Overland

My suggestion, either as a DIY or to pass along to Oliver, would be to glue and screw a piece of good quality dense plywood (veneer or marine grade) to the existing HDPE sheet, using plenty of marine adhesive caulk and the longest stainless screws that will work without piercing the fiberglass. I’d use at least eight screws and countersink them. I would think that should be sufficient. That assumes of course that the HDPE is strongly affixed to the hull. It should be, but I think the other recent failure was the board itself coming off.

Has Oliver always mounted these suspended on the side wall? These things are heavy - I don’t think I’d do that except with plywood as the mounting surface. Regardless, this is the second failure in a very short period. You guys will forgive at least one snide comment: we have so much knowledge and so many good examples of these systems upgraded correctly here on the forum and jeez sometimes it seems like Oliver ignores them all as a matter of policy.

I'd much rather a bracket fail than the fiberglass it's attached to. I've never heard of an awning completely detaching itself, but perhaps one has. I believe that the brackets that attach the arms to the case are what fail in wind. So you just get an awning that's folded over the top of the trailer without damage to either Oliver's brackets or the hull. I think that the bracket design changed when Oliver switched to legless awnings. Perhaps they were concerned that the constant flex of the unsupported awning would eventually fatigue the brackets.

I'd think the light itself would be the last thing to check, though who knows. Since it's LED, I'd think it wold be on or off and not flickering. Those bus bars are the surely the prime candidate for the symptoms you're describing. Oliver uses stiff solid wire, that will stay in place in the bus bar even if its hold down is completely unscrewed. But of course once you're underway, the vibration will reveal the loose connection.

They should loosen up after some use, though you may have gotten some dust in them.

We replaced our Duralast batteries on delivery, but I just checked and one of them is still holding the garage storage room door tightly shut. So, that's at least three years of useful life. Hoping to get at least two more.

I had some Cooper Discoverer AT's on a different vehicle and thought they performed really well, especially in the mud. Not nearly as tough of a tire as the KO2s, so probably not as good with rocks, but still a very good tire. They got a little noisy after 20k or so.

Supposedly they lost the moulds. I agree it was a great option. We almost ordered it.

Not a VPN, but it acts like a really strong ad blocker - doesn't reveal anything to web sites, accept cookies, keep track of history, etc.

Since it's Safari, I'm going to guess that the problem is either a content blocker or private browsing. I just tried logging in with a private window and got the same email, but no issue with a regular window.

Don’t know, strong competition from this version -

Man, I feel like I've made some version of that post 50 times. Probably have. I need a new schtick.

We've done three of the 'classic' overland trails since we've gotten our Ollie, and driven each keeping the trailer in mind and whether we could have taken it. The answer in all three cases was mostly no, but never would the suspension have been the limiting factor. On the White Rim Trail, tougher tires would have been needed, but that's irrelevant since the trailer is too long - you'd never make the switchbacks. El Camino del Diablo - tires on the lava section, but the real limits are width and sand. It can also be super muddy at the wrong time of year. That's probably the most borderline trail you could do. If you went slow, did some recon, took good sand mats and an extra spare, and are OK buffing out scratches from palo verde, I think you could do it. Actually portions of that "trail" are a joke (as are the videos of people acting like it's some huge three-day adventure). It was a 4-hour trip for us, though granted we were flying - the border patrol keep some sections super wide and smooth as glass. On the Mojave Trail, the limit is sand, and lots of it in some sections, or mud on the lake bed, if it's rained. I think there's a really steep section, too, that we never found. All the other trails that we went down in Mojave are sandy, but not 4WD sandy; so, easily done with an Ollie in tow, if you're just looking to camp out in the nowhere. And even the Mojave Trail, if it's dry and you want to take your Ollie out on the playa for some instagram photos, no issue. Bring a dog. Playa, trailer, labrador - Instagram? Instagold! Kill me. And I've been on other bad trails and never once has outright clearance been the concern. Even with smaller tires, the trailer has better clearance than most trucks. And if it's bumpy, you just go slower. I think these big suspensions on some trailers is little more than eye candy for offroad nerds. That's not to say that the trailer couldn't benefit from a somewhat softer suspension, which of course requires some additional clearance. But that's a tradeoff, since the softer the ride, the less stable the trailer becomes on the highway. Perhaps a combination of a softer suspension with a few more inches of clearance, plus an anti sway bar, would be the right solution. But, I personally don't see that as a special 'overland' package or anything. I think that it would benefit every trailer and is just something that Oliver should fix. And they should do it in an Oliver way, which would be practical and functional rather than just looking so. All that applies to the Elite 2. If you've got an Elite 1, flip the axle, put on some AT tires, and go. Take pictures. Just don't get mad at me when you get the bill for airlifting your Ollie off a switchback.

I think it's just typical business hours, M-F 9-5

newly washed Ollie

I thot snowball was the overland edition.

right next door

I bet you guys really enjoyed O Brother Where art Thou. But if you watched it and thought wow this is a great movie but perhaps better with a hallucinogen of some sort, then this is a song for you:

performed in space

I agree these are great systems. The RAM version seems to work identically to the one on my F150. I think the F250's work the same now as well, but at least originally they had a different setup where you used the steering wheel but the display showed you the trailer path. A combination of the two would be ideal. I'm sure that GM will have something similar eventually, but until they do, I think the Ford and Ram should really be the go to tow vehicles, certainly for anyone without previous trailer experience. It does take a little practice to get a feel for how much to crank the little knob, and in my case, get over the desire to just crank it all the way, straighten up, crank it again, etc. Now I've gotten pretty good at getting that perfect curve with just some minor adjustment. We live in an old neighborhood with narrow little streets. To get the trailer in the driveway, I have to do a 90° turn into a 10' driveway, with a tree on one side and people parked on both sides of the street. Without backup assist, I'd have spent the last 3 ½ years trying to make that maneuver.

I actually prefer Kansas to Oklahoma. Mainly because I've never found a good place to stop for the night in either OK or that top part of Texas, whatever you call that. I've always called it West Oklahoma. In Kansas, you've got the COE campground at Tuttle, and you can stay there and go eat dinner at Harry's in Manhattan, which is a pretty nice place. College town. I have no music to add to that. But here's something. Dizzy Gillespie tune, but I've been looking for the origin of this specific version for years. The only recording I have is ripped off this video, so if anyone can figure out exactly where this recording comes from, I will make you a cocktail at the next rally.

That's a good deal - looks like it's essentially the Grand Canyon Table but at almost a third the price.

🤔...songs about driving through Kansas. Yeah I have one. Also good for Oklahoma.

Careful what you ask for - I have something for every request. Since you put Bond in quotes, here are a few from my playlist of Songs that Weren't Bond Themes, but Could Have Been:

Maybe, but at this rate I do expect that by 2025 the manual will just state that the "trailer" is not intended for actual use. I'm hoping that this was just an editing error, even though I agree that tank water are bad.