Roger

@Steve MorrisI have adopted this mod and really like it. When you store the filter do you do anything special so that it is ready to use for the next trip?

When I bought my F350 I got the trailer TPMS monitoring system. So far, I have been very happy with it. Unfortunately, the Ford TPMS cannot monitor the spares. The nice thing about the Ford TPMS is there is no sensor to have to fool with when I manually check tire pressures and I don't have another device cluttering my cab. My practice with spare tires is to keep them inflated to the maximum allowed for the tire and then lower the pressure to the correct pressure when I use the spare. I also carry an inflator so in the worst case I can add air to the spare. I think I will add checking the spare tire pressure to my travel checklist, although it is a hassle to check the pressure on the Oliver spare. When I got my new truck, I lowered the spare and flipped it around (Ford has the spare with the valve up from the factory) so that I could check the pressure with it mounted under the bed.

Is that The Trailer or the trailer. I have owned 4 Volvos over the years but my wife knows when I refer to The Volvo it is my 1975 244GL Volvo that I sold years ago.

We decided to call ours Kimba, as in "Kimba the White Lion" from the Japanese manga series. No reason other than the trailer was white and that is what we kept thinking of every time we talked about our Oliver.

I know I have said this before, but I think everyone should get out their jack and practice changing a tire on their trailer as well as the tow vehicle. You can check everything works as well as to learn where the jack points are etc. I once had a utility trailer that got a flat and when I went to change the tire learned the truck jack was not tall enough to jack up the trailer. When my children got their driver's licenses I sat in a chair in the driveway and watched them change a tire on the car. Very entertaining. I have jacked up my Oliver several times, both at home and alongside the road but I have never used the stabilizer jacks when doing so. It is time to hit all the zerks with some grease and I will try out the stabilizer jacks when I do the job.

The few times when I have watched something while camping it has been on my tablet either streaming or downloaded before the trip. This doesn't limit me to sitting inside and I can watch/listen in front of the fire outside. Generally, I like to be able to listen to the night sounds in the background and enjoy the fire. Using ear buds keeps me from bothering anyone else if I'm not alone.

I find that I don't use the television and have been thinking about removing it altogether. I am wondering how many people have removed the television and travel without it.

If I remember correctly, the one we heard about on our tour had been side swiped in Texas. We were told that the owners then towed it to Hohenwald for repairs.

Back when I used the Andersen WTH, I placed my cables below the whale tail. That was where Oliver put them when they setup my truck on pickup and it seemed the natural place to put them there.

When I did my factory tour before buying my Oliver, they had an Elite II that had flipped and was being repaired. They told me the owners had towed it to Oliver for the repairs.

Thanks for the comment. I have Little Giant ladders so they hopefully will work.

I too don't like heights and ladders anymore. That looks like a very good setup. Since I already have a couple of ladders I will have to look into this setup.

E25, Roger, Roger, Georgia, "Kimba", 1023

After doing some more research I have learned that it is not the working load that matters for the safety chains but the breaking strength which I believe is usually 1/3 of the working load. I found a chart for RVIA that lists safety chain requirements by state. Generally, it appears that when a state has a strength requirement it must be at least the GVWR of the trailer. The only data I could find from the Federal Government related to commercial applications. For commercial applications the rules state the combined breaking strength of the safety chains must equal the weight of the towed vehicle. Based on the above it sounds like my chains are ok since (assuming the shackles are the weakest link) have a combined breaking strength of 6T.

I was looking at my safety chains and noticed they appear to be seriously undersized for my camper. The shackles holding the chains to the camper have a WLL of 1T. Since the trailer has a gross weight of 7,000 lbs. this seems to be seriously under-sized. The chain does not have a rating I can see but it also appears to be under-sized. I am worried now that the safety chains will fail if they are called upon. Has anyone up-graded their safety chains or had any issue?