by Bruue1 » Sat Jun 09, 2018 11:01 pm
Well... We're Back. 19 days 5,609 miles, 11 states. It was an awesome trip, tons of fun. We never played one board game, were busy all the time.
All in all the camper performed well. Crossing the Dakotas heading into the wind we were down to 9 mpgs and revving high rpms for extended periods of time. Otherwise we averaged 11-12 mpgs, even in the mountains. It pulled real straight and good the whole way. We're going to add some more shelves, water bottle holders, spice rack etc...
A couple notes:
1: I did not test fit the quick connect female end I had salvaged from the old camper to the male end on my grill before the trip. I just didn't get to it and it was at the bottome of my list. Firt time we tried to use the grill I found out they wouldn't mate. That was the second night out and the first shorter day of driving, my first relaxing evening turned into shopping box stores in a strange town far from home. I ended up converting both ends to standard 1/4 inch ends now, works great.
2: I plumbed the whole water system with irrigation tubing and barbed connections. I don't know why, I have always used pex on all of my other campers and I plumb my houses with copper and/or pex, this was my first time playing with barbs, tubing and hose clamps since my hydroponic gardening days over a decade ago. Irrigation tubing works in relatively low pressure systems, not in high pressure systems. Twice through the trip I developed a little drip. I was able to fix it on the spot both times pretty easily. The second to last day of the trip I heard a pop while hooked up to a campground spigot, flooded the camper floor a bit. Luckily I was right there, turned the water off and mopped up the water right away. I spent the last two days of the trip with no water system. It will be converted to pex soon.
3: I began the trip with two brand new cheap carlisle trailer tires. They were done after about 2000 miles through the mountains, and I mean done, ridiculaously uneven wwear, huge belt marks, as horrible as you could imagine. I found a nice pair of used Goodyear Marathon tires at a tire shop in Watsonville California for $40 each, that included mounting. They ran great, didn't even wear, excellent used treads, I was checking them at every stop. Then one blew for no apparent reason at 85mph in Nebraska on a two lane hwy, this was around the 4500 mile mark. When I bought the used treds I had an option to buy a non name brand of brand new trailer tire treads at the same shop for 80 a piece, they looked nice too, I just went with the goodyears. Next time I will buy the new treads. It looked like maybe the tread just flew off like a poorly treaded semi tire does. Luckily it tracked straight through the blow out, no swerve at all, never felt out of control. Had the spare on and were moving along within 20 minutes. I am going to special order some good 13 inch class D tires for it before any more hugely long road trips.
4: When that tire blew the force of the rim hitting the roadway was enough to activate the torsion suspension and slam the trailer frame behind the wheel well into the asphalt. It did get bent. I'll be able to pound it back to some semblance of its former shape but it got wrenched. Luckily it is a corner framing out the rear of the wheel well, nothing inside of the rails was affected, the frame is still square as is the axle. Inside the camper there is a bump in the camper floor behind the wheel well where the frame pushed up into the 3/4 inch sub floor. The floor is still sitting flush on the frame every where, it is like the frame pushed through on small spot but still has the floor fibers above is all still held in place. The best part of this story is that the floor and also the camper box did not mover anywhere else. I slammed it into the asphalt at 85mph and nothing tweaked at all, nothing moved, other than the frame where the contact was made. I am sure other campers I have owned would have been done with that impact. Other than minimal aesthetics this thing is not affected. Strong camper.
5: Went through one heavy rain, one of my windows leaked just a little bit. That one will get caulking around it and they will all get drip rails eventually as time and budget allow.
It was a great trip and it is a great camper, we love it, it is very comfortable and easy to tow. A family of four could not have done better. Now it will go on local weekend trips for the next two years. 2019-2020 Winter is will again hit the road long term but that time for Florida to John Pennekamp State Park and then to Disney World.
Thanks guys, keep building, keep camping, keep trying.
Stumpy, Lefty and One Eye all agree: experience is the best teacher.