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So true.

Camp pillows that tickled my funny bone...

Make sure that your valves - located near the water pump - are in the "boondocking position" if you want to draw water into you fresh water tank or in the "winterization position" if you just want to draw anti-freeze into your plumbing lines without drawing it into the fresh water tank. Then attach a short length ( 2 to 3 feet) of garden hose to the port located at the rear passenger/curb side of the Oliver. Place the hose into the liquid, go inside and turn on the water pump. This should then draw the liquid into the Ollie. Observe the level of the liquid going down and turn off the water pump when you are drawing air versus liquid. After you are finished drawing the liquid into the Ollie simply put your valves into the "normal position". Bill p.s. if you are unsure what valve position is right for your camper then refer to the Oliver University for a chart that shows the valve configurations for your year/model of camper.

I feel pretty confident that the folks at Oliver would notify owners immediately if there was this type of recall. Mike

In March I reported my Truma water heater failure to NHTSA. Instantly on the call they asked me to identify by Brand/Model/SN the LP Gas Regulator. They said at that time they were tracing down many regulator/parts failures and about to do a big recall. After sharing pictures of our Regulator and Fittings they said our Oliver installed parts aren't the brand/model in their recall. CS

Seriously - a very small amount of wax, silicone, WD-40, petroleum jelly, etc on each of those 4 tabs will go a long way in helping to "snap" the screen back in place. I always place the bottom in first and then tap the top of the screen near where those spring tabs are until it snaps in. Bill

Let me preface this story by making it clear that I am NOT a hunter but I do now understand why we SHOOT deer in the wild... I never liked the taste of venison, too gamey or too wild or too something. So, I had this idea ...that I could rope a deer, put it in a stall, feed it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it. The first step in this adventure was getting a deer. I figured that, since they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at the bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it should not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its head (to calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home. I filled the cattle feeder then hid down at the end with my rope. The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well back. They were not having any of it. After about 20 minutes, my deer showed up-- 3 of them. I picked out a likely looking one, stepped out from the end of the feeder, and threw my rope. The deer just stood there and stared at me. I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a good hold. The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you could tell it was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation. I took a step towards it, it took a step away. I put a little tension on the rope, and then received an education. The first thing that I learned is that, while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you rope it, they are spurred to action when you start pulling on that rope. That deer EXPLODED. The second thing I learned is that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger than a cow or a colt. A cow or a colt in that weight range I could fight down with a rope and with some dignity. A deer-- NO Chance. That thing ran and bucked and twisted and pulled. There was no controlling it and certainly no getting close to it. As it jerked me off my feet and started dragging me across the ground, it occurred to me that having a deer on a rope was not nearly as good an idea as I had originally imagined. The only upside is that they do not have as much stamina as many other animals. A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not nearly as quick to jerk me off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up. It took me a few minutes to realize this, since I was mostly blinded by the blood flowing out of the big gash in my head. At that point, I had lost my taste for corn-fed venison. I just wanted to get that devil creature off the end of that rope. At the time, there was no love at all between me and that deer, but I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging around its neck, it would likely die slow and painfully somewhere. At that moment, I hated the thing, and I would venture a guess that the feeling was mutual. Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had cleverly arrested the deer's momentum by bracing my head against various large rocks as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly enough to recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny amount of responsibility for the situation we were in. I didn't want the deer to have to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in between my truck and the feeder - a little trap I had set before hand...kind of like a squeeze chute. I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could get my rope back. Did you know that deer bite? They do! I never in a million years would have thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when ..... I reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist. Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they just bite you and slide off to then let go. A deer bites you and shakes its head--almost like a pit bull. They bite HARD and it hurts. The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is probably to freeze and draw back slowly. I tried screaming and shaking instead. My method was ineffective. It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for several minutes, but it was likely only several seconds. I, being smarter than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by now), tricked it. While I kept it busy tearing the tendons out of my right arm, I reached up with my left hand and pulled that rope loose. That was when I got my final lesson in deer behavior for the day. Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They rear right up on their back feet and strike right about head and shoulder level, and their hooves are surprisingly sharp... I learned a long time ago that, when an animal -like a horse --strikes at you with their hooves and you can't get away easily, the best thing to do is try to make a loud noise and make an aggressive move towards the animal. This will usually cause them to back down a bit so you can escape. This was not a horse. This was a deer, so obviously, such trickery would not work. In the course of a millisecond, I devised a different strategy. I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and run. The reason I had always been told NOT to try to turn and run from a horse that paws at you is that there is a good chance that it will hit you in the back of the head. Deer may not be so different from horses after all, besides being twice as strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I turned to run, it hit me right in the back of the head and knocked me down. Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down, it does not immediately leave. I suspect it does not recognize that the danger has passed. What they do instead is paw your back and jump up and down on you while you are laying there crying like a little girl and covering your head. I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the deer went away. So now I know why when people go deer hunting they bring a rifle with a scope......to sort of even the odds!! All these events are true, so help me God...An Educated Farmer

Mine did the same thing. It really does go back in easily. However, my son was with me. He's an engineer. He installed it for me. I don't remember how. I have his number. Want it? - lol

NPS put this out on social media, in a humorous attempt to make more people aware of the dangers. Every year, we see reports of folks trying to interact or take selfies with wildlife, with disastrous and sometimes fatal results . None of us, I'm sure.

We're rather partial to silicone, as it doesn't attract and trap dirt as much as many other lubricants. And doesn't smell as bad as wd40

I was also warned not to draw antifreeze into the on-demand waterheater.... and that involves the same valve settings.

Another possibility is that the "roped deer" was just getting even for what some dumb farmer did to him? Or, like ScubaRx says - look at ALL the connections on your tank sensors and power to the display. Bill

Hello Everyone, Finally, I have arrived at my first Harvest Hosts overnight! Diamond A Cattle Co., Pukwana, SD, is a great spot if you are traveling west on I-90. Kudos to my host, Crystal, who met me at the road and led me to her nice, flat pasture. There were two other campers boondocking; however, there was still oodles of room. What an exhausting drive; I counted 11 semi-tractor trailers blown over on their sides due to the storms and ferocious winds between Sioux Falls and Mitchell, SD. I was in a windstorm reminiscent of the Dust Bowl. If Oliver every wants a testimonial for wind-handling performance, that was it! Let's get to the real purpose of this note: TONIGHT'S UPDATE ON STARLINK With my Sheridan, Wyoming trip in mind, yesterday I signed up for Starlink "Portability," even though experience has shown that Dishy works fine in areas other than my local service area. For the extra dollars per month, it just seems to me the safer bet. Besides, Portability itself can be canceled for the months it is not needed. When I arrived at my HH spot tonight, I immediately went to work on Starlink. I set Dishy up on the rear street side and snaked the router cable in through the basement, through the door into the cabin, and then plugged it into the Starlink router. (NOTE: Coating the rubber seal on the router cables with silicone grease makes them much easier to plug and unplug.) I plugged the router power cord into the router and then into the outlet above the bed and within one minute I had my Internet WiFi network running in R-Villa. Running the Starlink speed test: 101 Mbps down, 21 Mbps up Ookla speed test: 123 Mbps down, 26.4 Mbps up Fast enough for all my purposes! The photo shows "Dishy" next to the red Andersen block. You can see the router cable running into the basement door.

The sensors are sonic and read through the tank walls. They are not internal. They are only accurate to about 10%. That said, if the display was completely dark, I would say it was not getting power. I doubt that finishing mowing the yard had anything to do with the miraculous recovery. Unfortunately, I don’t see a correlation with your other two scenarios either. I would begin by searching for where power to the panel might be being interrupted.

Oliver isn’t on the list of affected manufacturers in this article. Scroll down to the bottom of the article for the list of manufacturers & models affected. https://www.rvtravel.com/22000-rvers-told-lp-gas-danger-rvs/

Just a heads up that there will be a total lunar eclipse giving most of North America a good show this weekend.

Update. I did get 3 100 AH BBs and had them installed. I've just returned from the auto parts store where I had the AGMs load tested and one of four tested "bad" and the second of four tested "nearing end of life", the other two were still good. I'll keep the two good ones and use them in another application I have in mind. I watched the entire installation and I have to say, thank you to all who tried to help me understand how to do the swap myself. However, from what I saw, I would NOT have had the hand strength to manipulate those cables ( @Terry McCaffertyI was able to re use the existing cables and my tie-down now looks kind of like yours only black ) AND hold them onto the bolt while tightening the nuts. I most DEFINITELY would not have been able to lift the AGMS out of that tray. The entire process of discovery and completion has been very educational. Having read the Solacity piece among volumes of other material, I now feel that I need to re learn how to read the Solar Controller panel and use the information there differently. I *think* I understand that I need to know much more about the batteries' state of charge but I don't really know how to monitor/track that. More research! Thanks again to all of you

Is Oliver affected by the LP gas fittings recall? A recall was announced affecting 21,000+ RVs on Monday, May 9th. Just wondering.

There's not much info for troubleshooting a blank display. What you did - removing the fuse to cut power and reboot- is about it, and checking connection at the panel and power source. I "think" if you have a loose connection at one of the sensors, you would normally show an error signal instead of digits, not a blank display. (Opn or sht/open or short) A blank display would probably indicate no power, because of a loose connection to the power source , or the panel, or a blown fuse. Or a bad or failing panel. (Or a tiny gremlin inside your panel, tugging at the wire and reseating it while you mowed the lawn, put out the awning, and started up the fridge... 🤣 🧟‍♂️) Outside possibility that your continued punching of the buttons knocked out a tiny bit of corrosion or debris that limited contact, and you'll be just fine in the future... (remember how we used to "fix" touch tone phone buttons that wouldn't work by holding down the hook at the phone, and pushing the buttons repeatedly till they once again made contact?) We actually like our seelevel, enough that we installed the same seelevel system on the boat when we installed new tanks. Among those available, it has great reviews, and many people consider it an upgrade to other cheaper systems, and it was a relatively simple install and calibration. Used to be made in Canada, and probably still is. 15th season with the trailer, and fingers crossed that I didn't gump us by saying we liked the seelevel, and its reliability...

Check the fuse for the tank gauge, the little brass ““ears” that grip the fuse terminals are easily sprung out of position, they are a really soft material. You can carefully squeeze them back together with a mini needle nose pliers. Just don’t short something! Zap! Use the pliers to place the fuse back in straight, do not let it cock sideways or you are back to square 1…. Check all the fuses while you are lying sideways under the dinette table saying bad words. You may find other loose ones. The fuse section of the converter is definitely a low budget item. John Davies Spokane WA

That is correct always bypass the Truma when winterizing. I also bypass the Truma when I sanitize my fresh water tank and plumbing system.

Agree with @Trainman. Most American RVs, and virtually all of their appliances/components, are built to last barely longer than their warranty period. Yes, they do get bounced around a lot, but my truck doesn't need a new radio or navi system every 18 months because it goes down the road. The real problem is us. As long as Americans will keep paying top dollar for a rolling do-it-yourself project, they'll keep making them. I am hoping the Oliver design and construction holds up to our expectations. Bad enough when the gadgets break, much worse when you're dealing with roof leaks, broken spring hangers, and cracked frames.

If the "rail" of the tray glide smoothly in and out - then they should be OK. However, if it was me, I'd put a bit of grease on them just to make sure that they continue to glide smoothly for another 8 years. If you really want to do the job "right" then you'd clean all of the old grease - that would be that nasty looking white/yellow looking stuff - off before I put the new grease on. Bill

The forces on a travel trailer going down the road is like a 6.0 earthquake being towed thru a hurricane. It's little wonder that things rattle loose.

Thank you! Will put this on a list for when I am more resourceful.

Yesterday 4 Bright Way AGM batteries arrived! And the technician will be here on Monday! Getting closer. Somehow I only have 4 of the nuts needed to secure the cables to the batteries, so will see if I can find 4 more today. Still thinking about one question, and would appreciate advice: I wonder if the bearings that the battery tray ride on should be treated in any way, before the battery tray is reinstalled? At the present, they are exactly as they were installed 8 years ago. After all the mishaps I've had this year (even more than I've shared!), I am apprehensive about doing anything. IMG_2395.MOV

Camping hasn't been the same since we stopped camping with a twin sleeping bag in the tent. trainman

Some lessons in life are learned the HARD way.

Good ones, all of them

Seadawg, And Voila! It's working! Showing all tank levels and battery charge level now. Let's see: Since the discovery of this problem, 1. I finished mowing the lawn 2. I put out the awning, and turned on the awning and curb lights to aid packing 3. I turned on the LP to start cooling the frig I checked the SeeLevel. Now I have to figure which one of the above corrected the problem. I'm leaning toward a propane-powered display panel. I'm now not sure if I'm happy it's working, or.... But seriously, I had emptied all three tanks after our last trip a few weeks ago. Are the sensors internal, and at least one needs to sense liquid as a feedback to enable the display? The display was dark after filling fresh water, and was when i checked an hour later. I tried the battery + gray buttons for 5 seconds in case it was a display issue, but got nothing on the display. Next time I'll wait until the next day before asking y’all for help! Unless I smell something burning...

Are you getting no (dark) display, on all the guages on the seelevel?

We have a Rad-mini and a Rad-mini step-thru. We carry ours in our truck bed in a rack under a topper. When we're not camping and going in our Jeep we fold them and put them in the back of the Jeep. We've been very happy with our purchase of the bikes. Cindy

@Nancy K., not games I'm familiar with, but can always learn something new. I've played card games at times to if that's of interest. We're in E38, hope to see you there.

Alberta and Randy, I had the same problem trying to figure out how to reinstall the egress window screen. The screen is mounted outside the widow channel using four metal clips. The clips snap into the edge of the plastic channel. Just hold the screen in place and push until you hear it snap. It took me several frustrating minutes to figure it out.

Put it in as close to the handle as you can and then - once it is in - you can "slide" it into position. Bill

We have the Honda EU 2200i Companion. It is specifically built for campers with a 30amp plug. WORKS GREAT! weight about 55 lbs. I converted our to Propane with Hutch Mountain conversion kit.

When you go to NY, don't miss Watkins Glen. We stayed in the local town park campground. Hiked the Glen early in the morning to avoid crowds.

Congratulations and welcome to the Oliver family. Hope you can narrow down where the hum is coming from. Let us know if there are things the forum can help with. Mike

I learned to sail on Chesapeake Bay - many fond memories. Crab cakes at a little dive in that big town of Suicide, MD after a day on the water🙂. Enjoy your new baby and welcome to the Family! The next time you are backing up your Ollie and thinking that it is a bit of a problem - recall those days trying to dock with a raging wind and terrible current. Land yachting is easier. Bill

It does look lovely. Close to Newland, 30 minutes or so from Banner Elk. We love Banner Elk. Love that they will offer dog walking.

Welcome, and hope you have a great camping season. We are sailors as well. There's a lot of carryover, but obviously, other things are different in a land yacht. When you visit NY, I hope you will find space at Letchworth s p for a few days. It's a beautiful park, and worth several days. (My husband hails from western NY.)

You all are the best! Thanks for the encouragement and help. It will be next week before there will be progress on the solar panel/battery issue. While we wait we find ourselves thinking it might be good to put in a cut off switch between the panels and controller; another part of us thinks it's enough to get things operating again. Many thanks!