Our RV Adventures

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I say Bits and Pieces because nothing much happened today, so this blog is a little of this and a little of that.

First off, I want to thank everyone for the many great suggestions about fixing my rig door handle. Several people suggested I just drill through the wall and use machine bolts and decorative nuts on the inside. This one I had thought of, and it wouldn’t be a problem for the top two bolts. But the bottom three would come out right in the console where all the switches, wiring, and battery disconnects are. So I’m somewhat hesitant  to try that, except as a last resort.

I think the best one, which came from 3 or 4 readers, follows up on my Plastic Wood or JB Weld idea, but uses Gorilla Glue instead. Another reader suggested I fill in the hole with toothpicks soaked in Gorilla Glue, to provide some extra support, and I think this is the way I’ll go. I’ve done something like this before, repairing door hinge screw holes, using Elmer’s Carpenter Glue and dowel rods, but it didn’t occur to me to use the idea here. That’s what I have smart readers for.

I did check my several-years old bottle of Gorilla Glue and found it hard as a rock, so a new bottle (and toothpicks) are on my list for Friday’s Wal-Mart run.

Thanks again, guys.

fgfdg

What the #$^*&* is up with Starbucks? Or at least with the Starbucks phone app?

Last night I got a text message from Verizon saying that I had hit  75% of my data allowance for this month. Now, since I only have 4GB of data on my phone, this happens sometime. But usually I don’t go much over 2GB.

My plan starts over on the 8th of the month, so I just figured I’d hold off on any large updates like Angry Birds, or a couple of other games until then. But then this morning I got another text message saying I had now used 90% of my 4GB.

WTH

So I went into Settings/Data Usage on my phone to check things out.  And the culprit was immediately obvious since it was at the top of the list. While things like Gmail, Kindle, and Dropbox were .09 GB, .14 GB, and .12 GB, respectively, my Starbucks app had used 1.6 GB, almost half my monthly total, in the last two days, and it was still doing more in the background.

So the Starbucks app is gone. I only used it occasionally to find a nearby Starbucks anyway, but OK Google will do that just fine.

A lot of you have been snapping up the KJL Cree LED 900 lumens Flashlight I told you about, and I mean a lot. As I said, one reader bought 10. Thanks.

And besides almost blinding my friend Nick Russell when he pointed one at a mirror, I found another great use for them.

It’s a great Coyote Silencer.

I’ve mentioned before that I regularly hear coyotes yipping and yelping in the area, and about 3am this morning, they were at it again. But this time, rather than sounding a pretty good distance away, they sounded like they were right next door.

About 50 yards away, just over a small rise, there’s a good sized pond, one of several around here. And it sounded like the coyotes were right there. So after listening to them going at it for about 30 seconds, I swept my light back and forth in that direction, looking for glowing eyes. No eyes, but it was like I had flipped a switch.

The coyotes went dead silent and I never heard another yip or yelp the rest of the morning. Who knew?

fgfdg

I finally got around to replacing the battery in my Galaxy S5 phone this afternoon. It wasn’t holding a charge all day like it used to, so I included a new one in my last Amazon order. But then I kind of forgot about it.

But today I noticed it was getting hot in my hand when I talked for very long, and even hotter when I plugged it into the charger. So not wanting my head to burst into flames at some point, I thought this would be a good time to change it out.

As I expected, it took longer to get the Otterbox case off than to actually replace the battery, but that’s a good thing. If it’s hard for me to get into the phone, then it’s hard for anything else like dust or water to get in too.

So now, hopefully, I’m good for another 18 months or so.

fgfdg

And lastly, the magic elixir strikes again.

We’ve got one of those Holmes bullet-shaped turbo fans that we use in the rig and on the gate, but the speed control button on the base had gotten very difficult to use. You had to really push on it to get it to work, and then sometime it would skip speeds, or just shut off. So this was a job for Strike Hold.

I first saw this stuff at an FMCA rally up in Goshen, IN a couple of years ago, and was really astonished to see the vendor dip his hand holding a running electric drill into a vat of the stuff, along with a lit light bulb.

It was originally developed for cleaning and lubricating guns for the military, but it’s also great doing the same for any electrical connectors, too. I’ve used it to resurrect a lot of electronic stuff, including charging port on Jan’s Kindle Paperwhite, and the power connector on my ASUS laptop.

It cleans off rust and corrosion, and leaves a dry lubricating film on metal parts, protecting against moisture.

And as I had hoped, I sprayed it on the switch button, let it soak in for a while, and the problem was fixed.

Try it. It’s good for what ails you. Or your electrical stuff, anyway.

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Thought for the Day:

“When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.” – Winston Churchill

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Still in progress.

About 11:30 I headed in to Carthage to the Ace Hardware to get some larger screws for another repair attempt on my lighted door handle.

When the repair place in Prescott removed it last June to replace the wiring leading to the light inside after it damaged by our blowout, they stripped out several of the 5 screws that hold it on. This of course put extra stress on the remaining ones and they started coming loose too.

The ones that are holding the handle on now are #12 Bevel Head Sheet Metal Screws, so I thought I’d try #14’s to see if they would work.

Of course, from the Ace Hardware parking lot I could see the Whataburger, so a stop there to bring back lunch was in order on my way home.

Later, after lunch and I was on the gate, I tried out the larger screws . . . with mixed results. I did have to drill out the holes in the handle slightly for the larger screws, but this was no problem.

But the problem was that only one new screw tightened down. The rest still just spun. So now a little further inspection was in order. Using a flashlight and a right angle probe, it looked like the backing for the handle is a block of wood. This is what the screws fastened into behind the fiberglass siding. And it looks like the wood block has split vertically, which is why the screws aren’t holding.

So at this point I’m in a quandary. I can’t use larger screws because the heads would be too large to recess into the handle. I can’t use see how I can use any type of molly or wing bolt because there’s no room for it to expand, and I think that trying to use some sort of plastic or lead anchor would just cause the wood to split more.

I’m still mulling this over, but one idea I’m thinking about is to squirt as much Plastic Wood into the holes as I can, let it dry thoroughly, then drill a starter hole and try screwing into that.

Or similarly, try to fill the holes with one of those JB Weld Steel products, then drill and tap it, and then use machine bolts instead of sheet metal screws.

In other words, it’s problem still in work.

Anyone have any ideas? Let me know.

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Thought for the Day:

I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals. – Sir Winston Churchill

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