geokeg

Did Reed and Karen Lukens disappear? They were so active on the forum and no input now for several months.

Excellent John! Thanks for taking the effort to post this.

“Basement = 49” x 22” x 16”. Assuming you are asking about the Elite II. If you go to the Oliver University there is a file on measurements, very informative.

Great write up John. And from my life lessons in the snow country, I agree with you. If there is snow, frost, or ice my Oliver stays in the chocks...

Yep, that would do it. Kind of a learn as you go project isn't it? Thanks for sharing the insight, it may benefit others. Now we are thinking maybe the dogs should get an apology. ???? Safe Travels, George and Gretchen

Carol, Sounds like what we ran into our first night. Scroll through the modes on the control panel and when you get to Fan, make sure it says Auto, (if it was not in Auto, that was probably the condition you experienced). That should turn off the A/C fan unless A/C is programmed to lower the compartment temperature on the control panel. Then in Furnace mode if you select the temperature to be above the actual compartment temperature the furnace should come on, assuming the propane is on with usable quantity. The furnace mode should not operate the overhead A/C fan if it is in Auto, only the below deck furnace air flow comes into the compartment. We use a small quartz heater when we are plugged in to shore power to conserve propane and reduce cabin noise. George

Carol, We are so happy that you finally have this resolved and your solar system is working for you. What a saga! (We did the factory tour with you on delivery day). Happy Camping! George and Gretchen

Mike, That is all good input relative to warranty support and help from Jason et. all. Thanks, george

I applied the Capt. Tolley's solution today and time and rain will tell if it worked. The porch lights are directly over the windows and with known defective seals around the lights that sure seems like the highest point where water can penetrate the hull and run down onto the window frames and into the trailer. The seals around my window moldings looks really good with no visible voids or cracking. (So far we are not aware of water penetration but for sure are getting streaking and the rubber seals around the lights are garbage!) To get the volumn of water that you got there should be evidence of its origin. In any case I am NOT pleased with the porch light seals or the Oliver company's lame response to not get us some remedy to the problem.

Here is another thought on the window leak situation. A number of us have the black streaking from our porch lights. It has been suggested to use Capt. Tolley's Creeping Crack Cure to make it stop. I picked some up this morning at West Marine and am about to use it on our porch lights. Maybe it or a similar marine grade silicone would resolve your leak issue without having to take the windows out for reseal. I know the way things typically work for me, whenever you take something apart to fix it there are usually other issues that come up - often not good... If you do the window removal/reseal process please take some pictures and offer your usual informational comments. Thanks, george

Reed, Have you been able to determine if the leaks are coming from around the window within the frame enclosure or from around the enclosure itself going into the trailer hull? Thinking back of your early on postings and your discussion of extreme rough road conditions I am wondering if there are now some rough road induced voids in the sealing of the window and the hull. If so, and that is the leak source then some good aluminum tape over the upper window enclosure to the hull might be a worthy band aid fix until things get sorted out. Just a thought. Good luck with your search and resolution. george

Carole, I did send my controller back to Ryan for repair. He had a very quick turn around time to get it back. The big red knob shuts off power coming from the solar array to the controller so with it positioned to OFF that kills incoming power. The other red cable coming out of the controller has an inline circuit breaker at the other end of the cable. It has a little lever that when moved to its other position breaks the circuit and shuts off power going to the batteries and the battery power from reverse feeding the controller. The 2 black cables are for the ground path of the circuit and I think the one coming from battery side has a circuit breaker too that can be opened. (That part is from memory of when I did it last Spring). Take a look at your installation and see if what I have said is similar to what you see. I can take pictures tomorrow and post them if you would like further clarification. The 2 "hot" wires are the red ones. George

Hi Carole, Sorry to hear of your controller issue but not surprised. Our Olivers were too close in the factory process for ours to have an installation problem and yours not have it. Dang it! Anyway, I agree with what Mike has said and from looking at your pictures you have the same condition that our unit had. Ryan will have you bend the connectors 90 degrees to relieve the stress condition that is put on the controller with the connectors straight. The good news is that once you go through this exercise you should have a functional system that does a great job keeping your batteries charged. We have been quite pleased with our Blue Sky system and AGM batteries since we resolved the controller cables issue. If you have a multimeter you can use it to check for voltage at the connectors before connecting or disconnecting wires. The big red switch/knob and circuit breakers, once depowered, can remain that way until you get the controller reinstalled. Ryan can probably talk you through the power up sequence. It is not instantaneous, and takes a bit of time for the controller to sort out battery state, solar input, etc. Let us know how it all works out. George

This morning I looked out and had these lights illuminated on the Oliver. They had came on sometime in the night without a tow vehicle hooked up or other input to make it happen. I looked at the schematic in the owner's manual. No clue there for a source of power except maybe at the plug. We had a long soaking rain fall yesterday. I looked at the plug, nothing obvious for water intrusion. I whacked the plug a couple of times on the trailer frame and the lights went out. For prevention I sprayed some WD40 into the plug to displace the moisture and will keep it covered from now on. Darn plugs can be a problem with moisture and or corrosion.

Carole, On page 4 of the mechanical tricks and tips is the 4 page string of my Blue Sky troubleshooting and resolution experience for Hull number 178. Lots of technical info. there and on the last page a picture of the simple solution to the wiring installation problem. If it gets to looking like your controller is non functional I have pictures of the controller internals that I sent to Blue Sky for their assesment and recomendation. We have the same batteries as you so there should be similarity in system performance. The pictures of the Blue Sky display will be helpful when you get the trailer out in the sun. George

CCarole, Let us know what you are seeing on the Blue Sky display after a day or two out in the sun. Your system may have an installation problem with the Blue Sky controller that prevents the solar system from charging the batteries. We were at the factory tour with you and picked up our trailer the same day as you. Our controller had a wiring issue that caused failure of the unit. It took some coordination with Jason at Oliver and the Blue Sky technical rep. but with a new controller and repositioning the terminal connectors our system has been operating just fine since and we are quite pleased with it. On the second page of the Introduce Yourself topic listing is the Blue Sky Tech Support contact info. which might be worth looking at. If Ryan is still their tech guy he was very helpful with our resolution.

Buzzy, We are so sorry to hear of your losses. Thank you for the update, albiet a sad one. We pray that you will be able to once again join us on the forum and hopefully somewhere out with our Olivers. Best regards, George and Gretchen

Just did a Google search for trailer elctric brakes grabbing. Got several inputs. One, a troubleshooting tabel from camper trailers.com. May be a broken or weak return spring. Have you checked running clearance of both brakes on that side? Maybe the grabber has insufficient clearance and comes in early.

Thanks David, good input. George

Yep, probably should for insurance / liability reasons. Thanks. George

Excellent response, thanks John! Very informative reading and simple solution to a "non problem" condition. It appears that no neutral to ground accessory plug came with our unit. Easy enough to make one though as they show on the referanced reading you suggested. It appears that my issue is resolved and I can resume operating with full EMS protection after I install the accessory plug. Thanks again, I love this forum! George

When my trailer was delivered the surge protection switch was in bypass mode which I thought odd. I discovered this when I was working my Blue Sky solar controller issue. I put the switch into the auto protection mode and then discovered it would not accept power from my house circuit, (reversed polarity message). Fair enough I thought, maybe the house is wrong. I left the switch in auto and have gone to a number of camp sites with shore power and have not had any issues. I tried to power up from my Honda 2000i Companion and the EMS would not accept power from either receptical unless I put the switch in bypass. So far I have not done any more troubleshooting for messages on the control panel. The Honda powers up just fine now and even runs our Dometic A/C. Has anyone else had a wimilar experience?

We have hull number 178 and picked it up last October. We brought it to Washington state and it wintered outside with only a small cube heater inside to keep things from becoming cold weather damaged. That worked out quite well and I figured it cost about 50 cents a day to maintain constant usability, and no other winterization efforts for Puget Sound area weather. It stayed totally dry inside and always ready for a hook up and go. In the last several months we have taken road trips every other week and have been on some mighty rough roads. Lots of opportunity for quality or design issues to show up. In that regard we have nothing negative to report from our usage. Our only real issue has been installation of wiring connectors inside the Blue Sky solar controller box. Jason and the Blue Sky rep. were very helpful in solving the problem. I received a new controller and a simple reindexing of connectors instructions and accomplished the fix at home. The solar system has been through some pretty rigerous testing since then and has been working quite well, actually exceeding our expectations. So in summary, we highly recommend the Oliver product and hope that you continue to look into their product and processes to satisfy yourself before making a purchase decision. The Kegebeins

This may be helpful in Timbrens experience but not F150. I have a Silverado 1500 4x4 Z-71 and towed our Elite II across country with stock suspension. After putting on the Timbrens, a very easy process, I was very pleased with the improvement in hitch height change and overall performance. The vertical movement of the trailer hitch when under way is greatly reduced and ride quality in the truck is significantly improved. I do not feel the ride is harsh just much more stabile than with stock suspension. With the trailer disconnected there is about 3/4" clearance between the Timbrens and the frame cushion stops and you don't have any change to stock suspension until putting the big load on the hitch. I am glad that I chose them for the loaded suspension improvement, the simplicity of installation, and being able to just use them with no required maintaining or adjusting. George

Thanks guys. Good info. I'll check it out. george