jd1923

Thank you, Mike. Probably 50+ Forum Members will read this today. Where are all y’all’s on your Summer trips? Please show us your pictures! Where’ Ollie? 😂

Welcome to life with your Oliver and as part of our great community on The Forum! 😎

Actual usage data to follow - Wow, we love our Chill Cube (and inverter/battery and DC-DC charger setup)! We left yesterday for a short trip to Walnut Canyon, just east of Flagstaff. With batteries fully charged overnight, I unplugged in the morning, packed the truck, and set the Chill Cube temp down to 73. I did so because we had pickleball from 2-4 PM, the Oliver with us ready, and our dog Charley would be in the Oliver while we played in the heat of the afternoon. We stopped for fuel and a snack (cabin nicely cool) and didn't make it to our boondocking location because of the very heavy monsoon rains in Flagstaff. We spent the night at Cracker Barrel, LOL! 🤣 (Can't drive down FS dirt roads in these rains as it's getting dark!) Checked battery SOC at 7 PM and it was 98%! We used net 20 Ah all day! Sun early in the day, cloudy later. We always have our Orion 50A DC-DC charger connected when towing. I figure it added approx 90 Ah while towing. So the Chill cube cooled all day using only 120 Ah, outside temps mid-80s. BTW, absorption fridge on DC all day too so this number could be less. The heavy rains made the cabin quite humid at 68% RH. Had our first experience with a leaky window (towing 70 MPH through monsoon rains). Thankfully only the dinette window leaked, beds dry. I switched the Chill Cube to DRY mode. Dog water bowl also spilled while towing. It rained until 10 PM while the Chill Cube dropped RH about 15% in the next couple hours, making it very comfortable to sleep. The DRY mode also made the cabin COLD overnight as it kept drying/cooling several degrees under the set temp (thermostat control issues common with many A/C models). Turned it off when I woke middle of the night. Cooked indoors powering the broiler in the Emeril. We'll be away 4 overnights and should be able to run the A/C on battery every afternoon into the evenings! 😎

It's quite a different idea to build in what is designed as a portable power station! I would suggest an inverter that is made to be built-in (like the Victron MP2), one that has terminals that can be hardwired vs. plugging in all your connections that may needed to be checked often after towing the trailer. It's also more expensive, this item and the plugs alone will cost 100s! It's certainly original, crazy IMHO, but at the same time, I would love to see your implementation. I've been through all this, and I'm very happy to help with wiring questions! Now to answer this question... You will not find a wiring diagram to show all the wires to the battery bay. Bill noted, his wiring diagram does not even show the shore power connections to the EMS! First thing I did was to empty the battery bay, disconnect all the wiring, and except for the two main B+ and B- cables, fish all the smaller wires back into the basement of the Oliver (see my before and after pictures of the battery bay). It makes a world of difference! I also removed the tray since it weighs 30 LBS and I wanted all the room to house 900 Ah of LiFePO4 batteries The next picture (look bottom right) shows the 8 AWG wires that I removed from the battery bay. Basically you should find two red B+ wires. One of these connected to the 12VDC fuse panel and the other to the solar charger, plus the two corresponding B- wires to the ground bus. Additional lighter gauge wires will likely power a shunt or other. You just need to remove the wires, follow to the load and rewire internally. Your solar charger will be Zamp or something else, not the Blue Sky SC as shown in our 10-year-old hull. I added 400A bus bars and removed all the breakers and fuses out from underneath the streetside bed. These are 8mm thick pure copper: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D59Z9S7W/ All of our switching is now under the rear dinette seat. Notice in this next picture, the breaker to the solar is moved forward as are all the cables shown in the picture above. The 3 jack fuses are also moved forward (the wires started there anyway). There were some low power needs in the rear, so I took the light duty OEM bus, cut it in half to make it a +/- bus which is also fused under the dinette. There are many things to think about in an extensive inverter/LiFePO4 upgrade! 😎

@Boudicca908 I just noticed something else in the picture above. Notice the shackle dropped and is in the wrong position. After you left here and drove over a step or bump in the road, it likely gave a big thump and reset itself. If it is still dropped this way, driving on and angle slowly over a curb, should return it to correct position. Or it may have reset itself after we mounted the rims and lowered the hull. This happened to my old springs too. When you upgrade to Alcan Springs it won't ever do that again. They are too stiff to allow the axle to drop this way. See my Alcan picture for correct shackle orientation.

Earlier, but likely not as old as ours. We had a dish satellite but it was a bigger/wider unit. Same wheels, marker lights, battery door and no Zamp port like ours. Exact same pinstriping and grey color. It has the newer style doghouse latches. First time I've ever seen an Oliver traveling without the front basket!

Last time in an airport? Twas pre-Covid for me! 😎 Chris does an annual sister’s trip, to IL or FL. Me, last time I experienced the G-awful Planes, Trains and… for personal reasons, I flew back to Chicago in 2007 for my Aunt’s services, almost 20 years ago, God Bless. Started my current job teaching PMPs, 11 years ago and frequented airports every 2-3 weeks for 6 years, enough is enough! Now I present via Zoom! 😎 We have such a great home and local community, took us a lifetime to get here, so we don’t want to be away for more than a few weeks at a time, for the last 3 years, it’s been the Oliver only! That’s the beauty of the Oliver. We can visit the best of places just a few miles down the road! 😂

@ScubaRx Steve is right on this one (as usual), and NO, not everything is negotiable. I've been low-balled on so many items I've listed used 4-sale and I walk away, NOT negotiating with them. I don't respond to the questions, what's the lowest you'll go? I'll go, but not with that guy. Knowing when to walk is half the "Art of the Deal." I would have loved the stripped-down Oliver, because I'm an engineer, auto mechanic and restorer at heart. I was going to modify everything to my liking anyway and it would have been cleaner without having to remove the old, patch fiberglass, etc. OTT offering a naked Oliver? Dumb business model. Their product, their intellectual property is the Oliver as a "special package." If they sold a bare-bones model they would lose most of their margin. They would have legal and warranty issues, the list goes on. Ford sells the E450 chassis and 100 RV manufactures build on it. That's not OTT!

@Boudicca908 would you mind sharing your impressions of the Chill Cube A/C in our Oliver? What was the sound level like outside when we were working next to it. What was the sound like on low when we went inside, and then when I lowered the thermostat and turned it up on high? So far, Forum Members have only read my opinion. There must be a lot of Oliver owners running the Dometic P2 this summer wishing they didn't have to! Thanks.

Our first year after a short 3-day trip, our Oliver was parked at home for 6 months. I needed that time to rebuild the suspension, replace all belts and hoses, brakes, etc. on our tow vehicle. Hard to travel with the TV up on jack stands! We're opposite than most. We travel the fall, all winter long and spring and stay home most of the summers. Summers by us are not too hot at 5440 ft elevation but as soon as we go anywhere it gets hot in the lower elevations of the southwest. Summers of 2024 and 2025 the Oliver was home for 3 months at a time receiving all our many upgrade mods. No big mods this summer since I'm done with all that. Now that we can run A/C for several days on inverter we'll do more summer travel. We've been parked since early May but leaving tomorrow for Walnut Canyon, just east of Flagstaff. Just going for 4 nights, off this week, working next. So, two months now since our last trip. We enjoy lots of short trips around Arizona. We go camping, boondock often just an hour to a few hours from home, more so now with fuel prices high it's nice to get remote after a short drive. In 3 years, we have never put our Oliver into a storage state. No RV antifreeze, blow out the water lines when needed. Last winter was so mild it wasn't necessary. After our trip this week, I have two weeks off Aug-Sept and are planning 2 weeks in SW Colorado. Then another 6 weeks if all goes well we'll head east for The Rally. Longest time between camping trips? Going forward, I'd say it will be +/- 6 weeks for us! 😎

I run our fridge exhaust fan when it's hot regardless of how it's powered; AC, DC or LP. LP runs a little hotter but the real heat is generated from the cooling. We choose between DC/LP based solely on battery SOC. Of course, when we're plugged in we switch to AC. I can notice the heat coming out of the top vent when entering the cabin which reminds me to turn the fan on. Living in the SW, if the sun is on the entrance wall, turn on the fan. We also have Ruuvi temp sensors in fridge and freezer compartments to monitor cooling.

Yeah, I had the pleasure of driving a full-size 4WD GMC diesel TV last week. Beautiful truck! A climb up to the driver's seat like a snug cockpit up there. Leather luxury with the dashboard all lit up, I felt somewhat disconnected from the road. The view out seemed narrow, even with the huge, self-folding mirrors. My old truck, I can get my old butt up into the seat np without using the step, old-school dash, very connected at ground level. We all get used to what we have. Driving 4WD trucks where you don't need 4WD has gotten old for me. I've owned work trucks and farm trucks, all but one 2WD. 4WD trucks have steering and suspension maintenance and longevity issues that 2WD trucks do not have. On the upside, they make high-performance parts for 4WD trucks, but not for 2WD trucks. They are literally a pain to work on (it's only me doing the work). When we replaced the starter motor on my son's '97 T100, I had to remove a skid plate and the driveshaft to the front diff! If it was 2WD there would be nothing but room down there. We had a thread a couple years ago and there was NOT ONE forum member that said they would tow without their 4WD. I tow the Oliver up CRAZY ROCKY STEEP dirt roads out here in 2WD, np. The weight of the trailer on the rear wheels keeps them from spinning. We generally don't have mud in Arizona but be careful of sand when crossing a wash bottom. If I would have to tow with anything less than a 2500 diesel, it would be a midsize diesel, like yours, or the Nissan with the Cummins! I would not be able to sleep at night if I knew I had to tow with much less. We now tow much more smoothly with Alcan Springs, now that the top-heavy Oliver doesn't sway left to right as the hull porpoises front and back, not anymore. Anybody towing with a half-ton truck or less, please upgrade your leaf springs and use the WDH. Fortunately, the OP is buying an Apex with Alcan Springs! 😎

And you mentioned an exhaust brake which makes a huge difference! I added a Pacbrake exhaust brake on our TV and love it, use it almost always since it's safer to slow as soon as you lift your foot off the pedal, in mountains of course but also on busy highways. We get 13 MPG regularly towing in the Mountains! Never have gone long enough on flat Interstates to know the number. If we do make it to The Rally, I'll have 1700 miles mostly on I-40 to measure this. I'm thinking 15 MPG will be the number. Yes, torque is the criteria for towing, HP not so much. But the REAL issue with smaller trucks is the footprint, width and wheelbase. Our truck is a solid TV since it's full width and an extra cab with long bed. And with 2WD the center of gravity is much lower (which nobody wants but me, but towing weight is on the rear wheels). All of this adds to stability. After a quick test drive, I could not imagine towing with our GX470 and it's not for the 470, but for the short wheelbase. The length of the 23' trailer and a SWB truck is the tail waggin' the dog! 🤣

GJ added comments are great! Too he added his DC-D charger just before Victron came out with the smaller and more efficient Orion 50A charger. Either way, OTT would only install the Oliver half of the installation and last time they offered a sale, it included the older 30A version. We use front LP port everyday camping. We have a 12 ft extension LP hose with quick connects and a Y-coupler on the other end. Connect our fire ring and grill at the same time. You need to remove the regulators from your appliances since the LP on board is already regulator to low pressure. Too bad OTT installs the rear connection inside of the sewer compartment, where you must drop the bumper to use it. I would use it on rare occasion if it was accessible like the front but never have. Tried to remove it but the underbelly LP lines are not easy to access. Many carry an extra tank for their grill, and you should have an extra tank if you go with two 20# tanks. Also, if you must use a generator the front shore power outlet can be helpful. Better to order or modify a new trailer with enough electric to avoid this (we run A/C for days on battery with a variable-speed A/C). If you go without the second outlet you won't need the PD5100 Automatic Transfer Relay. These are known to fail. I replaced one in a class-A RV and later a class-C years ago. I bypassed the one in our Oliver since we weren't using it and I preferred a direct run. My picture shows the PD5100 still installed if needed someday and right now it's only holding up our LevelMatePRO, another very useful upgrade we wouldn't live without.

This information is all here in various threads. I'll summarize while trying to be concise enough! 🤠 All new 2026-27 Oliver models will have D52 Nev-R Lube axles rated a 2x 5200 LBS. But unfortunately, on the EII, OTT will install same underrated springs they installed on all our hulls, the 1750 LB Dexter part # PR4B. These have a long history of failure where the main leaf breaks where the second shorter leaf makes contact. The OTT YouTube video on the Apex stated OTT is using the lighter rated 4-leaf version of Alcan Springs. In the Alcan design, the second leaf is the same length as the main leaf, so it cannot fail in the same way. There are also no gaps between leaves which is often observed on the Dexter PR4B. There must be DOT cost/legal reasons why OTT keeps their products rated at 7000 GVWR. If OTT installed the 5-leaf Alcan it could be rated at 10K. About 200 Oliver owners have installed the Alcan Spring upgrade, most with 5-leaf and a few with the 4-leaf version (without the bottom leaf). Not certain and it really doesn't matter as much, but it makes sense OTT will install the same Dexter EZ-Flex kits on all models which include Dexter shackles and wet bolts. The video also stated the Apex will have Bulldog shocks. OTT will likely keep installing Monroe 555001 shocks on the EII.

Get one of these instead. 😎 Price dropped $12 since I bought one in May! https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DHNG4DL8/

OMG! When we visited Minnesota last year in June, we must have been lucky one month earlier in the season. Though there were wildfires north of the border, so the sky was brown-cloudy, and it kept raining on and off. We're not used to consecutive cloudy days anymore, so we had to get out of there. I had planned to visit Itasca State Park and boondock further up, but... When we got up the next morning, I said to Chris, "We're driving west into North Dakota, and we'll stop only after we see sunshine again! I'd make the same next-day beeline after seeing those deer flies! Next time to Minnesota for us would be during the shoulder seasons.

Thanks again for your positive feedback! 🤗 I since wrote another thread on a complete 10-step maintenance process. However, I also received feedback stating OTT had claimed in 200+ installations there had been no reported Nev-R Lube bearing failures. I'd say the conservative/prepared approach is preferred to believing this won't happen to you. 😎 Recently, @Boudicca908 spent a few days with us in troubleshooting a trailer brake error code. First step was to jack up the hitched Ollie using the rear jacks and removing all 4 wheels. It was a good time to do regular maintenance was well, like grease the Zerks! I spun each drum to feel/hear if the shoes had been adjusting properly, there should be a slight shoe drag on each drum. Three of four where fine. When I spun the front-left wheel, considerable material fell out on the ground below. The material was coarse (see pic), not like the usual fine brake dust from normal brake use. BTW, this is the same wheel that locked up a couple days before causing a 30 ft burnt-rubber skid on the road! So, we decided to remove the drum/hub assembly to inspect the brakes inside. The shoes were a little more worn than expected but the brake shoe-spring assembly was working as it should. What was truly abnormal was the contact plane for the brake magnet on the drum. It has deep wear either side of a tall circular ridge which is quite apparent in the picture. I suspect the coarse material to be from the magnet and the contact plane on the drum! But that wasn't all. The Nev-R Lube bearing was surrounded by excessive grease, which had oozed out, grease that should stay inside the "Nev-R Lube bearing." One part of the 2-part inner bearing race could be pulled out and pushed back in a good 1/8" easily with one finger. I checked a new hub, where the play was >1mm not near 3mm! I would define this as a FAILED bearing, but if not yet, it will be squealing at some point. This is a 2022 hull with just under 25K towing miles (the TV has a reading for miles towed). These bearings have a 5-year, 100K miles warranty. IMHO, I believe the bearing wear/play created a wobble in the drum, causing the magnet to vibrate on the contact plane resulting in all this damage and burning rubber incident which could repeat. The Nev-Lube bearing is still under warranty. I wiped off the excess grease, blew all the brake dust and other particles out with compressed air, reinstalled the drum, torqued the spindle nut to 155 ft-lbs and we finished our other work. Last year, I had received damaged D52 axles from Dexter. They replaced my custom order and allowed me to keep the damaged axles, for my inconvenience, with a lot of good parts in the bargain! I loaned @Boudicca908 a complete left-side braking plate assembly and hub/drum/bearing assembly in case of need on a long road trip! Hopefully Dexter will replace these parts under warranty. On another subject, the OEM Dexter 1750 LB leaf springs didn't look so great either! One of 4 was flat on one end. All four had spacing between the leaves which we know is an indicator of near-future leaf failure. It just so happens; I had a spare set of PR4B springs which I also sent along with @Boudicca908. I had purchased a set of these prior to our Alcan upgrade so don't need them anymore! 😎 With Alcan Springs I do not believe a backup set is necessary. Safe travels to our friend @Boudicca908!

For us it's not a seasonal event. We use the boondocking valve configuration every week or two since we most often boondock in remote areas and pump extra fresh water from the 35-gal water tank in our truck bed. We also have 12" heavy foam mattresses and thankfully have not had to move a bed once while camping since we installed our motorized valves day-one! 😎 Got this idea from Steve @ScubaRx when I was a Forum Newbie and it has been an upgrade worth its weight for sure! At the same time, we did not want to live with the basic OEM water pump and installed a Made-in-USA Remco variable-speed pump which does not require an accumulator. They claim it's quieter, but I'd say it has a different sound as it increases speed to provide better flow. This pump can run dry for hours to and is generally self-priming given water is nearby in the plumbing.

So cool! Oh boy, I forgot one important thing in my dream Oliver order... No, switches, fuses, breakers or manual water valves installed under the beds! 🤣

On our last day together, I checked the 7-pin female receiver on the truck side. It was a strange assembly! The female socket was merely pressed into the bumper opening (not bolted), with only plastic tabs keeping it in place! Then the 7 wires were terminated in a plastic terminal that snapped into the backside of the receiver. These two parts were very loose, not strongly connected. It gets me the GMC design does not have this connection hardwired. I gave it a good shake, moving it back and forth and rotating it the terminal. Maybe I cleaned up the connections (temporarily) since @Boudicca908 did not see the error message in the next 2 days towing. If it was my TT and TV, I would replace the 7-blade connections on both sides! replace this female receiver with a part that has a short wiring harness fused to the socket. Then replace the Oliver male plug and cable all the way back to the junction box in the bathroom vanity. Purchase both male/female sides from the same quality manufacturer for the best pairing. Anybody know of a good supplier for quality parts? It's hard to read through all the Amazon offerings and eTrailer wasn't much better. Who makes the best 7-blade connectors? It's not what OTT used on this 2022 hull. The other thing I learned is there are two types of 7-blade connectors (see pic). One has a single blade which I've used for decades, and another must be a newer style where there are two (IMO flimsy) blades. All of my trailers, including our hull #113 has the older single blade style.

I'm glad this old thread got bumped. When it was started I was a new member of the Forum. Palo Duro Canyon SP might just be a great day-2 stop for us on the way to the OTT Rally, only 30 minutes from I-40. Though it would be a shame to be there for only an overnight stay! Hopefully this Texas SP can be the location for a future Texas Rally!

Perhaps an understatement! OTT Sales would not want to see me coming. 🤣 if I was to purchase a new Oliver, my build would have NO factory options! No batteries or tray, no inverter, solar wiring to roof but no panels. No A/C or fan, just the two 14x14” cutouts. No rooftop cameras or old-tech Wi-Fi booster. No microwave, just the opening, and no tank gauges. No TV, no radio, no interior wall mounted displays (all we need are Bluetooth apps) not a thermostat, nothing at all. 🤠 No soft furnace ducting, must be fixed hard ducting. No silicone caulk on anything anywhere! Of course we would not be able to negotiate such a bare Oliver, but it would be a great canvas to paint my own design and build. Got to go back to 16” wheels, D52 axles and the full 5-leaf Alcan Spring package and LT vs ST tires. I wonder the price tag on such an Oliver? It’s actually what I’ve done the hard way in a used Oliver, using fiberglass fill patching 100 holes, literally. 🙃

Yes, soft water lines must be installed in and out of the water pump. OTT used some kind of 'white' suction line from the fresh water tank. I'm not sure of the difference between this and PEX except the tubing is translucent and you can see the water within. You can see examples of both tubing in the picture I took after installing motorized ball valves.