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Cort: Nancy and I in Boulder City, Nevada will be leaving here and passing through Flagstaff around noon or so. Heading east. If you have not resolved your Leaf Spring problem, as you know I travel with a lot of tools in the event... like yours. Nancy is checking to see if she can find your cell number, but you may have it. Will be towing the 2019 Oliver Elite... so easy to see Off the Grid, as well. Nancy did not have your cell number and have no way to contact you, otherwise. You met our Cattle Dogs and we can figure out if you need help, or not. Once we leave here, we are pretty much Off the Grid. Ray

I have nine (count em!) sets of keys that are necessary to lock/un lock everything! When I get them all together on key ring I look like a high-school janitor! The only ones I actually carry are the truck and the Oliver basement/battery box key. The good thing that happened going thru my key sets is that it made me record the key number for each... you know... in case I lose both sets 🙂 ~Oliver RV Lock (the manual key) ~Basement/Battery door ~Proven Industries tongue lock ~Hitch Pin Lock ~Hitch ball lock ~Bike rack pin lock ~Bike cable lock ~Truck cap lock ~and of course ... the truck lock. 😛

Doughton Park NC on the Blue Ridge Parkway. We head to the BRP to beat the heat this time of year. After the hurricane last year, many areas are still closed, but repairs are being made and areas slowing reopening. No electricity or water at the campsites but Ollie handles it fine with a portable solar panel. Directions to Doughton Park, take Rt. 21 to the BRP to the Park. Doughton Park Picnic Area: Air Bellows Overlook:

Whoa! Over a hundred owners have upgraded....Well, I was surprised to see these small springs underneath this big trailer. They did make it for 6 years and apparently about 20,000 miles (past owner) but it's no fun getting stuck like this. I noticed when I changed the punctured tire that it was closer than usual to the fiberglass. That should have been a clue to look further but I was clueless. If I hadn't found the broken spring on the left I never would have checked the spring on the right rear. I actually didn't check it to see if it was broken or not - I wanted to see what the spring was supposed to look like. Lo and behold, it was broken, and the shock was rubbing against the tire. A big lesson for me. I replaced the shocks a couple of months ago - I NEVER thought to look at the springs. Another learning experience 🙂

Sounds about right for us as well, except the e-bikes have separate keys for each battery with two batteries for each bike🤪. It’s kind of ridiculous! I have lost a full set of keys recently so I’ve changed tactics for “key management”. First off, with keys pads on TV and Oliver like @Patriot, I’ve always kept most of the keys ringed together in a safe location in the truck. Unfortunately this gives you the potential to lose all the keys with one mistake 🤨. The difference now is the keys are still kept safely in the truck, but ringed together in logical groups. Truck and trailer access, bikes, hitching related, and miscellaneous which includes cargo boxes and any other keys that don’t fit the other groups. I only grab the keys needed for whatever occasion, and of course never lay them down while in possession 🤔. The incident mentioned above happened by laying the keys on the bumper while making a hitch adjustment 😩. Some of these keys are very hard to replace because blanks can be very scarce depending on the design. Oh and now there’s a full set of backup keys in a safe location in the Oliver including a second key fob for the truck, and additional backups for everything at home. Not going through that again!!😆

I really thought I was done with this thread, but the engineer in me thought of a new need today, given the current heatwave across the country, currently bothering our trip! Mike @rideadeuce gave me the idea and I was skeptical at first, like driving 8 hours cooling the Oliver while keeping your dogs in the trailer or something. I believed highway speeds would pull any cooling achieved right out of the trailer and down the road, like a boat leaving the wake behind it. On this account, I was wrong. 🤣 For the last of couple weeks on our road trip I have used our Victron inverter to not only run the fridge while driving (LP tanks off of course), but also to power the HWH. For the last few weeks we have arrived at our campsite at 100% SOC, fridge cooled and water hot upon arrival, by running our DC-to-DC and solar chargers running. So today it was to be in the mid 90s for the 3rd day, OMG in northern SD and WY! I turned off the breaker to the HWH and set the thermostat low on our (POS) Dometic P2! Got back in the truck and towed our Oliver 90 minutes to our destination. I still cannot believe the results! In 90 minutes our cabin temp dropped 10F. This usually takes 2-3 hours with the P2 at the campsite after connected to shore power. The only explanation I could think of is that while driving at highway speeds the A/C condenser gets cooled much more efficiently. We used 216Ah in this short 90 min out of our 600Ah total (36%). It was totally worth it! We arrived at camp at 4PM with a COOL cabin. Those of you who run an inverter and study your inverter and battery apps, check out and spend a bit of time with these screen-prints. You can see that outside it was 93F when we started at 2:30PM and 94F by 4 PM (Ruuvi sensors), while the interior temp dropped from 85F to 75F. Get me one of those inverter A/C units and we can likely do this using 100Ah! No, you cannot run it all day with dogs onboard. 🤣

I’ve been able to narrow a similar list of keys down by using locks made by Pac Locks. They make a replacement Puc lock for the proven industries tongue lock, hitch pin locks, cam locks, and of course various pad locks for bikes and stuff. The beauty is that they can all be keyed alike so only one key is needed for all of them. I discovered Pac Locks through the “Lock Picking Lawyer’s” You Tube channel. He can pick most other locks in seconds, and Pac Lock is one of the few locks he recommends. Cheers, Geoff https://youtu.be/7eOt2mHEAOM?si=L-qhIZCfPWqQFOXa

Ray, you and Nancy are awesome! Hey if I was not 1000 miles from home, I would have loaded the truck with tools and my replacement parts, 90 min out and @Cort would have been on the road in hours. Your positive attitude, and those of others here, are what makes us Oliver owners a strong community. I used to belong to car clubs where we had a national directory, including phone numbers like you mentioned. I’ve had to make that call broken down on the road and others had called me. Had the correct OEM starter motor sitting on the shelf when one member called in need. That’s just great! 😂

I agree if the road is port to starboard level. I have repeatedly made the distinction between the 15% and 85% group. WHY? The 15% group are far more likely to "duck walk" their trailer. This is hard on the springs and shackles. But worse is when you transverse an area where the trailer and TV are on a steep side-slope. Doing so causes a LOT more weight to be transferred to the downslope side of the axle. Doing so twists the spring pack and racks the shackle. Now the springs and shackles pick up not say 1500 pounds, but likely many more hundreds of pounds extra load and worse the torque between the frame and axle moment. This is when you really qualify as a 15%er and need those Alcan 5 spring packs. I than asked the question how many of our owners actually transverse gullies sideways, duck walk, or travel on side-slopes as part of their joy with an OE2? My guess is 15%. The rest of us may boondock and use graded fire roads. But we would not want the harsher ride of the super duty shackles/spring setup. However, IMHO the 15%ers would benefit greatly by the stronger more torsion resistant heavy duty 5 pack suspension. And Cord is very likely a 15%er! GJ

Corrosive conditions for storage and/or use certainly will accelerate the failure of such under-sprung springs. The corrosive agents (Road chemicals and ocean salt) exposure would exasperate the corrosion at the grain boundaries resulting in even more earlier failure for sure. As such I too believe that corrosive conditions are a contributing causative factor in early failures. Especially so for metal that is over stressed or under designed. We have established that OE2 Dexter 1750 springs (11 pounds) are "Under-Sprung" for full time loaded duty of our 6,000 pound class trailers. They just are not enough spring for the job. Hence overloading, over heating, and over flexure occurs thereby killing them young. Dependent upon the owners use, the Dexter PR4 and the Alcan's (4 or 5 leaf) all have enough steel to provided an expected 20+ year life. The PR4B springs clearly do not. Regardless of how we use our trailers (15% group/85% group), I anticipate that all OE2 owners with the Dexter PR4B (1,750 rated, 11 Pound) springs will experience flattening. and if ignored will fail. Replacement of these springs on our OE2's is inevitable. It is just a matter of when and where. Hence inspection of them often and thinking ahead and choosing a time and convenient place to upgrade is just smart. We collectively on this forum have documented that well over 100 owners have upgraded their springs at a single vendor. Plus at least another 20 others who went a different direction for their spring upgrades. And the numbers continue to increase as time passes. These failures clearly validate that there is a problem fleet wise with these springs. Moderators: As such, it would be a wonderful public service for OTT to put out a Service Notice about how to inspect these springs and at what point they recommend upgrading to a heavier spring. GJ.

I have a similar set of keys on my RV key ring. One morning I left it on the bumper after hitching up and drove away, using my Truck keyring. Retracing my steps I found what was left of them in the road, run over by a hundred cars. Surprisingly the only ones beyond repair were the ring itself (pretzel), the key fob to my bicycle alarm (completely disintegrated), the round hitch pin key, and the trailer door key. Fortunately I had spares for the hitch and door.

In the recent thread, "2 broken leaf springs / shocks" the discussion of Alcan springs came up again. Then I realized we would travel right through Grand Junction CO on our way home, so it got me thinking. Is now the right time to upgrade? So, I called Alcan yesterday and thought I would be connected to Lew, the name I read on our forum many times, but instead talked to Tim who was fully versed in Oliver needs. We talked about the leaf springs and upgrading to 5200 lb axles. I cannot see doing one without the other. I sure wish they had run out of 3500 axles, like some others, when they built our hull! The 5200 axles and Alcan springs would allow carrying more weight. I don't see much in other limiting factors, the wheels, tires, frame and steel sub-frame should all handle more weight. Not that we would ever carry much more weight being at about 6500 lbs today, but nothing wrong with over-engineering overall strength. My only worry about new axles are the mixed reviews on the Nev-R-Lube bearings. I want 5200 lb axles to have 12" vs" 10" drum brakes. This is a big deal/difference for mountain towing. I was contemplating having them do the work, biting the bullet on this large $$$$ ticket item, but in the end I got off the hook! Alcan stocks the Dexter 50.5" 5200 lb axles but not the older 50" model that only a couple of us have. Tim put a set of 5-leaf Alcan springs on hold for me including their HD shackles and new wet-bolts. I will hold off on new u-bolts until I purchase new axles. The Alcan leafs will like sit on the shelf in my shed for a while. Our original leafs are still in like new condition, not a spot of corrosion and nicely arced. I also have a new pair of leaf springs and new u-bolts under the tool box of our TV, with the necessary tools, for any roadside emergency. I'll spend close to $1,000 next week and then another $2,000+ at the time we purchase new axles...

3. Although our Elite II entry door is keyed (because keypad durability got poor reviews on this forum), we still have just three: (1) our Tundra key; (2) the key to the Oliver and (3) the key to the locking topper/canopy on the Tundra. How? Anticipating the "high school janitor" issue highlighted here, the locks for our drawbar receiver, the two locks that secure our trailer coupler when the Tundra is disconnected, and even for the cable that secures the Power Watchdog to the campground power post, are 4-digit "keyless" combination locks, all set to the same combination. https://www.extremeterrain.com/trimax-locks-bronco-1-2-inch-resettable-combination-receiver-lock-mag125.html?utm_content=XT Towing - Hitches|Trimax Locks&T5_Var4=FB37443&utm_campaign=XT+General+No+Vehicle+High+LTVMiddle&dialogtech=ppc&utm_source=google-pla&utm_medium=shopping&T5_Var2=shopping&gclsrc=aw.ds&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=1059055562&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIq_ebhu-CjgMV4IbuAR0dFy0QEAQYAyABEgJKqvD_BwE https://www.amazon.com/HQPASFY-Trailer-Combination-Coupler-Couplers/dp/B0CYCDC2QW?source=ps-sl-shoppingads-lpcontext&ref_=fplfs&smid=AIEVNSJ0YNP6V&gQT=1&th=1 https://www.amazon.com/Antivanl-Trailer-Bulldog-Couplers-Stainless/dp/B0CYLK7KLG/ref=asc_df_B0CYLK7KLG?mcid=682ffb9c894037ad9156a29340e8450b&hvocijid=2600007127687710942-B0CYLK7KLG-&hvexpln=73&tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=721245378154&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=2600007127687710942&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=2840&hvtargid=pla-2281435177578&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/NBYT-Combined-Suitable-lockers-wardrobes/dp/B0BX5DK8D7/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.JQVu21JT9tdq19P6TSFQQbcJAj1qCKfMOjBmTWWMuRmwQbuA7vgjJuNyKu4JZIgyITuPS1QSYT5D5C84sZPsoOwEbbBWWl7hVg764V_pkNNtXqJ13DQm0pXR-uB1WuywIj2jvleQQrmKw0x9JyNrhxLT5HC5ifxWRcair5wSlSVuHX5m9yai9khKqqw9EbEHgNShetAFnfWILTHMfDZD5sIo1YiYro-l1FnavFs00BPCx_tmHbJYvD6dYJgcrQ_Q8V0Z-F0-uCq-oNY5-Wd6pkGitATB5ms3kU_SChgXbjk.8nf1pFQiE4e-riSPYwqc_UnZDpHcl-eORn-jMdmUsx0&dib_tag=se&keywords=combination%2Bcable%2Block&qid=1750521430&sr=8-1-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9hdGY&th=1

We always have a complete set of duplicate keys with us. 😎 “Two is one and one is none”. 🫡 🇺🇸 I can honestly say 5 years in and thousands of miles of travel, fortunately, we have never have lost or misplaced our keys.

Great looking rig Bill! Nothing like our NC Blue Ridge Mtns! Blessed to live here!

I believe the 5200 pound axles are a great upgrade. When I need a brake job, I plan on doing mine. But their springs need to be upgraded as well. I understand that some "Lucky" owners have the bigger axles (YEA! for them). BUT they have the 1750# springs. In no way I can think of would they NOT have the same spring issue as all the 3500 # axles. So inspections are in order for them as well.

Thanks Ray - good to hear from you. Left you a message. (My phone is 202 341 7536). I haven't started to work on it yet. Probably tomorrow I will try to get the old spring off and take it to the shop to get some new ones. Whether or not we meet up, happy travels to you and Nancy and the dogs. (I have two new ones :))

Yes, that's what I'm planning to do - replace the two broken springs and get back on the road - and at some point upgrade.

8 ~Oliver Door Lock ~Basement/Battery door ~Master tongue lock ~Bike rack locks (all keyed alike ~2 Bicycle keys ~Cable lock across tongue box ~Toyota key But at camp, I only carry the door lock key, and while travelling, just the door key and the Toyota key. I have two duplicate sets stashed, because I once arrived at camp with just the door key. So I spent four days without unhooking from the truck, leveling, dumping, or external power...

Also John if you tow either nose down or nose up (instead of level as possible) you will transfer extra weight to either the front or rear axle. Most of the time when I unhitch at home, the trailer will remain in that position until I reconnect. That puts extra weight on the rear axle for however long. I now level the trailer after unhitching. Of course while camping typically the nose is up a little to aid waste tank draining. I’m not totally sure but it does seem like there are a lot of broken springs on rear axles. We are actually on our (slow meandering) way to Grand Junction to replace the (humble opinion) undersized axles and the weak springs. Two less things to worry about. “On our way home” we’re stopping in Elkhart Indiana to have an Atmos 4.4 installed. There are bearing noises that I don’t like on occasion and I have to climb on the roof to oil the fan motor. Had to do that in 100+ deg heat last summer at Gilbert Ray campground. Not fond of doing that and the frequency is increasing. Time for a change. Okay three less things to worry about.

John yes they switched to the 5200lb axels, however they stuck with the 3500 pound 4-Leaf spring packs that have always accompanied the 3500 pound axles. Edit: ....and from THIS post by @Geronimo John, a tech from Dexter stated that the stock 1750lbs rated 4-leaf springs are under specification for a 6,000# RV trailer that is always loaded. On our 2023 the 4-leaf springs are already showing signs of flattening, so I agree with the Dexter tech that the stock 1750lbs 4-leaf OEM springs are under rated for our LE IIs, unless maybe for those weekend warriors that will just go to their local campground.

FYI for @DaveK and @Patriot, when you receive the dehumidifier from Amazon, take it out of the box and set it upright on the counter and let it rest unplugged for 24 hours before you turn it on the first time. Like all refrigeration based appliances, if it’s turned on it’s side during shipping, it must be allowed to set in the upright position for 24 hours to make sure the liquified freon and the oils inside drain back to where they normally are during normal operation. This of course applies any time the unit is allowed to lay on its side or upside down. It will certainly be handled like any other package during shipping so don’t forget to perform this procedure to safeguard the internal systems. 👍

Yet another "update" Matt Duncan kindly went into his old office at Oliver today and took the photo (below) of all the remaining Oliver hull plaques that have never been claimed. If you own one of these Olivers, please contact me in order to organize a way to get your plaque to you. We are still investigating a way to get older hull number plaques via Oliver's normal ordering process (and other avenues), but, I believe that this will take some time (i.e. early Fall at the earliest). Bill

I'm not familiar with trailer shops around Flagstaff, but unless you have backup parts the first thing is you need to source the correct replacement leaf spring. I would call every trailer shop around Flag to see if they have the correct leaf spring. I bought the following parts, 2 springs and a u-bolt kit so I could fully replace springs on one axle, left and right, on the road if this were to happen to us. Drive slowly and carefully if you only replace the broken spring on one side as the other will become the weak link. Very sorry for your predicament! I believe the part number SW4B is all you need to order. I ordered these from SW Wheel which you can see online for reference: SW4B-BR TruRyde® 4 Leaf 25 1/4" Double Eye Trailer Leaf Spring Bronze Bushings 1750 lbs APUBR3BX Southwest Wheel® U-Bolt Kit for 5,200-7,000 lbs. 3" Trailer Axle - APUBR3BX I have read on this forum that eTrailer will overnight these parts. Perhaps SW Wheel would as well. Get on the phone asap! As far as the shock, just remove it. They are unnecessary for travel. You can install 4 new shocks when you install 4 new upgraded leaf springs. Also, re-using U-bolts is not suggested. But I would if I was replacing just one leaf to get home or to a safe place to park the trailer. Hope this helps! Best wishes, JD

Here's some stock Tundra HP/Torque differences. 2006 Tundra 4.7L: 271HP@ 5400RPM 313 FT/LBS @ 3400RPM 2020 Tundra 5.7L: 381HP @ 5600RPM 401FT/LBs torque @ 3600RPM 2022 Tundra 3.4L twin turbo/non-hybrid: 389HP @ 5200 RPM 479 FT/LBS @ 2400 RPM I have not towed with the 4.7L engine, it has lower HP/Torque compared to the two later Tundra engines. The 5.7L and 3.4L Tundra towed Ollie fine for us. https://www.autopadre.com/horsepower-and-torque/toyota-tundra

I took a small square of "clear" packing tape and placed it on the inside of the windshield. Then an appropriate size of double sided tape (3M) with one side of the tape applied to the camera and the other side to the tape. In case you're wondering what the packing tape is for - it is much easier to remove this packing tape than it is to remove the double sided 3M stuff. The camera has now been in the same place for two years without a hint of a problem. Bill p.s. from the "high" position on the windshield it was easy to route the hard wiring into the head liner, over to the "A" pillar and down to the interior fuse box. All that is visible is about 1 inch of the main power wire and about 1 inch of the wire back to the rear facing camera.

Wow, some good ol’ Ollies there!

I have the Xantrex XC 3000 as shown in pics and 2 LifeBlue 200 AH Batteries. Here is with AC Compressor running and the lower wattage is compressor cycled off and fan running. It will drop down to near 500 watts as it cycles. It starts up around 200 watts and ramps up to 720 and settles in a few seconds just under 700 watts on start.

I believe OTT welded the axles saddles (not sure of correct term?) +/- 1/4 to the steel subframe (welded to inside or outside edge of the frame). It's just as crazy that OTT did this as the fact that Dexter would have both 50" and 50.5" axles in their catalog!

According to the list above, it appears that only Chris' hull #110 and our hull #113 have 3500 lb axles measuring 50". As soon we get on pavement, off the dirt and gravel in our travels, I'm going to measure again to be certain. Though I'll likely just confirm what I measured when this thread started months ago. I talked to Alcan yesterday and they only stock the 50.5" 5200 lb axles for their Oliver customers. The rep was not aware of the 50" since they had not run across it in all the many Oliver customers they have served and most customers have purchased/installed leaf springs only. GJ, hulls under 100 where built 10+ years ago. Did you confirm Dexter still makes/stocks these? Do you have a part number? Another Q: Would it be that much of an issue mounting the 50.5" axle to replace the 50"? Tires would be 1/4" further out on each side. Is there anything else? It looks like an extra 1/4" width would fit well enough under the fiberglass wheel well. From the beginning of this thread, I was surprised the manufacture would actually build two axel models only a 1/2 difference. Who made that business decision? Not good planning.

I would like to see this too. The specs for that unit call for cooling input power of 850 ~ 1500W so I'm guessing the compressor was operating at the lower end of it's capacity with the low watts he was seeing. Don't see how it's possible to get 13500 BTU's from 500-700 watts but I'd love to be wrong on that! The EER rating would need to be the the 20 range for that low of a watt draw.

I should have added, that the decision to go from 3500 axels to 5200 axels is a personal choice. Some owners have found out from Oliver that switch can't be made. While the springs breaking have mostly been on older trailers, 2021 and older, I'm sure the 4-leaf spring will continue to have issues. Dexter supplies most of the RV industry with their suspension system. Oliver could instruct Dexter to install 5-leaf springs. This would be a better option than the 4-leaf, but not close to the Alcan 5-leaf springs. I have our springs and shocks checked professionally, every 3,000 miles, when my Zerks are greased. With our 2022, am I playing Russian Roulette? That is a really good question. Many of you might say yes, but I think I'm watching things carefully. At some point, I will make the switch to Alcan, and schedule a day to get it done in Grand junction. Switching to Alcan, or other choices, are personal choices we all have to make.

Let me keep it simple too many 😂. Key pads on both my TV and XPLOR are game changers.

Could you let us know what model inverter, Ah LiFePO4 and if possible could you show your app pic showing the -A draw with the compressor running? Also btw, quieter than the Dometic P2 is a lot like stating, “lighter than an elephant!” I know it’s near impossible to measure sound volume, forget the bad apps that attempt to do so. 🤣 Like @CRM I’m leaning towards the inverter A/C vs. some of the others. Running longer on batteries to me is more important than whisper quiet now, if it’s amply quiet enough. Thank you so much for posting this!

The heavier duty the better...:)

You can carefully compress the rolled edges of the female spade connector using needle nose pliers to create a tighter fit onto the male spade. Try doing this in-place while connected, if room allows, to prevent over compressing. Otherwise, disconnect and gently squeeze the rolled edges for a tighter fit. Alternatively, replace the female spade connector either by crimping on a new one or splicing a short section of terminated wire with the proper fitting.

I replaced two springs on the same axle at a campground after one broke and the other was failing. Took 4 hrs using the onboard rear “stabilizers” and a bottle jack. Found a pair of springs at a local rv shop. Once I made it home I replaced all four with Alcan 5-leafs and never looked back. 10,000+ trouble-free miles on the Alcans. It can be done if you have the tools. PM me and I am happy to talk you thru the process.

A rocky road is a reason to tear the sidewall of a tire. Leaf springs need to handle the weight of the trailer regardless of conditions. Hitting an uneven bridge seam or RR tracks on a 65 MPH highway is a lot more stress on springs and shocks than the bumpiest road traveling <20 MPH. No excuses for these lame Dexter leaf springs!

Oh my goodness, so sorry that you had to experience 2 leaf spring failures and a shock, that's just terrible! I know you're out of warranty, but Oliver should be made aware of this, way too many stock leaf spring failures on our Ollies! @Mike and Carol and @jd1923 gave you some good advise, hopefully you will be back on the road soon! Please advise where this is so I can avoid it in my travels?

We really enjoy our time there! No, we are in Devil's Canyon National Forest, Utah. We have to place our spot in the "top 5" for our past 5 years of full-timing. A little hot during the day but you can't beat the night time temps :) Have fun out there and stay cool

Wow, sorry to see this happen. Other’s have had similar experiences so maybe they can advise. Once you get this sorted out a trip up to Grand Junction, CO to get a set of ALCAN springs installed might be worth the trip. Good luck, I hope this gets resolved quickly. Mike

We just got back from our Albuquerque trip and it was our first outing with real highway miles, about 1000 miles roundtrip over the last 12 days. We are now getting BETTER performance with our Orion XS 50A DC-DC charger. I have seen charge rates often at 45-47A and once 48A was observed! Check out these pics. As soon as I read total charge of 58A (see 57.74A on right side) from the shunt reading, I switch to the Orion reading asap and it was at 46A (46.1A on left). The fridge was on DC but likely not pulling amps at the time, so the Blue Sky charger with 320W rooftop was supplying the extra 12A. We were at 59% SOC (of 600Ah) when leaving after two nights and was up to 82% when we arrived at our next camp. A 58A charge rate is likely the best case scenario, but no more worries about battery SOC%. You gotta get one of these!

Day two, 244 miles in under 4 hours, mostly on I-40 at 70+ MPH. SOC increased from 56% to 82% (26%) or 156 Ah. Tonight and last night we ran our Emeril Air Fryer for 20-30 minutes (too windy to cook outside), fridge on DC most of the time which brought 600Ah down to 56% (fridge on DC overnight SOC would have been about 50%). Today on the road we charged 40Ah per hour. Yesterday it was near 42Ah. Likely 40Ah gained per hour is something I can count on with the Orion XS 50A DC-DC charger as I have it wired. If you drive a long day (7.5 hours with engine running) you can charge a full 300Ah! That and 720W solar, I'm thinking we no longer need 30A hookups. Very nice not to need to plug in. Carrying 35-gal extra water in the TV and it's only time between dump stations that bring us back to civilization, that's amazing. 😂

JD, running your fridge on dc and only 175 miles worth of charging... I'd say you're doing quite well! We've only used our charger twice since seeing you in Quartzsite. And we boondock more and more often. I do take advantage of solar with my portable and I'm happy to have the dc to dc charger as a backup for extended cloudy days...thankful I installed it for that reason :) Congrats on your successful project! It's sooooo nice to not worry about battery usage with the lithiums and having another backup plan through the charger! Happy Trails, John

First highway test today. Left home today and drove 175 miles to Holbrook AZ. We went mainly state highways, drive-time of 3:10 hours, an average of 55 MPH. We started at 59% SOC (600 Ah total) since we had started the fridge on DC about 40 hours before departure. Just after we arrived we had 81% SOC. That's +132Ah in charge or 41.7Ah per hour charge rate. However, the Orion on the Victron app never got above 38A and was more often running at 35A. This means the Blue Sky SC and 320W solar was supplying the DC power to run the fridge and net close to +7Ah. This is so cool! Tomorrow we will arrive in Albuquerque and since it is about 240 miles I'm thinking will be pretty close to 100% SOC. I'm never going to worry about our batteries when we have a half day or more on the road again!

We have the ROVE Dashcam, front and back. I can connect to my phone Wi-Fi and there are very clear front and rear pictures. Extra safety, including preventing scams.

After 3 days out boondocking, I tested the Orion XS 50A DC-DC Charger while driving 90 minutes to return home. SOC increased from 57% to 66% (9% of 600Ah). Ahs gained were 53.8Ah (271.8 - 218.0) or 36Ah per hour (pic1). I'm assuming the 10-12A generated from the solar charger covers the fridge on DC and +2A for our Inverter on standby, etc. It was a mostly sunny day with some haze. We started back on 20 miles of dirt roads, some washboard, then 20 miles paved roads. Our speed ranged from 10 to 50 MPH. I would consider it more equivalent to suburban driving, certainly not highway driving. The highest output charge rate observed was 47.8A early but most of the time it sat somewhere in the 30s. Battery voltage started at 13.10V and 13.35V ninety minutes later. Highest output charge voltage was 13.7V (pic2), even though it was configured up to 14.2V in the setup. I have an accurate voltage gauge in the truck measuring voltage at the starter batteries. With any amount of fuel pedal, it will most often read 14.2V. After I connect the DC-DC charger this reading drops to 13.8, then 13.7 and back and forth. Let's call it 13.75V. The difference between this and the input voltage of 13.1V (on Orion charge screen) shows a 0.65V voltage drop (TV batteries to input side of charger). This is likely normal for the length 65' of 4 AWG copper wire and 16' of the TV frame. That's all I got for now. In 3 weeks we are heading to Albuquerque and with some boondocking on the way home. It should be about 1,000 miles total. The real test will be in June, 4,000 miles in a big loop from AZ to MN and back! This is sure a great investment at $540 parts plus a day of labor.

Last test for now... What if when boondocking, far from hook-ups and other campers, you're needing A/C on a HOT afternoon, and your batteries getting low? You could start and connect the tow vehicle to the DC-DC charger. Diesels can idle forever using little fuel. The truck alternator via the Orion charger could supplement inverted power to the A/C for some period of time. The approx. +40A noted before at idle should offset the AH used by the A/C system. These readings (pic1) show this to be true, +39A were being supplemented by the charger at this point in time - nice! Also notice, the Time Remaining stat increased from 2 1/2 hours to 4 hours given the lower AH usage. I will eventually install an A/C that uses much less power than the Dometic PII. That's all folks.

Next is the tow vehicle side installation. The Ram Cummins and most diesels have dual batteries. I chose to connect to the RHS battery since there are less connections, because its proximity to the alternator, and because I wanted a straight run down the frame to the RHS of the rear bumper. Looking ahead, last year I installed a custom Nations 180A HD alternator. OEM rating on our truck is 130A, thus gaining 50A for charging ampacity! Starting at the battery, I ran the B+ cable along the fender rail to keep it away from the heat of the exhaust manifold and entered the main frame member just behind the engine. Conveniently, there are two holes in the frame just behind the front wheel (pic1). The RH opening is where it comes from the engine and the LH is where it continues all the way to the rear wheel. I had 100’ of 1/2" automotive loom from a past project which made for a clean installation! I removed the RR wheel for ease of access in running the cable. It took a couple of wire ties to get up and over the rear wheel-well but mostly the 4 AWG cable just lies nicely inside the frame beam, very well protected. I decided it should come out below the rear bumper yet above the trailer hitch. The Anderson SB175 connectors are huge (pic2). A full inch or more of bare wire is required inside each pole connector, so I crimped each in two places. There are a series of holes across the bottom of the rear bumper. I used the two holes closest to the center, fabricated and simple bracket to hold the heavy environmental boot in place (pic3). This worked out great as you can push in and pull out the trailer side connection with one hand and it does not budge! So, I have the trailer harness connection on the left and the DC-DC cables on the right (pic4). It looks clean, nice and balanced. Many on this forum and elsewhere believe you need both B+ and B- 4 AWG (minimum) wire running all the way end-to-end! This is certainly true for the B+ cable. For the B- cable, I merely ran a 2 ft length from the Anderson coupler grounded to the rear frame. I believe an 8” section of steel frame will produce less electrical resistance than 4 AWG copper and testing showed this to be either true or “good enough!” I ran another short 4 AWG ground wire from the B- battery terminal to the front of the same frame member. Last step was to connect the B+ charger cable and reconnect the battery terminals. I used another 60A MRBF for the main run (pic5). I also ran short cable from the B+ terminal to the alternator (for redundancy, this connects the charger B+ to both the alternator and batteries with new 4 AWG copper). I’ve never seen anybody take these extra steps, but I believe it will provide better charging performance. You’re running 4 AWG everywhere else, but OEM cables from battery to alternator are usually only 6 or 8 AWG and solid grounds are often an automotive issue. BTW, OTT only installs one 6 AWG ground wire for everything running on DC! I added a second 6 AWG ground cable from the negative bus in line to the batteries in a previous upgrade. This should work great, I really liked how it turned out. I measured carefully and purchased only 65 ft of black 4 AWG wire (not bad for wiring an extended cab long bed pickup truck tow vehicle)! I used all of it, and every run has slack on both ends and the trailer side connector is 6” longer than the standard hitch coupler cable. I ran thorough testing today and I'm getting 40A charging output with the Cummins diesel running at idle! Yes, engine running at idle. I captured pictures of all the Victron Connect screens showing Orion and Smart Shunt data. I'm getting rather tired tonight, so to do this reporting justice I'll get all my data together and add another post tomorrow. As I opened my thread above, "this charger setup is awesome!"

Thanks for sharing this info. Very interesting. I recently saw a video from some financial guy who said... If you're going to buy a boat or RV, just think of it as putting the money in a big pile and setting it on fire. And for many RV's I would agree. Nice to see that Oliver owners are not in that category. That being said.... As far as Donna is concerned, we will be making our LE2 (hull #145) a true Legacy and leave it to our son after we are gone. When you add up purchase price, maintenance, upgrades, etc. there is a whole bunch of money we won't be getting back, BUT... Just owning our trailer is a joy. And, now that we are both retired and have a new TV, we'll be looking forward to more trips. Happy Camping Everyone! Scotty