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Custom diesel super C builders, 19,500 to 26,000 pounds GVWR
Who will build me a custom diesel super C motorhome on a chassis with a GVWR of at most 26,000 pounds? Something like the Ram 5500, Ford F-550, Ford F-600, or the Navistar International chassis. I know about Powerhouse Coach. NRC Modifications and ShowHauler only use class 8 trucks. I haven't heard back from 1492 Coachworks yet, but I expect they'll say the same. Am I missing any companies? Thanks!832Views0likes2CommentsColeman-Mach 48008-966 AC large voltage drop
Back in October I got a new Coleman-Mach 48008-9660 3 P. S. heat pump and a 9630-715 non-ducted ceiling assembly. With warmer weather, I've noticed a problem with the air conditioning. On LOW COOL or HIGH COOL, with the temperature knob in an intermediate position between coldest and warmest, after a few minutes of operation, the fan noise suddenly decreases markedly, and the voltage drops to roughly 106 volts. After 2-3 seconds, the fan noise and the voltage return to normal. However, when on the genset or at an RV park with marginal voltage, the voltage drops so low that my surge protector disconnects, turning off all AC electricity in the RV. When first turned on, air conditioning starts normally, with only a slight voltage drop. There's never a problem if the temperature knob is at the coldest setting. There's never a problem on HIGH HEAT (heat pump). The RV has 30 amp service. There's no wall thermostat; all controls are in the ceiling assembly. I could be totally wrong, but it seems like the compressor stops and then restarts after 2-3 seconds. Does anyone else have this problem? Airxcel just says take it to a service center, and I guess I will. BTW, the heat pump works well, though I wish it had a LOW HEAT setting; the fan is noisy on high.3.4KViews0likes15CommentsRe: RVi Tire Patrol TPMS review
Dutch_12078 wrote: since you can buy sensors for $15, I'd suggest keeping a spare or two on hand RVi says their low battery warning gives about two months of warning. Each sensor comes already labeled and set up for a particular tire. There's no concept of a general spare that could be used on any tire.1.9KViews0likes0CommentsRVi Tire Patrol TPMS review
Summary: Easy to read simultaneous display of max 14 tires, but expensive and other drawbacks. I've used an RVi Tire Patrol tire pressure monitoring system for well over 2000 miles now. I drive a 27 foot motorhome with six tires and flat-tow a car. The Tire Patrol displays all ten tire pressures at once in large (5mm) digits on a clear, easy-to-read display. It will display up to 14 tires at once. While driving, one quick glance lets me check all the motorhome tire pressures, and another even quicker glance lets me check the toad. Tire Patrol consists of a 7-inch tablet, a hub, and the sensors. My tablet says "Designed by Inspira Technologies LLC," made in China. It runs a crippled version of Android. The hub receives transmissions from the sensors on the 900 MHz band. The tablet and hub communicate using WiFi. Mine uses WiFi channel 1 with an SSID that looks like CC- followed by a 12-digit lower case hexadecimal number. RVi says that because they use the 900 MHz band, the sensors can transmit at higher power than other TPMS sensors using the 400 MHz band, and as a result there's no need for a booster. Sensors come already labeled and are very easy to pair. They screw on easily. There are no flow-through sensors and no anti-theft features, so they also screw off easily. A sensor weighs 14 grams. Of the ten sensors I bought, one failed to pair. RVi quickly sent me a replacement. When I placed my order, the RVi web site said this: "When the batteries need to be replaced, you simply mail in your original sensors to the factory and we ship you new sensors for $15/sensor." As of this writing, it still says that, but it's no longer true. Instead, RVi sells new sensors for $15 each, but only if you're the original purchaser and have a receipt. The old sensors are disposable, that is, electronic waste. I hope someone goes into business refurbishing sensors. RVi says the sensors last 1-3 years, depending on how fanatical you are about removing them when not in use. My current plan is to remove the motorhome sensors if the motorhome will be parked for over a month. However, I plan to leave the toad sensors in place. The tablet has a capacitive touch screen, which can be a problem when driving. There's a fairly small on-screen button to toggle between pressure and temperature. As far as I can tell, the sensors measure the temperature of the sensors themselves, not the temperature of the air in the tires. Unless a sensor is in direct sunlight, its temperature reading is thus pretty much the outside air temperature, which is not very useful. A more serious problem is that alerts, such as high pressure alerts, are presented as pop-ups with lots of small (2mm) text. Here's a sample: High PSI Alert: High tire PSI detected in sensor(s): RF-4 Pull over at your convenience and check tire(s). Failure to do so may cause damage. At the bottom there's an "I UNDERSTAND" button (about 6 x 40 mm) to tap to dismiss the pop-up and silence the alarm. This is not what you should have to read while driving an RV. If you wear driving gloves, make sure they have capacitive touch tips. A good thing about the system is that software can be updated just by connecting the tablet to WiFi. I'm hoping RVi will improve the user interface in a future software update. My sensors all read 2 PSI high, compared to my hand-held digital tire pressure gauge. This is no problem; I just factor it into the low and high pressure limits. When parked, it was quite common for the signal from several sensors to be lost. They worked fine as soon as I was moving again. It was different sensors each time, and once working again they showed good signal strength. My motorhome has aluminum sides. This is pure speculation, but maybe I happened to park where tire rotation put a sensor in a bad reception location. About once a day, signal was lost from a sensor while driving. It always came back in a few minutes. The tablet comes with a suction mount that works very well. Like all tire pressure monitors I know of, the sensors measure the absolute pressure of the air in the tires, which is then displayed corrected to sea level. A hand-held tire pressure gauge measures the difference in pressure inside and outside the tire, which is what you care about. At sea level they should read the same, but at high elevation the TPMS will read lower than the hand-held gauge. RVi support was hard to reach by phone, but they replied to email very quickly. The hub has a level function. The idea is that, when you're ready to level, you remove the hub from where it's mounted, place it on the floor in the middle of the RV (pointed forward), then bring up the level app on the tablet. This seems like much more pain than gain to me, but if I had a towable RV I might feel differently. There's a school of thought that one should simply set the pressure alarm limits and never look at the TPMS display. I don't adhere to this school of thought, for three reasons. First, I want to look for outliers, that is, tire(s) on an axle that read quite a bit different from the rest. Second, I want to look for rapid changes, even though still within the pressure limits. Finally, if a rear motorhome tire sensor fails, I'll temporarily substitute a sensor off one of the front tires. This requires setting the front pressure limits to be the same as the rear, and then monitoring the remaining front tire.4.2KViews0likes5CommentsNorcold Polar N8DC 12V compressor refrigerator specs
I've been using a Norcold Polar N8DC 12 volt compressor refrigerator for a few days. So far I'm happy with it. Here are a few specifications not on the Norcold web page. They're from the data plate inside the refrigerator. Gross volume: 231 liters Freezer volume: 72 liters Net volume: 230 liters Refrigerant: R600a (isobutane) 45 grams Small print on a sticker on the compressor says Zhejiang Maidi Refrigeration Technology Co., LTD.1.2KViews0likes1CommentTire pressure monitor showing 10 tires at once
I'm looking for a tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) that shows the pressures of a least 10 tires simultaneously on its display. I don't want to have to look away from the road at least 10 times as a display scrolls through each tire. The products I've found are the RVi Tire Patrol and the TireMinder A1AS. Are there any others? Have you used either of these products?1.6KViews0likes6CommentsColeman heat pump and heating element together
I'm shopping for a new rooftop air conditioner. Getting one with a heat pump seems like a good way to save electricity. However, heat pumps stop working when the outside temperature gets close to freezing, whereas an electric resistance heating element (heat strip) will give some heat even below freezing. So why not have both? The only manufacturer I've found that claims to support both is Coleman-Mach. Specifically, I'm thinking the Coleman-Mach 3 P.S. model 48008-966 heat pump and the 9233A4551 heating element. Does anyone use these? If I turn on the heat, when does the heat pump run and when does the heating element come on? Coleman says "the heat strip only comes on if the heat pump quits working," but I'm not quite sure what that means. And how is the 48008-966 as an air conditioner?2.4KViews0likes4CommentsPantech MHS291LVW Hotspot on T-Mobile prepaid
Summary: works on 3G (UMTS), no luck on LTE, cheap standby service. After Millenicom was forced out of the Verizon MVNO business, I had an unused Pantech MHS291LVW "Jetpack" mobile hotspot, which is now on T-Mobile. I got a T-Mobile micro SIM on eBay (typically $5-6) and installed it. In the browser-based Pantech administration interface I went to Jetpack Settings > Advanced > Networks, set Network type: GSM/UMTS Mode Sub type: GSM/UMTS Dual Network Selection: Automatic and clicked Save Changes. In a few seconds the Pantech display showed 3G and a few bars. I browsed http://T-Mobile.com/ConnectMe and clicked GET CONNECTED, but got We were unable to complete your request. Please go back and try again. If you continue to receive this message, please give us a call at 1-800-937-8997 and we'll be happy to help. I tried a few more times, always getting the same message. In the browser-based Pantech administration interface I went to About Jetpack > Jetpack Info and recorded the IMEI. I then phoned T-Mobile at the phone number in the error message. I asked for prepaid, got an agent, and explained that I had a Pantech WiFi hotspot I was trying to get on prepaid. The agent asked for the following: the SIM card number (20 characters printed on the back of the cardboard containing the SIM), IMEI, my desired area code for the hotspot's new phone number, a 4-digit PIN, and a birthdate. The agent took a while, but eventually told me the hotspot should work within 2 hours. I waited 2 hours, again browsed http://T-Mobile.com/ConnectMe and clicked GET CONNECTED, and got to the activation page. I created an account and bought a 500MB 1-day pass for $5.00. A speed test showed ping 96 ms download 1013.3 kilobytes/s upload 523.9 kB/s. http://showip.net/ geolocated me to Jersey City, NJ even though I was far away. https://mim.t-mobile.com/primary/openPage showed data remaining in near real time. T-Mobile uses LTE bands 2, 4, and 12. The Pantech supports LTE bands 4, 7, and 13. I tried LTE with APN fast.t-mobile.com, but the Pantech displays "No service." The fine print on the data purchase page says Account suspended after 365 days of inactivity. So, for a $5-6 micro SIM and another $5 every 364 days, I have T-Mobile 3G as an option, with on-network purchase.1.8KViews0likes2Comments
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