Deming, NM

Friday - A long-ish travel day at 404 miles. We finally got out of Texas and we are about half way through New Mexico. We were originally thinking of stopping at a Harvest Host but decided to look at an RV park as it’s supposed to drop below freezing tonight. Since the rear furnace is still not working, we can have an electric heater if needed. 

This is an Escapee RV park. We had never stayed at one of them before and decided to try one out. It’s not bad. Tomorrow is a short travel day to Valley Vista RV park in Benson, AZ. One of our favorite places to stay.

Later - Well, it did drop to freezing in the morning so I think the RV park was a good choice. I really need to look at the furnace again. I think it’s something simple as I couldn’t find 12V on any of the wiring. Sounds like another project…

Midland, TX - HH

Thursday - A moderately long travel day to Midland, TX. Around 320 miles. We are staying at the Permian Basin Petroleum Museum using Harvest Hosts. I’ve stayed here before while traveling towards Tucson a couple of years ago. 

The museum also has a Chaparral Gallery as the racing organization is located in Midland. An excellent museum with a lot of information on the Permian Basin and the oil and gas industry. Lots of “hands on” exhibits. 

Tomorrow, we may actually make it out of Texas as we are aiming for just across the New Mexico border. Tonight’s low is forecast to be in the 30s. We’ll see how it goes with only the front furnace. I suspect that it’ll be just fine. 

Bridgeport, TX - TT

Monday - It was a productive morning. The motorhome's left turn signal was intermittent. If I put pressure on the lever, it would work ... most of the time. This is a recurring problem as I had repaired it before. I removed the lever assembly and disassembled it. It wasn't designed to be serviced but I didn't let that stop me. Several of the contacts inside of the assembly were burned. All bulbs on the motorhome's left turn side are regular tungsten filament bulbs. About half of the bulbs on the passenger side are LED. It may be time to change all of them to LED. One project finished. 

By early afternoon, the rain had stopped and the ground was almost completely dry. I removed the boot from the transfer case lever to see if the cable was still attached. It was. After crawling under the Jeep, I found the shift rod on the transfer case, and the end that should be attached to the shift lever cable wasn't connected. I'll assume that the tech just forgot as opposed to incompetence. I snapped it back on and the lever now shifts properly and the dashboard display registers correctly.

I was worried that I was losing hydraulic fluid on the RV. This is hydraulic fluid for the steering and the engine fan. I had checked the fluid in Cheyenne and the reservoir was full (the shop filled the reservoir). I hadn't checked it again until Hondo and I needed to add a couple of quarts. I used to check it every drive day and usually needed to add a little each time. There is some sort of pressure relief valve on the hydraulic pump that has a small crack and the shop in Cheyenne temporarily fixed it last year with some marine epoxy. They couldn't get the part in time for us to leave last year so they mailed it to me in Hondo. I have the part and just need to find a shop to install it. It needs a very large wrench and, I suspect, it'll make a mess when the old one is removed.

The reason that we are back here is to have the passenger-side windshield glass replaced. The shop that I had contacted earlier received the glass from the insurance company and is located in Arlington, TX, which is north of Fort Worth. This TT park is within the mileage allowance the insurance allows. He is planning to come out here on Tuesday. Rain and wind were forecasted for today. Tomorrow is supposed to be pretty nice. It's been blowing pretty good today with gusts almost to 50mph.

Tuesday - No wind and blue skies. I had picked up this extendable pole for the StarLink dish from Amazon and it was delivered right before we left Hondo. Today was the first time to try it out. The 15m cable is long enough to reach from this location on the rear ladder, through the driver sliding window and almost reach the router. I had picked up a weatherproof RJ-45 coupler last month and was planning to put a pass-through into the side of the RV. When I tested the coupler with a functional Ethernet cable, it didn’t work. So for now, the cable passes through the window opening. 

I tested the coupler and there is continuity on all 8 pins. One Ethernet cable failed on pin 8 so maybe I have a bad cable. Once the glass company is finished, I’ll try the coupler with a different cable. 

This afternoon, a team of four replaced the rubber seal and the passenger half of the windshield. To replace the seal, the drivers side also needed to be removed. The new glass appears to fit better than the old one as the corners look seated. 

The RV needs to sit for at least 24 hours so the urethane can set. Hopefully, this fix lasts… 

I tried using a cable (commercial Cat6 cable) that didn't have continuity on pin 8. Several cables from the same vendor exhibited the same flaw. Starlink sends power to the dish using the unused pairs on the Cat5/6 cable which includes pin 8. The good cable I'm currently using came from Walmart.

The only task remaining at this time is the rear furnace.

More RV Tasks

Friday - The super reliable rear furnace wouldn’t light sometime last week after working just fine for quite a while including all night. Odd. This morning, I removed the burner assembly, disassembled and cleaned it. The flame diffuser was starting to fall apart but it was still in one piece. I ordered a replacement diffuser and after vacuuming out the furnace, I reassembled it and tested it. It's working again. 

I installed a ladder-mounted pole for our StarLink antenna but haven't tried it out as we are heading back to Bridgeport, TX, in a couple of days so our windshield could be replaced. The pole and mount seem to be sturdy and well-made. All metal with no plastic pieces. I’ll set it up at the next campground. The unknown is whether the StarLink cable is long enough to reach the router from the ladder. I’m bringing a Cat6 coupler and an additional 25’ cable.

The glass shop picked up the RV glass from the shipping company yesterday. Slow shipping as it took almost two weeks to get from Oregon to Texas. There is rain predicted for Monday so the shop is targeting  Tuesday for the installation.

Saturday - The furnace didn’t run last night as in the blower didn’t even come on. The previous problem is that it wouldn’t light. Another thing to troubleshoot over the next few days. Today, I started getting things put away for travel. There must be a hydraulic leak as I had to add oil to the hydraulic reservoir on the engine. 

The basement storage seems empty as a lot of stuff was moved to the shed. 

Sunday - We left before 9am as we had a long-ish travel day planned. Challenges started first thing. Apparently, the dealer neglected to connect the shift lever to the transfer case. So we couldn’t flat tow the Jeep. Bridget drove it to our destination which was over 350 miles north. We are back at the Bay Landing TT park near Bridgeport, TX.