Mike and Carol

We don’t use any chemicals. After a dump, we drop in a detergent pod (usually Arm and Hammer, but whatever is cheap) and a capful of Calgon water softener. When we get home I use Happy Campers in addition while it is stored. Google “Geo Method”, it’s worked well for us for 5+ years. Sherry is right, we can usually find the liquid Calgon at Walmart, but when we can’t Amazon will get it to us in a couple of days.

I’ve been reading about some significant challenges getting through Canada over on AirForums. Hopefully that situation is resolved before your trip.

We picked up our Elite II with a Tacoma. It had the TRD Supercharger, so power was decent. The problem we ran into was two fold: first, the gas tank isn’t very big and gas mileage was poor. I was looking for a gas station every 150 to 200 miles. Second, payload weight was marginal and the bed was small, so we had to be selective on what we loaded. I upgraded to a Ram 1500 with the 5.7L V8 and got better gas mileage than the Tacoma. I recently upgraded to a Ram 2500 with the 6.7L Cummins and my gas mileage has improved even more, plus there are no issues with the amount of cargo I load.

Hey Swamp, welcome! Anxious to see photos and hear tales about your future Oliver travels! Mike

Ours is Dometic also.

Can you say “contrasting style”? Fun to watch.

I tried once to move my ball manually too, with a breaker bar. Nope, wouldn’t budge. Did some research and that is the anti-sway at work. You shouldn’t be able to move it, but a 5-6,000 lb trailer can.

I think the SMEV in our trailer is the same as yours. Works well for us.

We’ve been using ours for 5 years. Travel with it on the floor. No problem yet. It’s good to know their customer service is responsive. Mike

We have a small Vornado heater that’s now 5 years old. It is small, very quiet and has 3 settings, 750W, 1150W and 1500W. We rarely need to use the highest setting. Our’s isn’t digital, but they do make models with a digital readout. Check Amazon.

This is worth watching!

Raspy sold his Oliver a couple of years ago and is now in a Black Series HQ19. He’s not on the forum much, you could PM him and he’ll check out your post. Mike

We’re heading out in a few weeks for KY, TN, AL and AR. We’re going to do some Bourbon trail touring. We’ll be home a few weeks in June the will be in Colorado the month of July. Our COVID shots are done as well. As far as I’m concerned we’re back to normal. Mike

Hey Dewey, welcome! We’ve been able to fit our trailer into some pretty tight spots, so you will open up a bunch of camping as you know from your 18’ experience. Lots of question answerers and opinion givers here! Mike

His No Bo (Forest River No Boundaries) isn’t a toy hauler, it’s got a queen bed and two bunks (his kids are 5 and 8). It’s under 4K pounds so should be easy to tow with his PW. The picture is the trailer being delivered from Houston a few days ago. This is the only truck picture he’s sent me. He’s in Durango.

My son just bought a 2021 Ram 2500 Power Wagon with the trailer back up feature. He also just bought a 19’ No Bo travel trailer, first time owner, so I know he’ll be using that feature. He’s taking it out this weekend so I’ll be asking for a full report. Mike

It’s great to see all these ideas. For us, the black tank is our limiting factor when dry camping. The composting toilet wasn’t available when we ordered, I guess I could swap out. I just wish Oliver would use a larger capacity black tank.

When we were doing my lithium upgrade and rewiring we noticed the mounting board for my inverter had come lose at the bottom. Epoxied and braced, now all is well. Mike

at the non-rally

Exactly!

This is not an Oliver rally sponsored by the company, but a lot of rallies are organized by trailer owners. We are saying this is a non-rally, but it really is a rally based on the number of folks attending. I don’t think we need an agenda, but I’m sure there will be get togethers and informal events. Based on the age of most of us, I’m sure the majority will be vaccinated. We’ll be outside mostly, so risk is low.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both. It would be nice not to have to deal with black water, the composting toilet was not available when our trailer was built. A composting toilet can have its own set of issues. We don’t use any chemicals, a detergent pod and a capful of Calgon water softener. Check out Geo Method, it has worked well for us the past 5 years. I’m a fan of on demand hot water. That’s all we had when we lived in Europe for 12 years. They are more complicated and can be more expensive to repair. Our 6 gallon hot water heater has performed flawlessly. I’ve replaced the anode once and the on/off switch once. We’ve never run out of hot water. If I was mainly a boondocker I would have a composting toilet installed. Our limiting factor for camping with no hook ups is the capacity of the black tank. We frequently camp in W/E only campgrounds and have to take a couple of hours after 5 days or so to go dump and then return. It can be a pain in the... black tank. Mike

That’s what was demonstrated to me as well. I raised the tongue, watching the hitch at the truck receiver. It never took more than and inch or so after that for the chains to be loose enough to pull the pin and drop the whale tail. I never had the ball pop out. I retired my Andersen in December. Mike

I’m not sure why folks are loosening/tightening chains each time they hook up and unhook. They method I was shown by Oliver, 5 years ago, was to put the trailer on the ball, then raise the ball and truck a few inches which puts slack in the chains, then attach the triangle plate to the hitch, lower and go. When disconnecting, you first raise the hitch until there is adequate slack in the chains, disconnect the triangle plate, lower a bit, then open the bulldog. Once I had my chains adjusted I never touched them again.... for years. Is this not the preferred method anymore? I did make it a habit to check the extender links and the shackles on the triangle plate to ensure they were tight. Mike

Glad you’re enjoying your Ollie! It’s a great way to get he kids out and into nature. Mike