mossemi

While technically not cubbies, I did find these little silicone pockets extremely handy on our recent family reunion trip. They stayed in place for 14 days, nearly 3000 miles, 1 COE, 1 NP, 7 SP campgrounds and held a variety of odds and ends. They weren’t cheap at $10 a piece on close out at Bed Bath & Beyond, so I bought one and went home to try it out. I liked it so much that I went back and bought the other 5. So we have 4 white ones in the cabin area and 2 grey ones in the bath. And then I stumbled across a different brand at Kohl’s that holds a beer can and we used it for a bottle of water in the bath to rinse after brushing our teeth. Mike

Thanks for clarifying the WAN feature. It is definitely a piece of Enterprise equipment that requires a high level tech savvy and an IT department for support. I can say with confidence that it cannot boost any WiFi or cellular received signal without an amplifier in front of the antenna ports. The boost you are referring to with WIFi is the result of a better antenna located on the roof not any type of amplification. Using a rubber duck WiFi antenna inside and the outside roof top would give you the best coverage both inside and outside. As far as the cellular goes, moving one antenna 10 to 20 feet up on a mast would be detrimental to the MiMo capabilities. You would be better off with a MiMo antenna on the mast. And don’t worry about 5g, it won’t be anywhere near where you like to camp anytime soon. If they put 5g equipment on the telephone pole outside my house, it would cover about 6 houses. 5g will be deployed at stadiums and around apartment building where there are high concentrations of users. Although KOA's might be a target area. Mike

So 2 antennas support LTE, 2 support WiFi and the 5th supports GPS. That makes sense. I may be wrong, it’s happened before, but I don’t think the WiFi portion is capable of receiving a WiFi signal from another access point, I think it is an access point. I know you said you don’t use it that way, but have you ever tried to connect to another WiFi signal? All of that really doesn’t matter if you aren’t going to use it to connect to, let’s say a Starbucks WiFi while picking up an espresso. I think the LTE modem is the ISP and supplies the internet connection and the WiFi is a wireless router allowing multiple devices to connect to the www. I can’t see the WiFi antenna connections in your picture, I assume they are hidden by the net bookcase and transmit/receive the WiFi signal outside. If you put 1 of the rubber antennas on the router inside, it would be on the good side of the reflectix and improve the WiFi inside the Ollie. Cobra1169 could confirm the details if he was around. Mike

I line up the ball with the coupler when I am hitching up and back up to the point where the coupler would drop onto the ball if I lower the trailer. If I cannot connect the whale tail or the shackles at that point, I raise the coupler enough for me to backup a couple more inches and try again. Generally, if the ball is under the sliding collar with the coupler open, there is enough slack to connect. If my wife is helping, she stops me before I back into my TV, which wouldn’t be cool. If I am by myself, I place a piece of wood on my bumper to protect the TV. When you raise the coupler while connected to the ball, you are effectively reducing the distance between the whale tail and the chain mounting point on the trailer, resulting in the chains having more slack and allowing an easier connection. Doing it without connecting to the ball has the same effect. I would suggest you try it while hitching up, you might be surprised. Mike

The idea behind connecting multiple antennas is diversity. One of the antennas nearly always receives a better signal than the other, so you combine the signal from both antennas, thus improving the received signal. Any newer 4G phone has multiple receive and transmit antennas. That is called MiMo or multiple in/multiple out. Horizontal diversity is much better than vertical diversity because the higher antenna would nearly always receive a stronger signal. That would eliminate the benefit of the second antenna as far as diversity is concerned. So if your 5 way antenna supports WiFi and 4G cellular, what else does it support and how many coax connections does it have?

I think television coax and antennas are rated at 75 OHM and wireless coax and antennas are rated at 50 OHM. If you connect a 50 OHM device to a 75 OHM device or coax, you would create an impedance mismatch which would cause signal loss. Since the idea is to boost a weak wireless signal, you would want all components balanced for the best signal improvement. That being said, the short coax length would be a benefit and possibly not create enough impedance loss to be a problem, but it is a consideration. I don’t think it would be too difficult to replace the television coax with wireless coax. I’m not sure if your Cradlepoint is a WiFi receiver or not, it depends on the model, but I assume it is based on the 5 way antenna. The big signal boost you get with your equipment is the roof mount antenna. If I was going to spend the money to add a wireless booster or router, I would install a wireless antenna and coax cable which I think you did from your description. Although an antenna on JD's flag pole would be an interesting test. Mike

I think television coax and antennas are rated at 75 OHM and wireless coax and antennas are rated at 50 OHM. If you connect a 50 OHM device to a 75 OHM device or coax, you would create an impedance mismatch which would cause signal loss. Since the idea is to boost a weak wireless signal, you would want all components balanced for the best signal improvement. That being said, the short coax length would be a benefit and possibly not create enough impedance loss to be a problem, but it is a consideration. I don’t think it would be too difficult to replace the television coax with wireless coax. I’m not sure if your Cradlepoint is a WiFi receiver or not, it depends on the model, but I assume it is based on the 5 way antenna. The big signal boost you get with your equipment is the roof mount antenna. If I was going to spend the money to add a wireless booster or router, I would install a wireless antenna and coax cable which I think you did from your description. Although an antenna on JD's flag pole would be an interesting test. Mike

I can understand the coupler pulling up the ball and cone a little bit if the locking collar was not released and you were actually lifting the TV with the trailer while trying to create slack in the chains while unhooking. I don’t understand how that could happen while hooking up unless you have actually connected the the coupler and ball and are again lifting the TV with the trailer to create slack in the chains. There is a good video on YouTube showing how to connect a shackle to the Whale Tail plate if one of the chains is long enough to connect and the other is too short. It allows the trailer to pull the Whale Tail straight enough to allow the short chain to be connected. The method best for me is as follows: 1. Chock the wheels on both sides of the trailer 2. Unlatch the coupler 3. Use the front jack to raise the coupler off of the ball and if the chains are still too tight, keep raising the coupler enough to allow the TV to be backed up a couple of inches. 4. The chains should now have enough slack for easy removal of the Whale Tail or the shackles. 5. Level the trailer as you normally do. If you use this procedure to hook up, be sure to leave the chocks in place and raise the rear jacks before lifting the trailer on the front jack. Good luck, Mike

We used both dogs?. Oh well! And the only place I can find a replacement is at eTrailer, although I haven’t talked to OTT about it either. Mike

Drawer Locks There have been quite a few postings about galley drawers opening during travel. I am constantly amazed at the ingenuity and craftsmanship of my fellow forum members. My first drawer management version consisted of small Harbor Freight suction cups and 1/2” PVC pipe. It was a simple fix and worked well, but then I followed topgun2's recommendation to clean the inside of the dog house with the Norton's Duragloss recipe. The inside was clean, shiny and so slick, I couldn’t get the suction cups to stay in place any longer. So we once again had the unexpected open drawer experience during our rally trip this year and the hunt was on for a new solution. This was the product I chose and we will test it on our next trip with fingers crossed. And this is how I mounted them to the cabinet supports and drawers. Edit: The drawer locks worked very well on our last 2900 mile trip. Edit: The link above to Amazon actually takes you to the 8 lb. version of the latch. I used the 5 lb. version and corrected the Amazon link. Mike

After reading your original post about the Mikado and High Sierra products, I thought about adding a diverter after a mixing valve to avoid the hassle you dealt with adding an adapter. It sounds like the direction your going. Good luck and keep us up to date on your progress. Mike

Since my propane detector has gone off twice this morning, sitting in the driveway, I am now wondering if mine that goes off all of the time is the defective one. Or is the ones that have never gone off that are defective. Just thinking out loud. Does anyone have a test procedure for verifying a propane detector functionality that they can share? Mike Mossey

So that's where the half bottle of REJEX I found in our camp site at the Rally came from??. And I thought it was the Norton's that we’re spreading gospel about Duragloss. One of us is losing it and I haven’t spent the last 2 months casting flies in Mountian streams for large mouth bass bait. Mike Mossey

We also suffer from Propane false alarms. I must admit that I have placed a fan near the detector to clear the air on occasion and run the MaxxFan nearly 24/7. The statement about detector location made me search for recommendations and I found the following statement from this website. Propane is heavier than air, accordingly it will sink and accumulate near the floor of any room. Place the Propane detector on the wall 2 feet from the floor, and at least 2 feet from any corner. So maybe the solution is to move the detector. I’ll have to consider that. Mike and Krunch

This is what I use at home to keep peace in the house. I do not know about the one WhatDa recommended, but this one allows me to totally mute the television while listening on my Bose 35's. Mossey

I’m not sure what you are talking about with “ locking collar and springed rings”. edit: I re-read your original post and now understand you reference to springed rings and locking collar, sorry. I do believe the problem is the hose you bought has a 3/8” male quick connect fitting and the Oliver comes with 1/4” female quick connect fittings. Mossey

My Ollie requires a type 250 male quick connect fitting on the accessory hose in order to plug into the type 250 female quick connect fitting mounted on the tongue. For my hose, it does not matter if the gas shutoff lever on the female fitting is on or off. I slide the locking collar toward the inside of the trailer, plug in the hose and slide the collar back toward the outside. Look for a type 250 or 1/4” male quick connect fitting. Mossey

Krunch and I visited this area in our pre-RV days on multiple occasions while staying in cabins and lodges. The Custer, SD area is beautiful even if you don’t like motorcycles and there are usually a lot of them in the area. We really liked Custer SP and if Wind Cave is closed, try Jewel Cave National Monument. It’s a different type of cave and didn’t have an elevator when we visited. There is a mammoth dig site it Hot Springs, SD that we thought was pretty cool in 1996 and I hope it still is. And don’t forget Devils Tower NM. I think Dave and Cindy recently posted about camping there. We really enjoy the town of St. Mary on the eastern side of Glacier NP for the smaller crowds and be sure to stop at the Park Cafe for a meal or a slice of pie. The Many Glacier area of GNP has great hiking is just north of St. Mary and is on the way to Waterton Lakes NP in Canada. Watertown-Glacier International Peace Park was the first of it's kind and any visit to the area should include time for both parks. We have taken the boat ride on Watertown Lake and there is a drop off for the Cript Lake hike. It is a pretty strenuous hike, but worth the effort. Or you can take the boat to the south end of Watertown Lake and exit at the American ranger station and walk back to Watertown Township on the west side of the lake while crossing the International border. There is a loop road through Yellowstone and we like the eastern route and the NE entrance to the park goes through Lamar valley which is great for wildlife viewing. Look for people set up along side of the road with telescopes, looking for bears, wolves and their prey. The Tetons are special and it sounds like Don has a good camping spot there. Safe travels, Mossey

Maybe this post will answer your questions about the Andersen WD hitch. https://olivertraveltrailers.com/topic/hooking-up-and-unhooking-the-anderson/#post-181476 Mike

Thank you for the kind words about the travel trailer I chose for my first “RV”. It is interesting to have such positive comments from someone with the experience you have with Airstreams. And just so you know, there have been a variety of solutions concerning the non-locking drawers from our creative Oliver community. Thank you, ‘Mike

Mike, I didn’t know you had the Zamp Sidewall port until I saw your Timbren SES post which was after I had asked Jeff about his Zamp port. I run the Timbren SES's on my Land Cruiser. I had wondered why there were some many SAE reverse polarity adapters available and now I know. Did you install your own Zamp Sidewall port or did OTT do it? I was going to buy a 25' MC4 to MC4 extension cable and wack about 6' off and splice in an SAE connector and use the cutoff to reach the batteries inside from the Zamp port. I’ll pay attention to the polarity as I go about adding the SAE connector and the Zamp Sidewall port. Thanks for the heads up and since there are so many Mike's on the forum, I should probably switch to, Mossey

This is what I see when I look at your profile. I hope it’s like you left it. Mike

Overland said: Starting a new thread since the other one seems flaky. This is mostly for Mike since I can’t figure out how to send photos via PM. I’ll do a big post on my electrical setup someday, after I’ve redone a few things <b> and added a different hookup for my portable solar.</b> I bought the Renogy 100W suitcase last week on Prime Day. Thanks Mike and JD. And now I need a solar port. I know some people have used the Furrion solar port, Raspy used the CNLINKO and you have the Zamp solar port. And that’s my question, have you changed out your factory Zamp sidewall port? If not have you used it and are you satisfied with it? Thanks, Mike

Thank you for the clarifications. If we decide to follow that path, I’ll reach out for your recommendations. It’s been in the back of my mind for a while and I want a new roof prior to solar panels. The solar option on the Ollie has really been a revelation as to its benefits. We have had two 4 hour outages in the past two weeks and we have discussed a larger generator. I know from my work in wireless communications that fuel is the biggest hurdle during widespread, long term power outages. We also lost power for 7 days after Charley and 4 days with Irma and both hurricanes really devastated fuel supplies, so the solar option is very appealing. Thanks, Mike

Your graph pictures are labeled with Tesla, so I assume you have Tesla panels. Do you also have the Tesla battery wall? I think that’s what they call it. Are you happy with the ROI of your system? My neighbor certainly is happy with his Tesla panels, but last we talked, he was waiting on the batteries or battery wall. Mike