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After a lot of research, I recently ordered and received this Xtend and Climb Pro Series telescopic ladder and the silicone protective top rung cover. This ladder will travel with our Ollie. My initial impressions are it’s a very robust ladder. It’s hefty weighing in at 32lbs, very little flex and has a 300# weight limit. The reviews overall are solid. The silicone protective rung cover may work better than pool noodles when laying the ladder top rung on the Ollies gelcoat. I plan on detailing our Ollie using this ladder in the next few days and will post up a review and feed back on how it functions. Just a little info if your looking for a travel ladder. Happy Camping! A few pics -

In case you want to know: Evolution of the American RV Bill

The kitchen and bath countertops on mine were held in place with epoxy. Trust me, I know, since I cut through them. The other three use Velcro.

I'd say 10' or 12' to actually get on the roof. I've used both to get on the roof with no issues at home. I do carry an 8.5' version of this ladder in the Ollie closet while on trips: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B082V77HJY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o08_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1. I really like it because it's small, lightweight and has a one button push to close. The 8.5' is fine to climb up and inspect things primarily - you can get on the roof with it if necessary although getting back down is the "challenging" part although not bad on the awning/curb side.

Just received four new Bright Way Group batteries (EVGC-220A-AM) this week for my 2015 E2. They are made in China. I initially thought Taiwan but the actual box says "Made in China". These have the exact foot print as the Trojan T-105. They fit into the tray - just as tight as the Trojans. I wish I had a bit more room due to the battery strap shackle resting tight against the battery. The shackle left an indentation in my old Trojans but did not break the case.

I looked at the RVR9 as well. The Trax X2 looked much more stable to me. Wider base and bigger tracks. I had never considered that they might have sold their design to Trailer Valet, but I did ponder the possibility of a patent quarrel.

We live about 25 miles away from there. Don't get to Elkhart much except when passing through on the way to one of our state parks. We will have to check this out.

I have pulled my Elite II with our 4wd Ram 1500 with no problems when we first got it, but the weight factor is where you could have a problem. Most half ton pickups pretty much max out at 500 lbs. tongue weight, so for insurance and safety reasons you need the Anderson hitch to put you in the safe range. Yes, you could have an accident and if it went to court you could loose the case and your insurance could deny paying the claim because you over loaded your tow vehicle beyond the manufactures ratings. It takes a 3/4 ton pickup for an Oliver Elite II to be within the safety range for towing said vehicle. trainman

Since the fibergranite is produced in-house, it would be fairly simple to just keep the "additive materials" applicable to each different color. Then if/when a customer needs a retired color it would be fairly simple to used the appropriate color for that "one off". As I understand it - these materials are dry. Therefore, the shelf life should be reasonable. Bill

TxT - Yes, actually both Steve and JD are correct here in that once these fiberglass "fibergranite" panels are made they are held into their respective positions via Velcro. However, there is no Velcro used in the construction of these panels. Bill

Kevin, Let me rephrase that...more of a wash and waxing 😄. I will post up a review. It’s a tad on the heavy side at 30 lbs.

We will be picking up our Elite l the first week of June and I am preparing a home for it. We live in the city, and like Chukarhunter I need to access my yard through a narrow alley. I need to get the Ollie up a 4% slope of grass to the concrete pad where it will live. I have done extensive research on powered dollies. I even looked into aircraft tugs. I am about to pull the trigger on a Trax TX6000 Power Dolly. The manufacturer says that it behaves very well with Bulldog hitches, unlike some of the other dollies. I actually saw someone successfully using it with a Bulldog in a video, evidence that the factory rep was not just "telling me what I wanted to hear". There are several vids out there. Looks like it does well on level grass. Real well on concrete. Watched a guy push his big ole silver SOB up a moderately sloped driveway with no issues at all. The TX6000 also has an integrated brake system with a 7-pin connector so it will activate your trailer brakes when you stop it. This is a important feature to anyone who is dealing with an incline. What a horror it would be to have your Ollie get away from you and smash into something. https://traxdolly.com/product/tx6000-power-dolly/ The Parkit360 was in the running until I contacted the manufacturer and they told me that their unit does not play well with the Bulldog hitch. For the grass incline up to the concrete pad (about 10'-0") I am going to use permeable pavers to provide increased traction for the power dolly. Not sure if I will use gravel or grass with the permeable pavers. I am thinking that grass would look nicer but may be harder to maintain. Sure, I could mow over it, but when the power dolly tires dig through it to get traction on the pavers it will leave unsightly tracks. IDK... gravel, wood chips, I'll figure out something. https://www.truegridpaver.com/ I found one other solution. It is the one that I really wanted, but they are currently out of production. Check out the Trax X2. It is a 350 lb. radio controlled tank with a hitch connection. You could take the hitch post off and mount a chair on it. What fun! The manufacturer was not forthcoming about why they quit making them. I suspect that they only made a few and discovered that they were cost prohibitive for most. Too much investment up front to have them sitting in stock. https://youtu.be/urDkzQKwAhE

I did not know about the rung cover. I've got a different model (CS125+/300) but this same rung cover fits my model also - thanks for the post! I'll be getting one of those covers for sure

David, Like the idea of the silicone protective top rung cover. 👍

We also need a ladder but haven't chosen one yet. If you're going to be detailing your Ollie you'll be standing on it for a while. Looking forward to your review!

So I am glad I got into 2021 as I see they made fiber granite standard and increased price. I am just not a fan of the look. I got standard interior and saved the $$ and working with Foy Sperring on custom dinette top to be the show piece of interior. Many like fiber granite though just not my taste. I was also convinced I wanted truma and composting toilet. I passed on both. I will never full time and after a lot of research truma just wasn’t needed to start. I also decided to try standard toilet first. One way or other you deal with waste and I just wasn’t sold on composting and it is expensive option to be on the fence about.

Looking forward to your visit! Lots of decisions to make, many more than when we ordered. I do think it is important to consider individual camping styles to match options to. Since you aren’t first time buyers you know what your style is.... Mike

They won't work on gravel. Or grass. Imo. We used to put plywood down on grass. Even then, it was very iffy. You might be better off with a front hitch on your TV.

On my EI there are Lifelines. Took delivery yesterday.

Congratulations on the new Ollie. For the issue of the AC fan coming on when the furnace is on, that sounds like you have the fan setting on the thermostat in the wrong mode. Check your manual on how to set the fan to “AUTO” mode.

Disc brakes with larger axles on the 2022’s might be a factor.

Moonlight Mile Amazing for sure

Finally finished having all 5 of my "new" (11/20 Ollie) tires balanced. The first one took 3.25 oz as I mentioned in a previous post and that one was the worst. The other tires required the following: 1.25 oz, 1 oz, 1.75 oz, and 3 oz. All in all not too bad given the size/weight of the tires. I think this indicates pretty high quality rims and tires being used by OTT. Now I hope OTT added "make sure tires / wheels are balanced" to the quality checklist so future owners don't have to go through the hassle of getting it done post-delivery. 🙂

I chimed in on the topic of transporting bikes on the rear of the trailer last year. My Background/expertise comes from being an executive at Yakima Products for 20 years. I'm impress with some of these creative and eloquent solutions. I simply want to voice to proceed with an abundance of caution when engineering bike soultions that attached to the rear bumper of any trailer. As I stated before, the forces at the rear of a trailer are magnitudes greater than at the hitch of your tow vehicle. The axle of your trailer is a giant fulcrum/pivot point and the rear of your trailer is the launching point. There are very few products designed to withstand the forces generated at the rear of a trailer. At this time Yakima only makes two hitch mounts that are approved for use on the rear of a trailer. LongHaul - https://yakima.com/products/longhaul?_ga=2.263397708.1569403010.1602517930-2113444950.1601489236 RoadTrip - https://yakima.com/products/roadtrip?_ga=2.263397708.1569403010.1602517930-2113444950.1601489236 This means that none of the other 50+ bike racks made by Yakima are approved or designed to be used on the rear of a trailer. I would go as far to say that most of the bike systems being used on the rear of trailers are not rated for the dynamic forces being exerted on them. The majority of these bike systems are being miss-used and are at risk of a catastrophic failure. I have never spoken to the folks at Oliver but I trust you should not exceed the recommended load limits specified by the factory. In my early years at Yakima, I always felt that engineers were way too conservative resulting in not being able to make product to carry loads in ways that seemed fine to me. This was based on my own extensive experience using our products. It was the classic conflict between the marketing team and the engineering team. Fast forward many years and one of my roles was being responsible for all the warranty and customer service activities. At the time we fielded in the range of 500,000 calls per year. Every Monday morning after our customers spent the weekend transporting their toys, the phone lines were jammed with every situation you could imagine about gear that had fallen off and hit the road or got scrapped off from a low overhang or what ever. 98% + of the gear that found its-self on the road was due to consumer installation errors, miss use and overloading. My point: your personal experience and general judgment of what will work should not exceed the engineering guidelines. You can get away with exceeding these guidelines for a long time until that one compression, bump or off road water bar will get you. Now that catastrophic failure is happing to you. All you need to do is spend one day listening to the Monday morning calls coming into Yakima. The call starts with, "I was just driving down the road and my rack and bikes came off my car and were run over by the car behind me". After, learning more about what actually happened, 98% of the time, the products were WAY OVERLOADED or MISS-USED in some way. The final story I will leave you with is when I was driving north on California highway 101 earlier this summer. The road is rough and curves through the giant redwoods. I came around a sharp curve and came upon four bikes that were attached to an entire fifth-wheel ladder laying in the middle of the road. About a mile ahead was the first safe place to pull off the road. At this point was an enormous fifth-wheel trailer with holes ripped out of the back of the trailer where the ladder was once attached. You see bikes on fifth-wheel trailer ladders all the time. It's one thing for a 250 pound person to climb that ladder when the trailer is not moving. Its another to load that ladder with a 100 pounds of bikes that are getting tossed and flung around mile after mile after mile.