jd1923

I just thought I would make others aware of an issue I found, go figure just the week after we bought our older Oliver EII. I can't remember a time, when purchasing a used car or truck that I had not laid on the ground inspecting the bottom side, left, right and front to back! For some reason, when we first viewed our OTT listed locally for sale, I did not look underneath. I think I was enamored by the beauty of and cleanliness of it, along with I felt we were just looking, and I wasn't thinking I would spend this kind of money on a TT. Later we closed the deal over the phone. Paid for it 2 days later and the prior owner brought it to our home. I was down low installing 6" hose extensions on all the hose inlets, and I thought it was a good time to inspect underneath and could NOT believe what I found! Pictures to follow. I found 2 broken welds, curbside the first two right behind the wheels. OMG, my heart sunk! I called the prior owner. He thought I did it by overdoing the stabilizer jacks (not). He said he recently greased the Dexter components and he could swear the damaged was not there before (again, not). You could tell by the aluminum corrosion that these had broken some time ago. I'm not asking for help here, as I found a guy in town who runs a welding shop and does contract welding for many metal artists in town. He repaired this, charging an hour $75. Most of the hour was setting up for aluminum welding and creating a heat shield. I believe he used MIG. I gave him a Ben Franklin and it was done prior to our maiden voyage a few weeks back. I had no idea the aluminum welds would break at the contact point. The OTT welds must have been defective when the frame was built (edit: OTT likely welded this fine, later replies show this to be 80 PSI tire pressure). I called OTT service to ask about this and other questions, and the rep really had little to comment. My reason for writing this thread, is to let others know and to suggest that if you haven't looked under recently, it is a good idea to inspect your frame soon and regularly. Thanks for reading.

We have SiriusXM in two vehicles (not our new tow vehicle) and we occasionally play music via their app on our phones. It was a challenge to get SiriusXM to charge us for 1 vs. 2 receivers monthly. We argued that we generally drive only one vehicle at a time. How much would they want for a 3rd receiver in our TV or OTT?! Chris synced her phone via Bluetooth to the wall mounted Furrion audio system, so we can play SiriusXM. However, unless we install a SiriusXM antenna/receiver in our Oliver, we could seldomly use SiriusXM when camping. Many of our campsites out here have little to no cell service. No way a SiriusXM antenna/receiver can be integrated to the archaic Furrion systems. Dish Network has many music stations too, and we can get that anywhere. We often play a jazz or country station while playing our favorite Rummikub! Any of you ordering a new OTT? Let them know you want a white wall-mounted receiver (if you can find one, or at least silver) with higher quality speakers in the corners with white covers. Look back at the first picture I posted. What are the only other black objects in the photo? I may upgrade the audio system a few years down the road. The speakers could be upgraded, for sure, though something like this might add a simple cosmetic touch (not sure of correct size): Amazon.com: uxcell 2pcs 6.5" Mounting Hole Diagonal Distance Speaker Grill Mesh Decorative Circle Woofer Guard Protector Cover Accessories White : Electronics I understand there is a way to turn off speakers in the current system. I'll have to figure that out, because the one by the dinette, just over your head, needs to be off when sitting there. Mike and SeaDawg, delete those old dusty TVs, clean up your space visually and save about 20 lbs. in the rear of your Ollies! And btw, thanks for taking interest in my installation thread, even though TV A/V is not your thing!

So, I have the TV up, connected to Wi-Fi to stream Amazon, YouTube, Newsmax or any other streaming service, paid services or free apps. Bluetooth is linked to the soundbar, and all is good. Next step is a couple of inputs we desire, our old Blu-ray player and a new Dish Wally receiver: Amazon.com: Dish Wally HD Receiver : Electronics We liked that our older used OTT already had the Winegard Satellite dish built in. If you were to add one, you may be interested in a full system: Amazon.com: Winegard Factory Refurbished Dish Playmaker with Receiver : Electronics The double clamshell design of the OTT makes it seriously difficult to run coax cables from a dish mount up front to the attic in the rear, professional installer or not (coax could be run through the upper cabinets). These Sat dishes only need a coax cable connection, as they feed power directly from the coax to operate the dish rotation and angle (that's cool). The Winegard default targets DirecTV satellites. Nobody RVing wants this service, but they have market share, and require a 2-year minimum contract (we had DirecTV with TiVo in our homes from 1999 through 2014, never again with this greedy company, saying “we don’t carry your plan anymore”, charging more year after year). Dish Network is expensive enough, $120/mo for 200+ channels (with nothing to watch), but you can pay for one month when traveling and if you do not pay again, the service stops automatically. We did enjoy watching Wimbledon after we recently activated our new Dish receiver. You need to get up on the roof of your OTT, remove the cover of the Sat dish, and change the dip switches in the control panel, from the DirecTV to Dish Network configuration. My son Adam climbed up a ladder, with Phillips and dip switch drawing in hand, had it reconfigured in 10 minutes. I cleaned the cover in and out and he dusted the dish internals with a wet rag. There already were two coax cables in the attic. You need to figure out which is which, one from the Winegard and the second feed is from the coax port, street-side rear bumper for RV park cable connection (never going to use this one). I have a coax cable tester, but trial and error works fine since there are only two cables. Chris called Dish. We already had an account from our last RV. She gave them the new receiver ID and in a few minutes were watching TV. I needed a small rack to hold the two components. Most are designed to be wall mounted. I mounted a 1x1” piece of wood under the front so it would sit flat on its own. A little carpet tape underneath keeps in from sliding forward. The plastic bin on the right holds our backup cables, DVD and Blu-ray discs. I used just a little 3M VHB tape to mount the components to the rack, so they will not move. This TV monitor only has one micro-HDMI input, and they supply the micro to HDMI cable. All kinds of fancy HDMI splitters are available. Some require a power supply, but the simple ones draw power from the HDMI. Many have a remote control which is the last thing we need, another remote! I figure the default setting would be for Dish TV and if I was to play a DVD or Blu-ray, I would open the attic anyway to insert the disc and would toggle the switch to change input sources. I need to add a small square of 3M VHB tape, and the HDMI switch will site nicely on the wall above the AC outlet. I purchased this rack for $32 and $12 for the splitter: Amazon.com: HNVNER Floating AV Shelves,TV Wall Mount for Entertainment Center,DVD DVR Component Shelf for Cable Boxes, Games Consoles, TV Accessories (Double Layer) : Home & Kitchen Amazon.com: HDMI Switch 4k@60hz HDMI Splitter, GANA Aluminum Bidirectional HDMI Switcher 2 in 1 Out, Manual HDMI Hub Supports HD for Xbox PS5/4/3 Blu-Ray Player Fire Stick Roku (Support 1 Display at a Time) : Electronics

Thanks SeaDawg, we had the same rule in our family. No TV on Sundays, when we drove to visit our cousins and Yiayia (that's Greek for Grandma), or they came to our home. For the first 20+ years of my life, it was every Sunday. Yep, no football, no-way, nor anything else on the TV! We lived in Europe during the 60's and had no TV, no radio really, and we played music on the phonograph and families talked (no cell phones, video games and social media, oh I long for the days). Moved back to the states in the 70s and there was TV! The great TV westerns, Gunsmoke (our favorite), Bonanza, and the great sitcoms of that era. The larger family get-togethers are not with us anymore. I love to wind down, after working a long hard day, get my mind off my responsibilities, watching TV choosing the most brain-dead show I can find, to stop processing and fall asleep. Or watch a great movie, when we can find something new! You really need to delete your TV. Simple rule for organizing a space, if you haven't use it in the last 2 years, throw it out, drop it off at Goodwill. If we meet you at an Oliver owners meet, give me 5 minutes and I'll delete it for you! Lol, best wishes, JD

CRM, thanks for sharing your track system! You get that when the TV folds down, it's too far forward. There is only 76", top of bed to the back wall. My TV is 4" off the wall, so you have a full 6' viewing length to the hi-def screen, vs 4 ft distance to the low-rez 24" screen. I'm with you on using what you got, but the only TV I have lying around is a 47" TCL/Roku. It's large, thick, black and heavy! I wanted clean and white, like everything else in the Oliver. Could not pass up this screen at $328 Amazon used, at only 14 lbs. and 12mm thick. Thanks again.

I installed a Furrion 13,500 BTU A/C unit in our Bigfoot Class-C three years back. It was a ducted system in a 30 ft Class-C and cooled it nicely. We don't camp in hot summer weather, but I run our RV A/C units during the summer when parked at home. I would guesstimate the large Class-C has twice the cubic ft of our little LEIIs. The original Dometic failed, condenser fan dislodged and stuck in the casing. Buy another Dometic? I hope y'all find a better alternative. My feeling is you need to be down at perhaps 11,000 BTU as was suggested above. The 13,500 BTU (or greater) A/C system will likely not cycle enough in most climates, which means less air movement and less humidity management. It is important to engineer an A/C system at the right BTU rating, not too much or too little. We're keeping our old clunker original Dometic, for now. It's parked outside with A/C running now, only part of the day, and we've been high 90s to 100. I have it set at 84 degrees, so the interior stays nice. Yes, it's noisy (LOL, I can hear it from the front door of my house, and my 100' hose doesn't quite reach the Oliver)! Keep in mind, we live in the dry Arizona high country. The A/C does not run at night at all, and it would have to perform better, perhaps require more BTUs, if for say you live in the SE United States, or camp in the Midwest during the summer months.

Hey JD, thank you for these ideas. I will say, I have read so many of your upgrade posts, some amazing work! Thank you for sharing and I will study your work in the months and years to come, as we get to know our Oliver better. As far as warning labels, they're not of interest to me. The insurance industry and Federal Government have dummied down America, to make everything idiot-proof, with WARNINGS! I have already taken my heat gun to several labels (use a little Goo-B-Gone after), the one by the smoke detector, those by the cooktop, other labels outside are soon to go. The visual noise removed, all clean white fiberglass. Thanks for the sound quality app. I will show it to my son who is a sound engineer. Perhaps he can run the test. More to come soon on this post, as I have time not working. I will add a post re adding the Dish receiver, configuring the Weingard Satellite, and adding a rack in the attic for multiple A/V input sources. My final post will be to show how I made this TV monitor fold up to the attic ceiling, being out of the way of the rear view and emergency exit window. It's not a simple push mechanism, what OTT uses on their smaller 24" TV, but given the thin profile of this TV, you will hardly see it when folded, all parts white! Thanks for reading!

I see sale pending on JD's classified. Congratulations, John! You're going to miss your little Mouse!

A few pics of the TV install to follow. When I first installed it and connected to the Internet, the movie Fletch was streaming on the Samsung network! 1985 OMG! Then pic with TV off and soundbar installed. Next pic shows the slim profile and a final pic shows the Samsung network, and notice the HDMI input, currently no HDMI input powered up. The TV can swivel left and right and front and back. Pushing the TV back gives the best viewing angle when lying in bed.

So, you do not need a 1 1/2" ID opening as in the grommet OTT put in the corner. I drilled a 3/4" opening for the 2 TV cables (power and HDMI). I seal this all openings simply with a round of white Styrofoam. For the large original opening I took a piece of Styrofoam, that you get in any electronics packaging, use a hole saw without the mandrel bit, and by hand, just cut a round piece of Styrofoam just a little larger than the opening to get a tight fit. Next step was the soundbar. I chose another Samsung product (Amazon link above), for compatibility, like wanting the TV remote to adjust the volume (it does way more than that!). Another requirement was the soundbar needed to connect by Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, since this TV Monitor does not have an audio output. Wow, this product synced both interfaces automatically, take your pick. My TV and soundbar are now connected to our Oliver Wi-Fi VPN defined by the Wi-fi Ranger. Like the TV, the soundbar does need AC power, and thankfully there is already AC power at the foot of the street-side bed. See my install pic of the AC outlet. I drilled another 3/4" hole there, since the soundbar has an inline power supply, the "brick" which I wanted inside the center nightstand (tied up behind the drawer) and not outside, tucked under the mattress! I mounted the soundbar about 4" off the back wall, since it has rear speakers too. The soundbar is mounted to the nightstand tabletop merely with Velcro tape. No way I'm using the wall mounted Furrion player, anymore to play CDs, since I can play CDs in the Blu-ray player with high quality audio output to the Samsung soundbar.

Thanks again, SeaDawg! BTW, no that's not reflection of safety glasses. LOL, looks that way! That is a reflection that shows OTT did not get the back corner round, just an imperfection in the round and finish of the back corner. When I received the SAMSUNG 32" M80B 4K UHD HDR Smart-TV/Monitor, my first thought was, "this is a thing of beauty!" The picture is amazing, as the picture has a 3D look to it, with 4K UHD HDR resolution! The entire monitor measures 12mm thick (<1/2"), across the entire screen except for a 4x4" input panel in the rear that protrudes another 1/4" or so. Looking at the input panel, I was worried at first, since there is only one micro-HDMI input and a USB-C for computer use. NP, I could add an HDMI switch up above for additional inputs. I require 2 HDMI inputs, for the Blu-ray player and the Dish Satellite Wally receiver (more on this later). This is a smart-TV/Monitor, meaning it has no TV tuner, nor RF cable input. So, I cannot add an antenna for broadcast TV (one project off my list) and you cannot connect cable TV from an RV park. NBD, I think I tried that once, never again. A real TV would be 2-4" deep and black. The TV was supposed to come with a VESA mount adapter, to be connected to the ceiling mount. Well, this was Amazon used and it was missing. They got me one later, but I installed without it. I decided to mount the screen merely using 3M 4950 VHB Tape. This tape is STRONG! On our Class-C, I used it to tape the Solar panel mounts to the fiberglass roof, no screws used here, and this TV is only 14 lbs. I used my jigsaw with a medium steel blade, to cut a 4x4" opening in one end of the TV mount, to surround the input panel behind the TV. I covered the entire face of the mount with VHB tape (clean both sides with rubbing alcohol) and pushed it, massaged it onto the rear of the screen. There must be a good 20 square inches of tape contact, and this TV is not going anywhere. I don't have assembly pics, and it was difficult to get a decent picture after everything was mounted, but here it is -

CRM, does your added fan have an integrated thermostat? This is a smart upgrade, given the Dometic fridge gets that hot. Is it always hot when running the fridge, or hotter when running on LP? Amazon item? Let us know if you have a part # or source. Thanks

Thanks MAX Burner, i appreciate it, though I'm not near done yet in describing this installation! Please come back for more. And thank you SeaDawg, the Caframo fan is a great idea. The curb side is where my wife Chris sleeps, and she loves her fans. We had a hole in our Bigfoot, when I replaced and moved the thermostat with an AC upgrade. Chris found a pretty little butterfly artwork piece that we taped in place to cover that hole. I think for now I will just plug the holes with white Styrofoam. Pull out the plugs for the correct fix later. Next year, we will camp by Lake Mead and that would be the place to find a boat guy! If there is a way to mount a fan using the existing holes, or at least cover the holes, that would be awesome. Too bad it's near impossible to run power wires behind the interior walls, for anything not near a cabinet opening. There is power above and a huge grommet from the original TV install. A rechargeable battery-operated fan could work nicely.

Notice how far back the TV screen is in relation to the rear window. To make it solid, I bolted the mount through the attic ceiling and used long brackets I had in my shop to distribute the weight across the width of the attic ceiling.

I received the mount, disassembled it and reversed the direction of all parts. I removed the latching mechanism, cut and ground the latch metal from the frame, so that in the reverse direction it would not damage the TV screen in the folded position. The install looked like this:

I purchased a Samsung TV and soundbar. I wanted Samsung, South Korean made, running their Tizen OS, not the TCL/Roku TV I had years ago (is China watching?). Not the Sony TV I have in my living room, running Android, Google owned. And, it was the only white 32" TV monitor I could find! Samsung HD 32” TV monitor white (monitor means no TV tuner, no antenna input): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B89L2WNV?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details SAMSUNG HW-S61B 5.0ch All-in-One Wireless Soundbar w/Dolby Atmos, Alexa, Bluetooth: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09X61YYJB/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 I like that Amazon sells used electronics and parts. Generally, when items are marked in like new or good condition, another customer opened it and returned it, perhaps damaged the packaging. If not working, just return it. The TV new was $500 plus tax, now it's listed at $400 new, I paid $328 with tax, in used like-new condition. The soundbar was $182 and the TV, soundbar and mount total came to $550.

Given my goal is to mount a hi-rez 32" screen, my first thought is why does OTT only mount these small 24" screens? Then I realized the answer. When they are corner mounted, there is barely enough real estate to go much larger (it can be done, barely). The newer installs are center mounted. You would think there is ample room in the center of the interior living space. They want to the screen to fold up. I agree, there are times when camping when you want the TV screen out of the way to enjoy the view out the rear window. TV mounts that fold up, also fold back. They all work this way. The height of the 24" screen truly is all the room you have. When folded, you must have depth (under the attic) equal to the height of the TV monitor plus approx. 2" for the mechanics of the mount. In our Elite II, there is not enough ceiling space under the attic to fold back a larger screen. My next thought is that I need a TV ceiling mount that will fold forward. If this can be sourced, or if I can build one, the TV in the down position would be far back close the rear window. This would be great! Watching TV, lying in bed, it makes sense to have the TV at my feet, close to the rear window. I do not want it to fold down and closer to me, like by my knees. Closer, given a low-rez 24" screen OK (not!). Back near the rear window, the larger hi-rez screen would be perfect! Well, they do not design folding TV mounts this way! So, I'm thinking, can I buy a standard mount and turn it around? Turns out it worked fine. I bought this mount on Amazon, for $41 total and reversed everything and removed the funky latch mechanism. I will later design something for the folded position. I do not trust these latches anyway. I got to believe many of you get to your campsite to find your TV has bounced and is sitting in the down position. This is the mount I used. It is solid and fits my criteria of being low profile and white! VIVO Manual Flip Down TV Mount, Folding Ceiling Mount for Flat TV Monitors: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BDSPGZWY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

New TV, ceiling mount and cabling all have to be thin profile and white in color.

Being confident, the old has to go... Next day, I just pulled everything old! Request for those reading... How should I fill these holes? I'm an engineer/mechanic, not an artist or autobody/paint guy. I want to be able to later finish the fiberglass and polish the corner, without evidence of original installation (finish work TBD by a professional).

The first thing I did, as an upgrade our new-to-us Oliver, was to upgrade the A/V system. The prior owner recently replaced the original lame corner-mounted 24" TV (TV means television in this post, not tow vehicle) with an Insignia smart TV running the Amazon Fire TV OS. OK, it was an upgrade, since it was then capable to stream from Amazon, Netflix and other services. But come-on, the TV was ugly and BLACK, 4" deep, had a ginormous black 1 1/2" wire harness, etc. I could go on-and-on! (see pic) I have never watched TV on a 24" screen, and do not plan to do so going forward. We enjoy TV and watching movies and I not going to start squinting to watch a low-rez 24" TV. I'm thinking 32" hi-rez would be perfect in this space! 🙂 First thing I did was to realize and test all the accessories we have in the new Oliver. Like the Weingard Sat dish upgrade, nice! The Furrion radio audio system, can play CDs, DVDs, but not Blu-ray. OMG, I looked at Amazon and other providers to replace this head unit, and still today, now that Blu-ray has been around for 16 years, you cannot replace this system, with a wall mounted unit, that also plays Blu-ray. In our beautiful Oliver, view of the rear living space, let me ask you, what stands out as being out of place? It's of course the BLACK, UGLY TV!!!

Thanks Mike, if we weren't living in Prescott AZ, we'd want to be in Boerne, TX! No better state to work in and bring up a family than Texas. Many great spots in Arizona, more retirement locations. Boerne is a very special central Texas hill country town, what a great community! Say hi to Chaney, for me next time you wander into Hearts Home Acoustics. I bought my first Collings dread from him, and he taught me how to play Bach's Sleepers Awake on classical guitar. If there is a day, I cannot play this song, I will have to hang up my guitar after 50 years! It was about 2008 or so, when I found Boerne to visit Hearts Home, and we've been back 3 times. Will visit you and the hill country again next year for the solar eclipse meet. I could not believe the meet location. What a find, we're going, campsite or not, for our first long-distance Oliver trip!

I'll likely rebuild the front-end, check the brakes and shocks this fall. This truck is totally solid and after buying Oliver, I had a $20K budget for our TV. I will reach my budget, after buying all the suspension parts I need! Look for my Audio/Visual system upgrade post soon. I did this upgrade the first week we owned our Oliver. We decided, we are going to call ours Oliver, not Ollie like many of you. Think of Eva Gabor, saying Oliver, in the iconic show Green Acres! "Land spreadin' out so far and wide, keep Manhattan just give me that countryside." I love that phrase and it changed my life when I first heard it. This verse tells much about the RV/camping experience. We travel mainly over the winter, including camping at 3-4 Pickleball tournaments a year. Thinking to meet up with all, y'alls in Texas for the solar eclipse, we love Texas! We lived and worked in the Austin Texas area from 2006-2014. We've been to Fredericksburg 4-5 times, took family there! It's awesome, going for German draft beer and food. Schnitzel and spaetzle! OMG! And my son won a major tennis championship at Kerrville, great memories, and my favorite guitar shop is in Boerne TX, Hearts Home Acoustics!!! Of course, I'll post my suspension rebuild project in the Towing an Oliver forum. I really love this Oliver TT forum already. You guys are great and respond with good advice quickly. I've only been here 5 weeks and plan to be fully involved here. Thanks

I was just out washing the Ollie. I had pressure washed it when we got home with all that road dirt, but it's still dirty. It's so hot out, I only got the roof washed and dried and will do the rest tomorrow. I did take a minute to remove the Anderson, everything but the frame mounts for now. That's a relief. I'll go with the OTT suggested 55 PSI for now, even though the load tables say you can run as low as 45. 80 PSI does make the trailer skate around a bit, squirrely is right. The TV likely has worn ball joints. I know the tests. When I have a bad ball joint, I replace all of them, bushings and other parts along the way. This way, I don't have to do the labor again, and should get 10 years worry free out of a full rebuild. Shocks, yes certainly if they're original or worn-out replacements. Thanks, everybody!

"Design flaw" I see is it's an EV. Yes, the range is too short for highway travel. Then find a charge station and wait how many hours for a recharge? Trucks will likely continue to be diesel, for many, many years to come. Maybe when the EV batteries run low, they can be charged by our OTT house batteries! Ha-ha

John, you must have really disliked your Ram seats! I drove an '03 Laramie for 18 years. It had the leather seats and I loved them. This '01 is a "Laramie/SLT" really the SLT cloth seats. They seem comfy to me and the interior on my truck is perfect, looks more like 4 years old than 22. Will be keeping these as-is!