Tom & Shelly's build

[eLink]

This journal has been a great inspiration. I'm glad to see that it's finally finished and you can start enjoying it!

[western traveler]

It has been great following your build.

[noseoil]

Great job on the build guys, looks like it should be rolling well into the future with many miles of smiles. Nice to see a good design well-executed & completed. It's always worth the wait, but now the fun really begins. Hope to see you up here soon, on one of your trips!

Let us know what NM motor vehicles says about a license plate & how they approach it for inspection. I'll be curious to see how it goes & what they're looking at on a build. I still need to transfer ours over from Arizona, but with the permanent plate, I'm reluctant to spend more money...

[Tom&Shelly]

Thank you all! This has been a great deal of fun, a wonderful learning experience, and just a little frustration once in awhile. (A bad day in the wood shop beats a good day at work, at least for the times I worked at a desk!)

Can't wait to try her out. Tim, we hope we can make it up there sometime in the next month or so. We'll let you know.

We registered it this morning. They did not inspect at all (we didn't even have it with us--it was at our mechanic having passenger tires installed). The other day we took it to the trailer manufacturer and he wrote us a front dated invoice and manufacturer's certificate, and those and my license (for ID) were all MVD needed. These days, we did need to make an appointment at our (rural) MVD a few days in advance.

We didn't need weight for registration, but I was curious so we took her to a station and it came to 1800 lbs with water and camping gear (we took the water, then dumped it on the way back to check handling both ways--no difference--great each way). So we didn't quite figure the tongue weight in the same configuration, but ignoring that: 208/1800 = 11.5 %, so we seem to have done well.

Too much running around to take pictures this morning, which is unfortunate, because it was a rare overcast day. Hopefully, we can get some under those conditions soon.

Tom

[noseoil]

Great news on the license plate. How much was it for the plate & registration, & for how long (year to year, permanent, like Arizona or)?

Socked in here in Raton today as well. Was out in the shop earlier on some stuff, but not pouring concrete today for another obelisk until it's a bit warmer. The mold worked well enough.

[Tom&Shelly]

Great news on the license plate. How much was it for the plate & registration, & for how long (year to year, permanent, like Arizona or)?

Hi Tim,

Nice obelisk!

For a permanent plate: Vehicle excise tax: $83.96, Original permanent registration: $41.50, Vehicle Title Fees: $5.00, Credit card fee: $1.55, and Village of Tijeras surcharge fee: $10.00. Seems like some shady fees there, especially since they only take credit and debit cards, but at least it was quick and easy.

No choice on plate type. This time it was the traditional yellow one. When I registered our Harbor Fright trailer in 2007 they gave me a balloon plate (ugly! But then I know what balloons really look like).

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

Clouded up again this afternoon, so when we got the teardrop back from our mechanic with a brand new set of passenger tires, I left it out and took a few pictures:





I call the last one "Does this license plate make my a$$ look fat?" No one told me that when you take a picture of the back of a Benroy, the hatch should be open.

Tried a few books in the bookcase and they rearranged themselves, but all stayed in their little area



Guess I should have taken the picture before straightening them up. The issue is several different sizes in there so the adjustable back bar has to be set for the big ones. May have to keep the same size books in there. Read all of Tony Latham's books, so I have a Tony Hillerman in there for evening reading--inspiration for camping in Dine (Navajo) country. I'm saving a stack of Louis L'amour for longer trips later in the Summer.

It looks like the sliders slide around as we drive (again, I should've take the picture first--this is so you know what I'm talking about). May have to come up with some sort of latch



But back in the galley the water jugs stayed put, and the Coleman stove and nested cook kit and dutch ovens all seem to stay in more or less one place.

Tom

[S. Heisley]

Looks Great! Thanks for sharing the journey of your build.

[Tom&Shelly]

:thumbsup: Looks Great! Thanks for sharing the journey of your build.

Thank you Sharon.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

Got the home base power installed



I used 3/4" aluminum angle for the entire thing. If I do it over, I'll use 1" or even 1.5" for the pieces against the wall, since they flexed more than I expected. Installed the panel at about 45 degrees, which my calculations suggest should yield good performance year-round. I carefully installed the panel a few inches from the wall so it won't catch too much shade from the overhang.

The wires fit nicely through a gap between the wall and the door.

The wires were a little stiff to run straight to the trailer plug, so I built a charging station out of junk



Included a fuse because I had an extra fuse block, and also a voltage meter that I was going to install in the teardrop before they invented the AiLi columb meter. I don't want it on all the time so I included a push button from my Dad's junk box.



It's partly cloudy with snow flurries today, but took that picture when the Sun was behind thin clouds. Amazed me that it would drop to about 14 volts for several seconds, even though I didn't notice any change in brightness; if indeed that's due to the weather and not something in the circuit through the PWM controller. I'll go and figure that out one of these days.

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

Still a little cool for camping in the mountains of New Mexico (without heat in the teardrop). Plus we had a few personal matters to attend to. Maybe in a week or so...

In the meantime, I put in the counter light, complete with an upper shelf to hold things while in camp



Also included a little place to store a few items for checking out the shore power connection



The thing on the left is an Altoids can. I told Shelly we could suck on the mints to calm our nerves while the tow truck was on the way. She pointed out it was fairly stressful this morning, and, if we sucked on them now, I could put some spare fuses in the can. So that's what we did.

I was going to put a Harbor Fright meter in there, but decided it made more sense in the tool box in the truck. After all, that's where we're more likely to have wiring problems (because I didn't do those!)

Have a few square tuits, but when I get a round one I'll take some scrap Baltic birch and make something to hide the wires, and hold a lid for the storage bin.

I think this is a bit "gimmicky", but I made red/amber/white counter lights



the idea being red to preserve night vision, amber to dissuade bugs, and white if we actually want to see what color the food we're preparing is. Bright as the counter lights in our cabin kitchen,

Tom

[Tom&Shelly]

We had our shake-down campout 29 April - 1 May (this morning). Went to Bandelier National Monument, Northwest of Santa Fe next to Los Alamos National Laboratory, and about two hours from us.

We stayed at bandelier's "Juniper campground":



Nice place--very clean, flush toilets, and dish cleaning sinks with hot water.

All went well with Cabin Fever. Everything worked as planned. We ended up using about 6% of our battery capacity



After a two hour return trip, that was halfway refilled from the TV. I think it was still too full to take much more current. Anyway, at that rate, we could go for about two weeks and not deplete the battery more than halfway. Of course, it was still daylight when we made dinner so we didn't use the galley lights, and we didn't try out the DVD player.

Towing the trailer went real well up mostly paved highways and secondary roads. Only problem was after we got home and backing it into the garage. Lots of strange noises from the trailer brakes, and when finished the hubs were hot (they were cool the whole trip up). So we have to investigate that some more.

My camp cookery needs practice. I tried out corned beef, canned peas and carrots, sliced potatoes and tomato soup (we call it Irish scallop for some reason) in a dutch oven



The part we ate tasted fine, but the coals must have been too hot for a lot of it, and we had some burned to the sides and bottom. Anyone know how to keep it cooler, or should I have taken it out sooner?

That was our first dinner, and I also screwed up the eggs for the first breakfast, trying to fry them on an aluminum pan over a Coleman stove we can't really adjust. After that, Shelly made the second dinner and this mornings breakfast (egg sandwiches) with more success.

Spent some time yesterday hiking (less than 3 miles round-trip) from the visitor center to the "Alcove House" 140 feet above the valley floor. The cliffs are made of volcanic tuff, which the ancestral Pueblo carved out and added to, to make their homes.





I only get nervous on the ladders when gripping the loose rungs. Luckily, the Ranger assured me those had all broken off last week.

I hope we did not dis-please the spirits!



Tom

[noseoil]

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[Tom&Shelly]

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Thank you Tim!

Think I need to print and laminate this to take with us. I clearly had too many briquettes under the oven.

For the Coleman stove, I'm thinking either we buy a Partner Steel stove (as Tony Latham uses) or I rebuild the Coleman with some better regulator valves to give us more adjustment.

Tom

[bdosborn]

Tom,

That's way too many coals. We use the 3 up 2 down method for ~325F. Add 3 to the dutch oven diameter for the number of coals on the top. Subtract two from the dutch oven diameter for the number of coals under the oven. When you can smell your food it's done. Works every time.

Bruce