Our RV Adventures

It’s been a S L O W day today, our slowest full day so far.

In fact we only had 23 vehicles come through the gate today, not even a full page of 24. So very nice.

Jamie, our GGS supervisor/service guy came by about 8:30 this morning to do the oil/filter change on our generator and top off our diesel. He didn’t bring water with him, but said we still had 250 gallons, so half a tank.

I was already in bed when he got here, and I vaguely remember him shutting off the generator because the white noise machine we use went off. Then a while later I woke up HOT. It seemed like a good bit of time had gone by, and I could hear the generator running, so what the heck?

Checking up front, we had no power there either. So I stuck my head out the door and ask Jan if Jamie was still here working on the generator and still had the circuit breaker off. She said No, and that he left a good while ago.

At this point I was think that maybe he forgot to turn the 50 amp breaker to the coach back on. Todd, our service guy at Carthage Gate last year did this. But Jan’s fan and stuff under the canopy run off the 30 amp breaker and the lights and bell run off the 20 amp, so hers were working.

Getting dressed and going outside I found the 50 amp breaker in the ON position, so what the heck?

Next I checked my Progressive EMS (Electrical Management System) and I found it was only showing power to L1 and nothing on L2. Going back and looking closer, I noticed that the right side of the breaker was just slightly lower than the left side, and when I wiggled the handle the left side was firm and the right one had a little play in it.

So, a bad breaker.

We had a breaker die completely last year, so nothing new.

The reason the Progressive EMS shut down power to the coach is that a low or no voltage condition on one line is considered a fault condition and it shuts down. We had the same thing happen on one of our first gates in 2012 when L2 on the generator dropped to 80 volts, so the EMS shut down to protect the AC’s from the low voltage.

In this case, with no voltage, I could have put the EMS in bypass mode which would have gotten half the coach working, or I could have plugged the coach in the 30 amp breaker, and then used my AC bypass line to run the 2nd AC from the 20 amp breaker.

So I had several backup options, but I wanted take a little time to play with the breaker to see if I could get it working. So unplugging the coach power cable, I used my voltmeter to monitor the voltage on the bad side and flicked the breaker off and on until I got a reading, pushing up hard on the right side.

It took about 10 tries, but when I finally had voltage, I plugged the coach back in with the breaker still hot. Not a good idea normally, but necessary under these circumstances. And a minute later, I heard the generator lug down a little as both AC’s came on at the same time. Success!

Then it was back to bed for another couple of hours. Later in the afternoon I called Jamie and told him what happened, and to bring a new breaker with him next time he comes by.

So that was the problem. The non-problem, that’s where you think you have a problem but you really don’t, showed up right after I got the new TV installed. Jan was no longer getting a signal back to her TV in the bedroom.

Now the TV upfront has nothing to do with her TV in back. Her signal comes from an S-Video and L-R audio output from the DirecTV DVR, both of which feed into a stand-alone RF modulator, and then the output of this feeds on Ch. 4 on the line going back to the bedroom TV.

Her TV showed no signal, just snow, so that pretty much eliminated the DVR as the problem, since if the modulator were working, I’d have a black screen, not snow. So either the RF modulator was bad, or the cable from the modulator, through the wall down the length of the coach, was bad. Not a good thought.

So to test this out, I got a 50 foot length of cable and ran it directly from the modulator , down the hall, to the bedroom TV. And now I had video.

Bummer!

I would use another word, but this is a family blog.

This means the cable was bad. And since I wasn’t going to be able to pull a new cable, and I don’t think Jan would like to keep the cable running down the hall, I went on Amazon to look at wireless AV transmitters. But something kept nagging away at me.

And then in one of those AHa! moments, I remember the rig’s original RF switcher. This was a little push-button box that let you change inputs and outputs between the two T’V’s, the rooftop TV antenna, and the VCR.

And then I also remembered that although I had bypassed all the front TV and VCR cables, the feed to the bedroom TV still went through the switcher.

So digging into the overhead cabinet where the switcher lived, I found the TV2 button in the wrong position. I guess I must have pushed against the DVR which pushed against the switcher when I was moving stuff around getting the new TV into position.

So that was how I fixed the non-problem. I just pushed the button. Sometimes it’s the easy stuff that’s hard.

One other thing I accomplished this afternoon was to program our DirecTV remotes so that they will control the new TV. It took longer than I expected because I had to go through about 20 5 digit codes before I found the right one.

As I mentioned yesterday, today was Blue Moon BBQ day, so I made the 1/4 mile trip down there about 12:45 to pick up lunch. And I won’t make that mistake again.

In the past I’ve always gone there about 11:30 and have always gotten my order in immediately, but today the place was packed and I was 6th in line, with some large orders in front of me. So it was about 20 minutes until I got my order taken.

I went later today, since I slept in a little longer due to my rude awakening from no AC’s working.

Jan got her favorite (well, her favorite besides the Nachos last week) Stuffed Baked Potato, while I again got the 3 meat plate, but with Pork Loin instead of Ribs. The Brisket and the Hot Sausage are delicious, but for me the Ribs are only good, not great.

They’re obviously parboiled before they’re put on the grill, or in the smoker. This way they have that ‘so tender, they fall off the bone’. And that’s what you get. With a slight tug, the meat just comes right off, leaving a nice smooth bone.

I don’t like that.

I like my rib meat with more texture, and with the meat sticking to the bone, so you have to gnaw it a little to get all the meat off. But that’s just me. Your mileage may differ.

We both had leftovers for tomorrow, and I also got a small Cowboy Cornbread to add to it, a Blue Moon two’fer. Nice. 

Thought for the Day:

As I said, sometimes it’s the easy stuff that’s hard.

adfadsfs