rideandfly

David, Thanks! Looking forward to towing Ollie with a F350. Busy ordering stuff to "Farkle" the Super Duty right now. Motorcycle term "Farkle" https://ridermagazine.com/2017/02/01/what-the-heck-is-a-farkle/ Bill

Just bought a new 2024 F350XL Super Cab 6.8L gas V8 (MiniZilla) with 3.73 rear differential, got $12,000 of MSRP. I have towed Ollie with three different 1/2 ton trucks that did a good job for us. We decided move to a larger tow vehicle with a 8' bed. We camp light with one of the lightest LE2's here, have to admit Ollie's ready to camp weight will increase a little with the new TV. The larger pickup bed size will be for extra bulky stuff that's hard to pack in the previous 5 1/2' pickup bed when boondocking. One hurdle to overcome was fitting this truck in our garage with a garage door that's 81" high. The way this F350 is set up from Ford it's 79.1" tall. The length was another issue, but at 254.4" long, there's plenty of room to park it in the garage and still have room to work at the workbench behind the truck. The payload is 4058 pounds. Looking forward to towing Ollie with the F350 in the mountains out west. Got about 19.5MPG probably downhill one way (most folks get lower) on the 30 mile trip home from the dealership with the F350 around 65MPH on the highway. Used to get 22 to 23MPG with the F150 5.0L on the highway under 70MPH. Averaged 14MPG towing Ollie with the F150 5.0 at 60MPH, will see how the F350 does on roundtrips after 1,000 mile break-in unloaded and towing. I have driven F250s, F350s, F600s in the past, the new F350 is not as soft of a ride as the F150 unloaded, but the ride is fine for us.

Wow, what a beautiful campsite with a beautiful Ollie Rig!!!!

You did get me on the click bait! Nice quality work!

Hope the video helps. Watch the video to the end before starting.

Have you seen this video?

Fine looking Group! Looks like a great place to be camping, too! Hope everyone has a fine time!!!!

Sorry to hear this. We have not had the pleasure to visit there, but hope to in the future.

Thanks for the Mini info! Looking forward to seeing the report on three Ollies in Arizona!

Mike please forgive me for going off topic. We will buy the router, too. Question, setting the TV resolution at 720P, will that reduce TV outage time when the Mini is offline for a few seconds then back on again? Probably like most folks here, some places we go there is no cell service or antenna TV reception.

Mike, We had a very small hole in the tree canopy, really surprised me that we could receive signal, but we did! 🙂 Really like the Mini!!!!!

Camped at Davidson River NF Campground NC, We had a campsite with electricity. The campsite was shady with enough of an opening for the Starlink Mini to work fine. Blue Ridge Parkway was not too far away. There are a couple waterfalls on RT 276, not too far from the campground, Looking Glass Falls (old photo)

Another way, disconnected the wire connected to the Aux 12V power pin in the trailer’s plug in Mike’s 7 pin diagram. The wire connected to the Aux 12V power pin on my Ollie was black, but highly recommend testing with a Volt meter to be sure it’s the 12V hot before disconnecting. I used electrical tape to prevent hot wire from contacting other pins or if you have heat shrink, it makes a nice job.

Thanks, this is another plus for Alcan over Dexter springs. When I installed the Dexter EZ-Flex system on Ollie several years ago, I did not like how delicate the Dexter bronze bushings were in the springs.

Question, are the Alcan wet pin bronze bushings (assume bronze) thicker (larger OD) than the Dexter bronze bushings? The Dexter bronze bushings are so delicate, during installation in the springs, it was easy to damage them. I may have missed this point in this thread. Installing the bronze bushing on a Dexter 5 leaf spring coated with castor oil:

Mike, Good to hear you and your family are OK. We have been following this tragic storm aftermath closely. So sad to hear about this after our recent hurricane in NC. One of the charities we like are normally on the ground quickly in disaster situations like this one. Will do on the thoughts and prayers for everyone in the area.

Agree, I'm keeping the Metaltech in the airplane hangar with Ollie and the Vagabond to keep them out of the weather. To transport it used a trailer to keep it in one piece. I had it in the garage for a while with a table underneath, Debbie did not have any trouble with it, but when I put things on the table occasionally bumped my head, glad I'm hardheaded. 🙃 That's what I like about this forum, for folks that may be buying a scaffold, this lets them know real life application of a product, good or bad. Bottom line working off of a scaffold on Ollie is great for increased safety, ease and faster than working off of a ladder. 🙂

Best it's ever looked in the 9 years we have owned it. Agree, ladders no more!

This is the photo where I got the idea to buy the identical scaffold from Home Depot while on sale, thanks to you and @Ronbrink. I have some other jobs in mind for the scaffold, but have to admit, our Ollie is very purdy after after waxing, probably the best it's ever looked since buying it used in 2016.

David, Very Nice setup! The Little Giant fits perfectly in the "XPLOR" hangar. I just used a scaffold for the first time waxing the top of Ollie down to the top of the windows, it was so much safer, easier and faster than hanging off of a ladder.

Happy 4th of July to Everyone Here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We are spending our time waxing Ollie in the shade today! Like the scaffold folks here mentioned, bought it on sale at Home Depot and working great!

Like always, appreciate the information!

The Timbren system is low cost and easy to install, but it's sometimes tricky to have air gap between the Timbren rubber blocks when Ollie is not connected (see my previous post on first page). If the bed is loaded when camping and Ollie is disconnected, it's still possible for the Timbren blocks to be contacting the rear differential giving a firm ride if the load in the bed is heavy. In our case, without Ollie connected with our normal camping gear load in the bed, there is air gap between the Timbren blocks and rear differential giving a nice ride. With rear differential airbag systems, you can let air out of the bags with Ollie disconnected to give a smoother ride. As mentioned above a WDH needs to be used with a TV/Ollie rig when required by the TV operators manual and stated on some trailer hitches. We keep a close eye on our actual ready to camp TV & Ollie weighs using CAT scales to comply with TV/Ollie requirements.

Robert, When I used Firestone rear differential air bags at about 30PSI, did not have much TV rear end sag towing Ollie. It was a firm ride while towing, but when not towing decreasing the air pressure to about 5PSI gave a nice unloaded ride. I have not used the RAS system. I'm currently using the Timbren rear differential system towing Ollie, but believe many folks here have had good results using rear differential air bags because of flexibility given by adjusting air bag pressure when towing or empty. Some folks use onboard air compressor for the rear differential airbag systems, but I mounted the rear license plate with left & right airbag valves and found that air pressure could be easily increased with a simple bicycle air pump.

Agree, only axles with SC 50" on the list so far are 2014, 2015, & 2016 LE2s.