Frank C

Best not to put phone numbers or email addresses of people in posts on the forum. There are a lot of scammers/spammers that look at this site searching for personal info. Send that type of information through a direct message to the intended person.

Probably would have been better to break the “KIA as a tow vehicle” suitability discussion off into a new separate topic thread. Right now this new revised thread title has no relationship to the subject of the original post.

Does Oliver have any responsibility or give any input when a new owner shows up on delivery day with an undersized/unsafe tow vehicle? We’ve seen owners towing with unsuitable vehicles, overloaded with respect to towing rating or payload, using a WDH when it’s contraindicated with certain uni-body SUVs, or not using a WDH when they should be, some with no trailer brake controller, etc. Maybe in this case (or the others noted), the trailer was bought used? So no input from Oliver, just from the previous owner?

Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner. Here’s a pic of the Telluride. Notice the roofline above the windshield, and the chrome trim above the door handle on the B pillar. Based on the published specs for the Telluride, it’s a really bad choice for towing an Elite II considering that the empty dry weight of an Elite II with no options at all is 4,900 lbs.

If you’re asking about my installation, the screws just came from Lowe’s as “stainless”, no mention of what grade or type of stainless. And I don’t recall the length, probably 1/2” or 5/8”. The Husky mud flaps are pretty thick, plus the thickness of large diameter stainless flat washers and lock washers (and I used LocTite as well on the threads. I didn’t want the mud flaps coming loose! 🙂). But you are correct, the right length is important to prevent the screw from bottoming out in the aluminum T slot extrusion before it actually clamps down on the mud flap or the frame cross rail.

When we were given our Hull #461, the name “Ocean Boulevard” immediately came to mind. Haven’t gotten around to putting a palm tree decal on the trailer yet though. And I don’t want to call the trailer “Eric” 😂.

What the heck!?!? Are those the original tires on the Ollie? Looks like a chunk of the tire was actually cut away.

My Elite II has 1-1/2” axle spindle nuts.

The voltage number will vary a bit depending on the shore power. Normal AC shore/household power voltage is usually in the range of 110 to 125 volts. AC shore power frequency (the H value) is usually controlled very tightly by power companies and should always read 60 Hertz, so the shore power voltage and frequency are not the problem. It’s odd that the Progressive unit in your trailer is showing E0 (normal/no errors) but your external surge protector at the post is showing a reversed line-neutral problem with the shore power. That reversed line (hot) and neutral wire error should be showing an E1 error on the Progressive display.

What else is showing on the Progressive display besides the E0 (normal, no error) message? Is it showing a voltage, frequency (the H Hertz number), and amp value (the A number)?

We always travel with a full fresh tank as well, so we have water for rest stops on the road, and also to be prepared if the destination campground has water quality or availability problems. I like being prepared, and a well stocked Ollie can provide shelter, food and water for an extended time.

Murphy’s Law always applies! 🙂

Hi Steve, that’s a very loose interpretation of Newton's law. And that example of the extra weight of full tanks only applies in an ideal world with frictionless surfaces. Frictional forces must always be taken into account in the balance of forces with Newton's laws. In that cartoon illustration, the frictional force of the crate sliding on the floor must be accounted for. The crate won't keep sliding on its own. You have to keep pushing, even to maintain a constant speed. And the heavier the crate, the harder you have to push to maintain a constant speed, because the frictional force increases in direct proportion to the weight. In the real world, every extra bit of mass in the trailer and tow vehicle absolutely will require additional energy to move, even at a constant speed on a level road, for several reasons: -Rolling resistance of the tires increases as the downward loading on the tires increases. -Wheel bearing friction, etc. all increase as well as the mass increases. -Even when towing at a constant speed on a level road, a change in direction (making a turn) is a change in velocity vector (which is still an acceleration) that requires more energy as the mass increases. And of course we don’t drive indefinitely on level roads at a constant speed. There are hills, stop lights, etc. that constantly require acceleration, so more mass means more energy needed.

I wanted a very capable but still somewhat compact truck as a tow vehicle so I went in the opposite direction of your thinking. I found an F-250 SuperCab (rear suicide doors) with short (6’-9”) bed. It’s only my wife and me when we travel, and this truck keeps the overall length a bit more reasonable for maneuvering around with the truck, but still has a lot of room in the cab and the bed, and huge towing and payload capacity. The SuperCab has no door pillar between the front and rear doors when the doors are open, so it’s very easy access to the rear seats. We do a lot of day trips with the truck after setting up the camper at the campground, so I wanted something at least a little more “compact” (a relative term when we are talking about a 3/4 ton truck 🙂) to make it easier to get around in downtown areas, parking lots, narrow roads, etc as we do our exploring during the day.

I think the "issue" being raised (and it's a valid issue) is that as Bill is doing his weight calculations and assumed safety margins, he is mixing up towing capacity and payload capacity. They are not the same thing. He has mentioned the towing capacity rating of 7,700 lbs. but then is using that number to calculate how much load he can put IN the truck instead of using the cargo/payload number from the truck door jamb sticker.

The Oliver trailer has no brake controller. The Oliver brakes are controlled by the brake controller on the tow vehicle. Since your tow vehicle has no trailer brake controller, you are basically towing with no functioning trailer brakes. A very unsafe situation, especially in any hilly/mountainous areas. If your vehicle had a trailer brake controller it would look something like this on the dashboard, a digital display with +/- buttons to adjust the trailer braking, and two small squeeze paddles to manually apply the trailer brakes when needed. Just because the tow vehicle has a pin connector on the bumper, that does not automatically mean the tow vehicle has a brake controller

I finally settled on an F-250 as our tow vehicle. The previous two tow vehicles we used (a Ford Expedition with max tow package and then a Nissan Armada) just didn’t have enough payload rating or cargo volume. The F-250 I found is an XLT model, so not luxurious by any means, but it’s not totally stripped of all creature comforts. It’s a basic model with cloth seats, remote start, power windows, power driver seat, but no sunroof, no heated seats, no leather, no nav system (I just use my phone) etc. What it does have (and the main reason I bought it) is 12,600 lbs towing capacity (no WDH required or recommended) and an insanely high (for a “3/4 ton truck”) payload rating of 3,334 lbs., so no concern at all with carrying the weight of driver and passenger(s), the Ollie tongue weight, truck bed liner, truck bed cover, 2 bicycles (on a bike rack over the bed cover), all the camping gear, camp chairs, folding picnic table, tools and road emergency gear, etc. in the bed of the truck. A bit of a stiff/rough ride when not loaded up or towing, but when loaded and pulling the Ollie the ride is great.

Yep, that’s what I use. It’s a good high quality grease.

For a degree or less of side to side leveling I’ll just use the jacks. For any more I use the Lego block style leveling blocks under tires on the low side to get it mostly level and then the jacks to stabilize and fine tune the side to side leveling.

That’s an odd one. I’ve never seen that one before. I always used Interpower as a reference for cord types, but I don’t see one like that. It looks a bit like the Euro IEC 60320 rectangular C19/C20 form factor, but the C19C20 has the two power connections offset to one side, and has a ground. Might be a proprietary one. https://www.interpower.com/cgi-bin/ic.cgi/p65list2.p?w_country=North+America&w_pc=truep:// https://www.interpower.com/ic/designers/in-depth-product-line-information/More-Information-on-IEC-60320-C13-Connectors.html

I never said the welds broke on my jack mounts. I just said I didn’t trust them for lifting the trailer completely because they are small welds and I don’t trust them for lifting ~ 1/2 the trailer weight when I’m working on the trailer. Mine have the steel angle channel brackets. Next time I have the access hatches open I’ll take a picture.

I have the good old fashioned lead acid wet cells. Cheap proven technology, but they are heavy and bulky for the given amp-hour capacity. They’ve worked well in the 4 years since we purchased our Oliver. Minimal maintenance (I check the water level about every 6 months). The 4x12v parallel setup I have only gives about 100 amp-hours usable of capacity to a 50% to 60% state of discharge (not recommended to go lower with lead acid batteries), but it’s worked fine because we typically stay at full hookup campgrounds. No factory solar or inverter on our Ollie. HOWEVER, when they do need replaced I’ll probably upgrade to 2 x 100 amp-hour BattleBorn lithium batteries, just to gain capacity and save the weight, and the BattleBorn batteries claim up to 100% usable depth of discharge as usable capacity

After seeing how tiny the welds are on the rear jack mounting brackets, I don’t trust them for anything other than leveling the trailer at a campsite. I know they are rated for 3,000 lbs each but I still prefer to use a very large heavy duty scissor jack (rated for 3 tons) to raise the trailer for tire and bearing work when I need the trailer completely off the ground. I do use the stabilizer as a backup. Sorry for hijacking the thread again. 🙂

I had a 2016 Ford Expedition as our original tow vehicle, with the same 3.5 liter turbo engine, and had the same problem with a failure of the electronic throttle control. Cruising at highway speed (not while towing), the engine suddenly dropped in RPM and was unresponsive to any movement of the throttle pedal. I was able to get to the shoulder of the road and the engine “rebooted” after shutting off and restarting. I had about 50 miles to home and the problem repeated twice more, but rebooted each time after restarting and I was able to make it home and then drop the vehicle off at the local ford dealer. So the problem didn’t leave me stranded but it could have been bad if it happened while towing. Problems do happen now and then. You just have to prepare for the more common problems that can be dealt with on the road like a flat tire. And hope the other rare problems like computer glitches don’t leave you stranded. We’ve seen Oliver owners stranded just from a flat tire because they didn’t have a decent jack to even handle a flat tire on their trailer while on the road. And it is a good reminder of why you should stay in the right hand lane, unless passing, so you can get to the shoulder quickly if a problem happens, especially when towing. I don’t think the problems are widespread. All my recent vehicles are far more reliable, comfortable and better equipped than anything I owned back in the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s. I owned a 1975 Chevy Nova and like clockwork every 30,000 miles it needed a new water pump, starter motor and wiper motor due to failures, and was completely rusted out by 100,000 miles.

Here’s the instructions from Truma if the unit is stuck in CLEAN mode.