gregirish1954
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Re: Size black and grey water tanks for an Ford E-150
I've had my no-frills Thetford TC 25100 for about 18 years now and the only time it leaked was when I didn't put the top unit back on the bottom unit properly. Only did that once!! If it ever fails I plan on replacing it with the another 2.5 gallon capacity unit. The larger units might sound good initially but 5 gallons of waste is awful heavy, especially when trying to empty the tank into a 4" dump-tube!! I have it sitting on top of a custom stand to get the seat-height back up to something reasonable and there is storage in the stand for bowl-liners, tank chem, and toilet paper. Stand and toilet slid into a cupboard when not in use.834Views0likes0CommentsRe: Houston Area Camping Advice
Besides getting the annual State Park Pass, you might want to load the Texas State Parks app on your phone. With it you can find state parks via a list or by map, get reasonably detailed info on each park - including any advisories (Some state parks have closures for hunts and others get crowded on popular weekends and temporarily close for capacity reasons), get PDF maps of facilities and trails, and make reservations.640Views0likes0CommentsRe: Route from Roswell to fort stockton
Last April I took 285 the other direction from Ft.Stockton to Artesia. Between Carlsbad and Ft. Stockton is the Permian basin with loads of oil drilling and production going on. This means lots of trucks. It's not pretty by any means but I didn't find the road to be all that bad. (but I drive a lot of forest service roads so my scale of good and bad might be skewed a bit!!) On my way back through a month later I took 180/87 to Big Spring. Again, part of this trip is in the oil-fields and not pretty but the roads are not bad. While I-20 does skirt the southern edge of the Dallas/Ft.Worth complex it's certainly not a road you want to be on with a large vehicle during peak times!! Other than that it's not a bad shot going east as long as the weather doesn't **** on you.542Views0likes0CommentsRe: Where do you keep papers you might need someday (or not)?
I, as several of the other respondents do, also scan documents onto files which are then stored on thumb drives, along with all the rest of my files. (I keep almost nothing but the OS and programs on the internal hard disk) Once a week I back up my working thumb drive to an encrypted local file which is stored on the internal hard disk as well as copied to yet another thumb drive which is locked away. Being a highly suspicious type, as well as a former IT person trained back in the 70's by NSA, I NEVER use the cloud, even though it's convenient, because that puts the integrity and safety of my data out of my control and everybody knows that eventually someone is going to screw up. I also use an off-the-shelf encrypting security app on each of my thumb drives. that way if someone gets their hands on one of my drives they also have to crack my 32 character password before getting at the files. (For an extra layer of security, sensitive files are also individually encrypted with their own unique password.) Because I keep the thumb drives separate from the computer unless I'm actually working with one, if someone walks off with the latter they won't have the former and all I have to do to get up and running again is find another computer to plug my thumb drive into.464Views0likes0CommentsRe: Shower Drain Fix (5er Storage issue)
Nice fix! It's annoying that the manufacture's consistently opt for quick and cheap rather than well-thought-out and only slightly more expensive. I've always been puzzled as to why waterless traps, which are pretty common in Europe, have not caught on here in the states and Canada. Seems like they would be a no-brainer for RV's, don't require much vertical space and are already winterized. waterless trap517Views0likes0CommentsRe: Austin Texas to Fayetteville Arkansas
While US-71 along the western edge of Arkansas isn't bad at all, my personal preference is for US-259 through eastern Oklahoma. A little more hilly but scenic and decent road. Above all else, avoid the I-35 corridor and especially the Dallas-Ft Worth metrocomplex, not a good place to be in a car let alone towing. Again, personal preference.701Views0likes0CommentsReplaced the Airconditioner with a MaxxFan Deluxe Vent
I’m sure there are plenty of people out there that will question my sanity at removing the air-conditioner from The Van, and they may have a point, but I have my reasons none-the-less. For one thing, most of my camping is done in places without shore-power, and without shore-power the AC unit doesn’t work very well as anything other than a 100 pound chunk of metal sitting high up on top of the roof. In fact it’s been close to three years since that AC unit has done anything other than mess with The Van’s handling. Something any high profile vehicle can do without! For another, I’ve already got a hole in the roof that I'm sure I could make much better use of than simply plugging it with an unused appliance. - - - OK, so that's pretty much just a different way of wording my first point, but that just goes to show how strongly I feel about it. Before After If you'd like more details on this conversion check out my blog post1.8KViews0likes6CommentsRe: Solar Install: what would you change
As a one who has relied on solar power for a long time, my first response is add more panel capacity than you think you need. (I hear that little monsters get really cranky without their DVD's!) Those handy little 'capacity calculators' often don't account for extended cloudy days, tree-shaded campsites, sun on the fridge side of the rig, etc. but extra solar panel capacity can help get you over those humps. Even on cloudy days a solar panel will output some power and if you have extra panels that might just be enough. Even shaded campsites may get a few hours of sun and, again, if you have enough panels that may allow you to leave the rig in place and go hiking or swiming instead of moving your house to a sunnier spot. As I'm sure you've found, panels can be expensive, rivaling the cost of the batteries, but with a little planning up front, adding additional panels later can be relatively simple, especially if the wire from roof to charge controller is over-sized during the initial installation and a charge controller with enough capacity for additional panels is chosen right from the get-go. As a final comment, power from a solar source, unless grossly over-sized, needs to be managed and that requires some sort of monitor such as the Xantrex LinkPRO90Views0likes0CommentsRe: Quit Camping???
I have traveled (Tent and RV) all my life and initially The Wife (Of 35 years) went with me, even tented a few times in the early days, but now she limits travel to 3 or 4 hours distance and day-trips only. We have a Sprinter based class B that is luxurious for two people day-tripping and downright decadent for one person camping, gets 20 MPG, (I know, hard to believe but I have 65,000 miles of data to back it up) is nimble in parking lots and on Forest Service roads, and acts as our second vehicle. I'm retired so the only constraints on travel are weather and holidays (I don't do well in crowds) and The Wife has never begrudged me taking off; in fact she's often the one encouraging me to go. (hummm. . .I might have to think about that!) She does prefer that I go for at least a week, and two or more is better (Longest trip to date is 3 months) as this gives her time to settle into her solitary routine and enjoy. It's a vacation for both of us, she doing what she likes, me doing what I like, and when I get back we appreciate each other all the more. Kind of like a reality-check on our relationship. A re-boot if you will.202Views0likes0Comments
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