Whitney, TX - TT

Thursday - I arrived at the Cat shop to pick up the RV around 7:30am. I loaded everything from the Jeep and the refrigerator was nice and cold. Started the engine and the oil pressure gauge read 0 psi. Not good. They sent out a tech and after verifying that the sensor was plugged in, he connected his laptop to the port on the engine and confirmed that there was oil pressure (52 psi). It turns out that they loaded a newer version of software to the engine computer. Apparently, on a Cat, you have to enable which data elements are shared out and oil pressure wasn’t “checked”. I was on my way by 9:30. The instrument cluster is a Freightliner product. 

It was about a 4 ½ hour drive to the Lake Whitney TT but for some reason, it seemed longer. There was a lot of traffic and road construction and the Garmin kept trying to send me on the Interstate through Austin. 

They’ve made many improvements to this RV park since the last time we were here. This pool at the lower lodge was never open every other time we’ve been here. It looks great. Kind of warm but I’ll blame that on the weather. 

Friday - I spent most of the day sorting things back out. I put the back seat back into the Jeep, rearranged the basement storage so I can get the compressor refrigerator back into the sliding tray, and put everything away that we took to the cabin. The clothes that I was wearing at the last hotel reeked of cigarette smoke so all of that went into the washing machine right away. When we moved to the cabin, I had removed several parts of the Internet setup including the Apple TV and the DMR hotspot. It's all working now. Sufficiently well to participate in two test sessions.

After dinner, I went to the pool again. There was a grandfather and his two grandsons there. They live in the area and visit one of the TT parks just about every weekend.

Saturday - After the morning test session, I started on my "project of the day". Actually, it'll probably take me more than today to get it done. Back while we were in Athens, TX, I ordered a high-output electric radiator fan to help move more air through the radiator stack. The stack is composed of the dash air condenser with the transmission cooler below, the charge air cooler aka intercooler, and the radiator. The fan has two speeds but I'm going to start with the lower speed which moves 1800 cfm (cubic feet per minute) and draws 18 amps. The high speed is 2400 cfm and draws 23 amps. The temperature controller is rated for 25 amps and is designed for one temperature threshold. The fan is attached to the A/C condenser using plastic pegs. With the grill closed, there is still around 1" of space.

I thought that mounting the fan was going to be the most challenging part of this installation but getting the thermocouple into the radiator fins may prove to be even more difficult due to lack of access. I partially removed the condenser to get to the back and pushed the pegs through the fins, avoiding the tubes, attached the retaining clips, and cut off the excess length. It seems solidly mounted and has rubber and foam feet to protect the condenser from damage.

I mounted the fan controller to the frame surrounding the engine. The wiring is a bit odd as it controls the ground instead of the 12V positive. I dug up an extra inline fuse and I'll install that on the 12V positive line that will run to the grid heater relay input terminal. The wiring is rated to run the grid heaters which draw over 100 amps. I have one more wire to run and that is supposed to be to the ignition. Since this doesn't have an ignition wire, and I don't want to connect it to anything related to the ECM (engine computer), I think I'll wire it to the parking light circuit. The current draw should be negligible as it is just for the fan controller circuitry. But, it is hot and muggy now so I'll wait until tomorrow for the last two connections.

The Internet speeds here have gone downhill now that it's the weekend. There are a lot more people here just for the weekend. I participated in both test sessions but had to run audio over a phone call.