Your wisdom - please!

[Thom1961]

Hello All,

As a new member, this is my first posting to the group. I need your collective wisdom, please!

I am now the proud owner of a new-to-me 2000 Fleetwood Bounder 34D that has just over 50,000 miles on a Ford Triton V-10. I recently purchased this coach from a small family owned dealer in Michigan and drove it back to my home in Minnesota over 900 miles. It drove quite nice and I didn't have any appreciable issues. The engine purred along with ease and the transmission shifted up and down flawlessly as asked.

Since then an issue has come up I need help to figure out what is going on, so am hoping someone might steer me in the right direction. If someone can give me a good idea what the problem might be, it could potentially save me some money in repair.

In attempting to take the motorhome west on my annual trip to California, I started out and after driving 50-60 miles in the rain, I began to experience a "jerk" or "halt" that appeared to be random. There were no unusual vibrations, squeals or abnormal sounds. It didn't appear to involve the engine or transmission, but perhaps something in the drive train? No trouble light ever came on. It would only last for a split second (literally) when occurring. There was no change in the tachometer or speedometer, when it happened, it was not shifting up or down and occurred on level roads at highway speeds. It happened both in overdrive and when manually taken out of overdrive. Wondering what was happening, I took it to a semi-truck repair shop and they couldn't really find anything. U-joints all appeared tight, There was no leaking of fluid at the differential, and when checked the fluid was clear and clean. There was on the Right rear axle some moisture, but it was not weeping. The mechanic looking at it only suggested a possible bearing/seal going out on that right rear. He had no other suggestions.

I then drove the coach home the 150 miles I had traveled and the same thing occurred several times again, randomly, but was able to get home without further issues. Any ideas, please? Has anyone experienced this as well?

Thank you,
Thomas Reynolds

[Thom1961]

Thank you so much for the information!!!
Tom

[doxiemom11]

Yes - we also know someone who drove in rain and had the air filter saturated with water. He thought he had a transmission problem.

[CG_Dawson]

The lug nut covers mentioned by Dutch should also have two small indentations on opposite sides of the covers. If you look around in the storage bays, you may find a "T" handle wrench that fits those covers.

[Dutch_12078]

Thom1961 wrote:

If you will indulge me with asking another question. I am trying to get some extensions on the dual rear wheels for checking and maintaining the tires for proper air pressure. The way the tires are placed, the valve stems are impossible to get to, both inner tires and outside. What do you have to do to get the hub caps off, or do they come off at all? What about the bolt covers and center of the hub? My brother and I have tried to crow-bar them off, but they seem stuck from the center. Tricks? Something we're missing?

Thank you for the welcome, by the way! You guys rock!!!

Tom

Look for two nut covers opposite each other that do NOT have the small flange on them that the rest do. Those two will unscrew from an adapter that's screwed onto the stud ends after the lug nut. Removing those two "odd" nuts will allow the wheel cover to be pulled off, and removing the adapters will allow the wheel to removed normally.

[Thom1961]

Latest report: My brother and I took the Bounder out for a 30 mile road trip today, after putting in 3 bottles of Heat, sufficient for the amount of gas in the tank, to dry up any potential water that was there... it never hiccuped once the entire time we were out. We tested it on both OD and manually taking OD off. Since we were unable to reproduce the same symptoms that occurred in the rainy weather, I am concluding it was the moisture that was causing the problem, just like so many of you suspected!

It took several attempts to get the generator to stay running (with a load), but after our road test, it did. Perhaps there was some more water in the line to that. I'm sure it needs a tune-up as it was running a little rough even so.

If you will indulge me with asking another question. I am trying to get some extensions on the dual rear wheels for checking and maintaining the tires for proper air pressure. The way the tires are placed, the valve stems are impossible to get to, both inner tires and outside. What do you have to do to get the hub caps off, or do they come off at all? What about the bolt covers and center of the hub? My brother and I have tried to crow-bar them off, but they seem stuck from the center. Tricks? Something we're missing?

Thank you for the welcome, by the way! You guys rock!!!

Tom

[Rwake901]

happy-2 wrote:
AFTER YOU GOT OUT OF THR RAIN DID THE PROBLEM CONTINUE? If so you mite check your Air cleaner and see if its getting wet from the rain.I believe there was a modification for the Air cleaner so as to not let water get in.Id make a shroud to block the water.

X2. I've heard this too that the air cleaner sucks in water.

[Blackdiamond]

You said it did not appear to be engine or trans related.

Could it have been a very brief moment of hydroplaning?

[Cobra21]

ddndoug wrote:
Moisture will cause a bad coil to arc to ground much easier. If it was an electrical miss it can feel like the symptoms your describing, sometimes they will set a code in your computer and sometimes they won't.

Doug

This would also be my guess, a spark plug or plug coil.

[J-Rooster]

Thom, I'm sorry for being rude let me be the first one to welcome you to RV.Net!

[J-Rooster]

J-Rooster wrote:

happy-2 wrote:
I would Also use some Seafome or stable in the gas tank and run it through the Genarator to help keep water out of the gas.And when you fuel up and park it for awhile put a bottle of Stable in the tank,run the gen till you get home and parkit.

X-2, Seafoam and change fuel filter sounds like you ran some bad gas thru your system IMHO. I had the same problem a while back. Seafoam is $7.00 per can at Walmart 1 can will treat 16 gallons of fuel.

The bad gas can happen when gas sits in the fuel tank for long periods of time.

[J-Rooster]

happy-2 wrote:
I would Also use some Seafome or stable in the gas tank and run it through the Genarator to help keep water out of the gas.And when you fuel up and park it for awhile put a bottle of Stable in the tank,run the gen till you get home and parkit.

X-2, Seafoam and change fuel filter sounds like you ran some bad gas thru your system IMHO. I had the same problem a while back. Seafoam is $7.00 per can at Walmart 1 can will treat 16 gallons of fuel.

[Bruce_Brown]

happy-2 wrote:
AFTER YOU GOT OUT OF THR RAIN DID THE PROBLEM CONTINUE? If so you mite check your Air cleaner and see if its getting wet from the rain.I believe there was a modification for the Air cleaner so as to not let water get in.Id make a shroud to block the water.

You beat me to it. Those are the classic systems of water injestation, and the year of the MH also fits the time of that air intake design.

[rk911]

happy-2 wrote:
AFTER YOU GOT OUT OF THR RAIN DID THE PROBLEM CONTINUE? If so you mite check your Air cleaner and see if its getting wet from the rain.I believe there was a modification for the Air cleaner so as to not let water get in.Id make a shroud to block the water.

betcha this is the pblm. we experienced the same symptoms as described by the OP. cause was a water-logged air filter. ford did have a TSB (technical service bulletin) for this that involved a shroud for the air filter. our solution was to change the paper filter to a K&N Filter.

[Thom1961]

Tomorrow is expected to be a sunny, reasonably warm day for us here in northern Minnesota. I plan to further my investigation as several of you have made suggestions and take the coach on a run. Does anyone have a picture of the modification made to shroud the air intake to prevent water from entering the system? I'm not mechanically inclined at all, so every bit of help is greatly appreciated.