the regulator at the valve, protecting the hose. I've seen an overpressured hoses that looked like a snake that had eaten a rat. But, truthfully, I rarely used a regulator nor hook up to city water. I fill my water tank using a filter and operate with the pump 99% of the time. Brad

I am really excited to see that Technomadia (Chris and Cherie) will be hosting part of a new rv series on PBS, The RVers, Loving snd Living. Their segments will focus on RV tech.</p> Though no longer Oliver owners, they're still eorking technical nomads... fulltiming this year on their boat, but also found traveling in their vintage bus. They've provided a lot of people with great info, and their original solar setup for an Elite is still used by a number if people... including us. You'll also be able to watch their segments on Amazon, itunes, and a few other venues. Always generous with their time and knowledge, this is yet another unpaid labor of love for the RV comminity from Technomadia... Technomadia.com Our best wishes to them! Sherry and Paul

Ahh yes - Christmas wish lists. Seems I am fortunate - I only ask for more time to take the Ollie out wandering - and less time working, puttering, and generally just wasting time. But HH and Good Sam, well that's just Lagniappe under the tree... Happy Holidays to all in Oliver land.

That was my thought - you mentioned #720 as current, minus the #300 which leaves somewhere around #420, seems a decent SWAG to start out with. Now I do not know what a recommended minimum tongue weight would be on an Ollie or otherwise. Seems one would want to consider a safe range, just to accommodate casual loading of the interior areas. According to the numerous internet sources it can be somewhere between 7% - 20 % of loaded trailer. For my application 10% of my initial loaded EII is right at +/-600 pounds - more than enough in my mind. I would also wonder what the Oliver's rear frame would handle given its a stout rear frame. I know what I was told by Oliver - but I don't buy it... I've put 300 on mine and it didn't flinch. I didn't measure the tongue weight, but with it loaded at approximately 180 lbs., the Oliver sits level with the truck and tows like a dream - with and without the Anderson. As for the quoted cost for the Gen 3 - I agree, it is steep- must be design, material, labor, and accounting for future warranty costs - that's the answer I got when I questioned prices on several of the options I purchased.... LOL SWAG =- sophisticated wild ass guess -for those wondering... RB

"Are 12V batteries hooked up in series or parallel?" 12 Volt batteries are always hooked up parallel if your intention is to keep the system at 12V.

The capillary wick material can actually help the drainage. The weep holes by themselves can sometimes not drain because of surface tension of the water. And given that the windows are tilted inwards, the tracks won’t drain completely because the outer weep hole is actually a little higher than the bottom inside track surface. A capillary wick material can actually get liquid to flow uphill (just like it does in a wick lantern) to help drain water out of the track. Just have to position the outside end of the wick a bit lower than the end inside the track. As mossemi mentioned, the pipe cleaner works as a pretty good wick as well. I just went a little further and figured I’d try a fiberglass lantern wick material as an experiment, just because I like tinkering. No metal wire to rust. ?

Hopefully I'm not stepping on anyone's copyright toes but I found this over on the Fiberglass RV Forum: http://www.marxrv.com/12volt/12volt.htm http://www.marxrv.com/12volt/12volta.htm Bill

It's awesome to see them succeed. Their site and videos were primary references when we were speccing out our Ollie and our electrical system in particular was largely influenced by their bus setup.

Mark, first off congratulations on your purchase of an oliver, one of the finest rv's made. I'll try to answer some of your questions. On the charging, yes to all of the above,your converter/charger takes over, and when your solar is insufficient you either need ac current from a plug in or generator. On the consumption side, all of your d.c. appliances draw from your batteries when in use, the solar just replenishes the power used and the converter/charger takes over power management when you're plugged in either with shore power or generator. Try not to go below 12.3 volts when your batteries are at rest, that's the 50% level with agm batteries. When the solar is charging the voltage can go as high as 14% but you have to wait until the batteries are at rest to get a true state of charge with the solar controller we have. geO is correct about the battery monitor, however I've done without so far by just monitoring my voltage early in the morning before the sun comes up and starts charging my batteries. It takes a while to figure your usage out without a separate monitor. This method is crude at best but so far so good, you shouldn't need to monitor your batteries when plugged in your converter takes over that task. I would strongly advise doing some research on battery management and inverter usage, there are multiple posts on this subject throughout this forum. Steve

Measure the distance from the centerline of the rack to the centerline of the two axles (D1), then do the same for the hitch (D2). The rest is algebra: rack weight x D1/D2 = reduced tongue weight. To measure the effect of taking the cans off the front, measure that distance to the CL of the axles (D3), divide by D2, and multiply that ratio by the weight of the cans. Add both results together for the total effect of moving the cans and adding the rack. Minimum hitch weight is typically considered 10% of the total. But of course, you're adding considerable yaw inertia by placing a weight on the tail of the trailer. FWIW, I towed with a basket on my bike carrier once this year with a fairly light weight (surely less than 100 lbs including the rack), and if anything felt that it towed a bit better - possibly because I've been towing without a WD hitch. But with such a light weight, I think that was just my imagination looking for something that wasn't there.

I think of battery management being a very important aspect especially when camping off the grid. This link explains the importance of a good battery monitoring system. Manyt have ways of getting by with out them, but if you want to understand exactly what is going on a battery monitor is the best way. http://olivertraveltrailers.com/topic/battery-monitoring/#post-11798

The batteries charge when plugged in, regardless of the amps. The tow vehicle will also charge them, albeit slowly. When plugged in, or on generator, the charge current will outweigh anything being drawn from that current so your batteries are still charging. The charge from solar will vary greatly depending on time of day, year, cloudcover, location, etc., so in poor conditions you can easily use power faster than you can charge from solar. There are a few posts here and there on what you can expect from your solar - I don’t keep track of them though so you’d have to search. Voltage charts vary, but somewhere between 12.1 and 12.5 is generally considered 50% charge. Others here have much more experience with AGMs than me, though, so I’d defer to them.

This is the option from Oliver for the no microwave and cabinet instead on Hull 364 delivered in July. There is a cable fitting on the top of the cabinet and a chord could be run from the microwave replacement cabinet to the upper cabinet that has an outlet.