John E Davies

As I said, I am a huge fan of solid axle(s) with good articulation in a truck that will be taken off pavement. When one wheel drops and the other goes up, the axle pivots in the center and the truck stays relatively high and close to level. The differential stays off the ground. The passengers do not freak out….. Toyota does know how to do this well. This looks a little disturbing: John Davies Spokane WA

I hope it arrives on schedule, what a great Christmas present. John Davies Spokane WA

There is a lot of craziness that will inevitably die down some, in a year or two, but I doubt that it will ever get back to those simpler times. It is still fairly easy to find spots in less popular destinations mid-week, but even there, the weekends are typically booked solid, Friday through Monday, so you are forced to move along. You really need to be able to boondock for extended periods, and be willing to travel over gravel ranch and forest roads. If you can find a nice primitive site on a BLM reservoir, or NFS pullout, you can use that as a base of operations to explore in your tow vehicle. Do not count on being able to drive into Yellowstone in the summer and find a spot at the spur of the moment. No way! Even the REALLY remote, lightly used National Parks like Great Basin have now gone to Reservation Only. their visitation numbers have doubled recently. You may have trouble finding a spot, but at least now you will not drive a couple of hours, only to see those hated Campgrounds Full signs. The wonderful COE campgrounds around Lake Roosevelt here in WA went that way last Spring, which was a great help, and in their case you can actually reserve the day you arrive. So if you see a spot that is open, you just need to find a cell signal, which can be quite hard, and grab it using their online reservation system (Recreation.gov). I hope that I can camp for a few more years, but at some point the crowds and the horrible summer wildfire smoke will force me to sell. For the cost of my trailer payments and insurance and additional fuel used, I can buy a whole lot of hotel rooms. It will be hard to rationalize all the camping hassles then.😤 John Davies Spokane WA

Poking around, with way too much free time on my hands. I found this statement about the current F150 EB: ”Ford changed the design. It's now only good for charging the small battery that enables your elec brakes in an emergency. It will no longer work your electric tongue jack or your RV's front jacks. Ford got rid of the relay and fuse that you had to add when you had to tow package and made it all electronic. It's also "smart" so if you don't hook up a trailer you won't even get any power to the Auxillary pin. Ford went to this new design in when the new design aluminum trucks arrived” https://www.f150ecoboost.net/threads/trailer-charging-circuit-undersized-wire.61842/ That sounds insane to me, but I am sure some Ford owners here will either confirm or deny it. No relay! Shakes head….. John Davies Spokane WA

Forgot this, you should research your F150 charge wire size and amp (fuse) capacities. They are likely pretty decent, but most likely nowhere close to 4 AWG. My LC200 has a 40 amp fuse in that circuit, I don’t know the gauge. I bet it is no bigger than 10 AWG. John Davies Spokane WA

Have you researched the installation instructions for the Victron charger? I did, and that is (one reason) why I chose the Redarc. The Victron must be mounted vertically with at least 10 cm clearance top and bottom, that is difficult to do under the seats. I do not know the height of that particular unit, but my Victron 35 amp solar MPPT charger fits that way, but is not ideal, but it also sits right on top of a four inch diameter vent hole….. https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/5329-how-to-victron-mppt-solar-charge-controller-underneath-the-street-side-bed/ My Redarc is horizontally mounted on top of an aluminum plate with big holes in it. Then there is the wire needed, the Victron needs 6AWG from truck battery to Ollie battery, so you must run all new wires. If you are going to all that trouble, you might as well make them even bigger and put in a higher amperage unit of some kind. Why stop at 30 amps? I picked the Redarc 11A unit because it is the biggest output I could find that did not require stringing new heavy cables all over the place; however one of my Ollie wires was actually undersized, and I had to replace that section. I suggest that you study the Redarc offerings, they have a 50 amp dual input one that ALSO functions as a solar MPPT controller. It is very robust and can be mounted in any position, anywhere, even underneath the frame (with waterproof butt splices). BUT you must run suitable heavy gauge cables everywhere, that unit requires 4AWG, and use a suitable Anderson 75 amp or bigger double Powerpole connector at the bumper.. https://redarcelectronics.com/products/dual-input-50a-in-vehicle-dc-battery-charger https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/2204/8993/files/BCDC1250D_Instruction_Manual.pdf?529 https://redarcelectronics.com/collections/in-vehicle-dual-battery-chargers But mounting it outside the hull would completely solve your heat gain worries, especially when charging off the truck when natural wind flow would be excellent. I do think the battery box needs better venting, it should be wide open to the interior, and the door should be sealed and insulated. I addressed this in this thread. https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/5301-how-to-lithium-battery-powered-vent-system/ It has been working great, and the battery temps have been remarkably close to inside temps. BUT i only have the standard 45 amp PD charger, and an 11 amp output Redarc one under the rear bed. I think it would handle the extra heat load of bigger units, but that is guessing. The big downside of a higher amp DC to DC charger is that if you sell or wreck the TV, or sell the Ollie, you or the new owner will have to do that part all over again. With the 11 amp Redarc, everything is in the trailer, the only caveat being a smart alternator TV requires you to run a very small gauge voltage sense wire up to the TV battery. John Davies Spokane WA

It is a good idea if you have a cheap seal with a steel perimeter, otherwise a little oil can theoretically seep past over a long time frame. I have done it now and then, and never noticed any benefit. OTH if you buy the really superior Timken seals, which you should, they will come with a coated perimeter, and those do not need anything extra. It is really hard to apply sealer onto greasy parts, when your hands are greasy! It has been a really long time since I worked on a motorcycle, but aren’t those seals usually rubber coated on the outside? Here is a Honda fork seal: Here is a coated Timken: And a raw steel Dexter: John Davies Spokane WA

For that location, I would use some white epoxy filler, it is something you can do yourself and it should not be noticeable down there. For an eye level gelcoat repair, a professional is needed, unless you are comfortable working with that tricky substance. This is most excellent. https://www.amazon.com/Marine-Tex-RM305K-White-oz/dp/B0014419V0 http://marinetex.com/products/marine-tex-products/marine-tex-epoxy-putty/ You could just dab it in there, but a much better repair will result if you use a dremel tool with a small round steel grinding bit (not a sanding drum) and VERY carefully cut away any loose material and sharp edges around the perimeter. Make a neat bevel. Vacuum away all the debris and then clean with a solvent. That way the epoxy will stay in place and not get ragged around the edges. I can't tell how big that chip is, if it is small, you could just use a countersink drill bit for that, and it won't slip and scar the neighboring gelcoat. Plus a neat circle will look better than an odd shape. Usually a towel bar support bracket does not snap in place, it hooks on at the top and then you tighten an internal hex or slotted set screw underneath. Once tight it might need an occasional snugging down every few years, but it should NOT fall off constantly. If it does, it is defective and should be replaced. You need to address the problem, not the symptom... 😉 John Davies Spokane WA

I will start, this showed up in a Craigslist Ad, “free, you haul”. Usually I would expect this to be in Idaho, but it is actually close by, in case anybody here is interested😁. Can you imagine the incredible mess if a wind storm went through there? I bet his neighbors love him…. For those who may not know, the black areas in the wood are dry rot and mold. John Davies Spokane WA

I have not done this, it is just rattling around inside my head. for the shower lines I would install a pair of L Port bypass valves, like the water heater one, close to the existing fresh drain (aka near the furnace) and also tee those isolated sections there into the water tank drain line, between that valve and the belly opening. You could add two regular valves there, open them the in the winter and close them when you need the shower to be working. Yes, you still need a way to blow out the dead end shower section, you could make a simple adapter hose to screw on the end of flexi hose outside, and blow back into the trailer. By leaving the drain valves open, any seepage past the isolation valve would hopefully drip out the belly rather than go uphill to the shower. But I don’t think that would be 100% certain. I haven’t actually drawn this out, getting the valves oriented correctly is important. I think it would work. Three way valves are a little tricky to understand, this might be informative. John Davies Spokane WA

Welcome to the Forum. That is a 100% custom mount, very similar to the factory bike rack, but it is bolted down hard, not easily removable. The cross beam is a little smaller too, 2”x4” rather than Oliver’s 2”x7 beam. It would not be too hard to mount the factory cargo tray to the factory bike rack, but it would be really expensive compared to fabricating one. My tray is the early style one, from 2017, it has the same dimensions as the current one but is built differently. The spare tire cover has to be eliminated and the license plate relocated in my case, since you could not remove the wheel otherwise. The factory bike rack would normally be unloaded, disconnected and removed for that. https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/3263-how-to-move-the-factory-cargo-tray-to-a-rear-rack/ John Davies Spokane WA

That is ugly, just drill a brand new hole above it and use regular hardware. And open a Service Ticket. One of my bolts was missing, but the holes were not wasted like that. Yikes. Edit: If the holes are grossly oversized, there may be nothing but the clamping force of the nuts and some friction holding up the batteries. If they are a precise fit, they are orders of magnitude stronger because the parts are supporting in shear, meaning the bolt or hole would have to fail. With oversized holes, the parts can simply slide down further. Aircraft are assembled with rivets in snug fitting holes, when one is “bucked” with an air tool, the shank swells to fully fill the hole. It is extremely strong, you cannot duplicate that in this case, but you can easily drill precise holes that are no more than a few thousandths of an inch bigger than the bolts. That will be plenty strong. John Davies Spokane WA

I have been trying to get pics from my wife's DSLR camera since September, when we returned form our four weeks in Canada,, She finally got me some. Here is the south end of the Cassiar, the truck and trailer look reasonably clean. There had been no rain yet, just lots of wildfire smoke and ashes. The price is per liter, that is US$4.40 per gallon, about average for the trip, we did see it as high as CAD$1.93 (US$5.86) First gas stop, this is typical along here, the single gas island is pay inside first, so everybody is jockeying around the waiting cars, and a single big rig really gets in the way. About a third of the way up, near the Stewart turnoff, we hit 25 miles of road construction, in the rain. The truck is actually a little cleaner here, there was about five miles of pavement before this gas stop, so some washed off. Notice how clean the back window and hatch are! Most of the chaos (gravel and water spray) is channeled under the fabric. The trailer did not fare so well. No chips, just spray:: Then there was 50 km of freshly chip sealed pavement, posted 50 kph; although we only encountered a handful of cars, they were doing 90. Rain and no striping. Yikes..... The southern third is nice fresh asphalt, well striped for the tourists. The northern third is mostly unstriped chip sealed pavement. Here is the north end of the highway, in Yukon Territory, 540 miles from the start, after two days of steady light rain the mud is mostly gone, what is left is oily sludge from the chip sealing. This is in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory at the RV park: Another week of steady rain eventually removed most of that gunk. A car wash would have been pointless. I will eventually do a trip report, later in the fall or winter, it will be quite long. John Davies Spokane WA

I did not watch much of that video, enough to know I would not use him as an example of safe engineering. He actually drives around with all this stuff just flopping around? Darwin Award nominee. It is not quite as scary as this: John Davies Spokane WA

Define “adequate” please, are you hoping to drive on gravel roads and freshly chip sealed highways? If yes, then no they are not adequate by themselves, but if they are combined with a second set at the rear bumper, such as Rock Tamers, then they will be pretty good. The second set needs to come way out, to take care of those outer tires. And they will be a trip hazard and knee knockers, unfortunately, especially in the dark. You might want to add some reflective tape to the support arms. John Davies Spokane WA

It really is a very odd car market. Used pricing is up 30% over last year. We have been looking for a new crossover for my wife, certain brands are unobtanium, the local Toyota sales drone actually laughed at us, we walked in and expected to see a new RAV4. How droll! They are not even taking orders. In Seattle, some dealerships are pretty much ghost towns, what comes in off the truck is already sold at well over MSRP (“Market Adjustment” AKA theft), so there are no cars to view, much less to test drive. Unless you want a Volvo, he had all kinds of inventory. But those dealers list all that ghost inventory on their websites. They do not say “In Transit” they say “Call for availability.” what crap, pardon my language. My wife made a special trip there, a five hour drive, to look at cars, and then found out that they were expected next week. We test drove a 2019 Acura RDX A-Spec yesterday at Autonation here in Spokane, what a wonderful car! It was Certified Used with 40,000 miles, and had just come out of the detail shop. By the time we returned it, it had been sold for $45,000, sight unseen! We placed an order on a brand new 2022 model with much more equipment at MSRP ($52,000). It won't get here until spring, we can wait. The salesperson did not even take a deposit. “If you back out, it will be gone within four hours.” I feel sorry for folks who need a vehicle right now and have to pay new car prices for old cars. I do not have ANY faith that 2022 will improve, on the contrary it may get even more difficult. So far Acuras do not seem to be so hard to find, too bad they don’t make a truck. John Davies Spokane WA

I do not have a clue but flipped it for you. I am hazy about how you mounted the board to the compartment, some additional (upright) pics would be helpful. The board appears to be regular particle board... Are you aware of its unsuitability for a structural mount? Especially in a potentially wet area? https://www.livspace.com/in/magazine/materials101-particle-board-vs-plywood John Davies Spokane WA

I blow out "Mouse" for indoor storage, but I do not winter camp in extreme cold. I would not trust the method to be 100% effective. If you do want to try it, I suggest that you do it twice, with an hour between blows to get out stuff that might drain to the low spots. Installing winterization (isolation) valves for the outside shower would help, a three way selector placed close to the furnace, with a drain out the belly for the "trapped" water, would allow you to forget about that circuit entirely, once it was either blown out or "anti-frozen"... I just made up that word. overland rerouted all the rear water lines to just behind the tanks, so they are better heated, and that might be prudent, you could do it at the same time as installing the shower bypass stuff. Is your trailer stored outdoors when not in use? Be aware that even though you completely blow out the lines, you must always add a few ounces of antifreeze to the three waste traps afterwards, or they could freeze and crack. John Davies Spokane WA

That 4900 is fluff, it represents a completely stripped dry model with no options at all, perhaps that includes the 20 pound bottles' propane contents, I do not recall. Figure about 5300, depending on how many check marks you add to the build sheet. Lead acid batteries are especially heavy, as are solar panels. A big generator up front and two e-bikes in back could contribute another 300. The Andersen hitch weighs 50 (it not needed with a HD truck)..... So that combination would put the trailer at 5650, and that is before you filled the water tanks or added your personal stuff. Completely filling the fresh water tank adds another 250 pounds. I have never come close to maxing out the trailer, you could do it if you had lots of cast iron pots, or were into Cowboy Action Shooting and had lots of firearms and ammo. It really is a very healthy payload for such a small little "tank". Many people do not understand how heavy these are compared to a typical Casita, and usually underestimate the size TV that is required. The Ranger is NOT enough truck, especially when you reach the Western mountains. No way. You must consider the TV payload as well as its tow rating. "Payload up to 1900 pounds" means 2wd stripped (no options). You will not often find those vehicles sitting on the lot, nor are they a good choice for towing the LE2. Then you must also add the weight of the aftermarket stuff you attach to the truck, like a bed liner and canopy, that might be 300+ pounds. See where this is heading? As Roy Sheider said in Jaws, "You're going to need a bigger boat!" John Davies Spokane WA

Columbia is a large town 30 miles due east, you could visit Henry Horton State Park if you would like to hike or picnic, it is very pretty. Or drive up to Nashville for a day trip. https://www.bringfido.com/lodging/city/columbia_tn_us/ John Davies Spokane WA

The simplest solution for vibration control would be to add a single layer of stereo sound mat under the inverter charger. Unfortunately it is quite heavy, but I don’t think you would have to cover the entire cabin wall with it. The standard “isolation mount” in aircraft avionics is the Lord mount. Normally four are used in a horizontal position, but they do offer ones suitable for vertical mounting, these might work but they would move the inverter much further away from the cabin wall and that might create clearance issues or hinder access to other electrical stuff nearby. I have no clue how big the inverter is, so you would need to get the dimensions, weight and mounting hole sizes, study the compartment clearances, and maybe consult with a Lord tech advisor….. https://www.lord.com/products-and-solutions/vibration-and-motion-control/aerospace-and-defense/equipment-isolators/multiplane-mounts These high capacity chargers (as well as the batteries themselves) need better cooling than the factory design, but cutting vent holes in the lower electronics compartments will also let out the noise. It’s a big catch 22. Having that unit located right under the sleeping area is very unfortunate. It gets quite hot in there in summer and the air can’t get out…. I agree about the lack of an MPPT solar controller, it is a head scratcher; I sold my Zamp and replaced it with a Victron one when I converted to Battle Born lithiums. It is a much more capable charger, and it is fully programmable and can be networked through the VictronConnect app. And the lack of vehicle charging is also disturbing. IMHO Oliver should at least run two large gauge cables from the battery area up to the tongue and terminate them there in a weatherproof junction box. The owner could then easily add a big dc to dc lithium charger in the truck with minimal hassles, before or after delivery... the factory lithium packages are definitely works in progress. Yours is a most informative and professionally presented post. Thank you. I hope you will do more of them. See my “HOW TO” page for my lithium and other mods. I am glad those have been informative over the years, as will be this thread. John Davies Spokane WA

Cars and trucks are mass produced, and use drop in harnesses with all connectors in place. RVs are not, and having specialized automotive grade wires would really drive up the cost. Aircraft wires are actually individually labeled with a code and gauge (size) using a special wire marker device. Really high end RVs like an Earth Cruiser use individual heat shrunk labels at each end, that identify the purpose. Both those are really labor intensive. Not all wires are yellow, just the ground ones. They no longer supply a detailed set of wiring diagrams, just a “component location” diagram which is (very slightly) better than nothing. If you want to look at wires, an older Owners Manual will have them. Here is one from the 2018 LE2 book. .John Davies Spokane WA

I have bought three vehicles from Autonation dealers, and they have always been fairly priced with no sales pressure. One was my used Land Cruiser, We wanted to see if they would give us an acceptable deal on our ram 5.9 Cummins trade, and when they offered $22k we were gob smacked, because we expected $17k. That was long before those pre emission trucks started going up in value. We are looking at the Acura RDX, if we decide, we will buy from Autonation at MSRP, no worries. One other vehicle we looked at is the new Santa Fe Plug-In Hybrid, some Hyundai dealers sell at close to MSRP but others are marking that $40k car up by $15k. Probably because there are pretty much zero to be found, with orders extending into 2023….. I think Toyota may be shooting itself in the foot by not offering a non-turbo engine in the new Tundra. There are legions of fan boys who simply do not want complicated twin turbos, intercooler, and extra pipes in a full sized gas truck. John Davies Spokane WA

LOL…… This is ironic because this has been an ongoing issue for just about forever. They need to install steel front mounted push button latches that do not rely on feeble spring tension. At some point they will get tired of complaints and redesign the cabinet and drawers….. I had to duct tape my rear table drawer closed the first day after delivery, I found it sitting up against the bathroom door along with all its contents. That was before they started using positive acting latches. The galley drawers never got them…. John Davies Spokane WA

I am sorry and also very surprised to hear about your fire. That engine has been stone reliable in the past, it must have been a build issue… did you smell gasoline or could this have been electrical? Every vehicle needs an onboard extinguisher. A cheap dry chemical one will do if it is rated for fuel fires, but the powder residue is highly corrosive and must be removed immediately after! I suggest that everybody buy one of these for each of their vehicles, it fits in a glove box easily, runs for 30 seconds, leaves zero residue and never expires. I hope the price will come down, it is definitely too high IMHO, but it might save somebody's life one day. Most likely you would have to use it on another vehicle, but you never know. Do not call me anal, but my LC200 has two cheap box store extinguishers in the rear door pockets, for fast access from either side, and an Element in the glovebox…. And my small house has five extinguishers. 😳 Like bear spray, if you do not have a backup and need it, you could be in deep trouble. https://olivertraveltrailers.com/forums/topic/4291-how-to-element-fire-extinguisher-install/ Please post some pics and keep us advised. Good luck. John Davies Spokane WA