Len_in_PHoenix
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Re: Tires again.....Hartland by Discount Tire
Limited trip report: I made a 300 mile round trip last weekend with the Hartland tires on my 180CK, loaded to roughly 5k pounds. The outbound trip was early in the morning and had temps in the low 90's. The return trip was Sunday afternoon when Phoenix hit 119 degrees. No issues at all with the tires...there were alligators and broken rigs all over the road on Sunday, but the Hartland tires did just fine. 1,500 mile trip coming in July. Will follow up after that one is over.2.7KViews0likes0CommentsRe: Tires again.....Hartland by Discount Tire
In a few weeks/months I'll be able to report on this topic also. I put a set of Hartland radials on my "new to me" 180CK the day I bought it. I've only put about 20 miles on the trailer since they went on, but I can say that it does feel smoother than it did with the 3 year old Triangle tires that were on it. I'll be making a 250 mile trip next week and a 1,500 mile trip next month. Follow ups will be coming.... And thanks for posting this! It reminded me to go register for the $75 rebate!2.7KViews0likes0CommentsRe: Review - Little Dealer Little Prices, Prescott Valley, AZ
I think the clerk got the number correct but not the business term. Instead of 40 "percent" he should have said 40 "gross margin points" or just "gross margin." Here's the math: (selling price - cost of goods)/selling price $542 selling price - $325 cost = $217 gross margin dollars $217 gross margin dollars / $542 selling price = 40.036 gross margin points By the time you factor in all the other costs related to running a business they are actually working on a rather thin profit. The best way to get their prices down and still make a profit would be to improve their purchasing strategy. And yes, I play the corporate game during the week. Sometimes it's hard to shut it off.553Views0likes0CommentsRe: Introduction and Hello
Our first trip is going to be here: Tilted Earth Wine & Music Festival Yesterday's additions were a portable front yard (6x8 piece of astroturf), an outlet polarity tester, and a stack of bins and totes to put little stuff in. Today's newbie question: should the water heater be drained prior to traveling to reduce strain on the water heater mounts? It's only a 6 gallon unit, but that's still almost 50 pounds of water.371Views0likes0CommentsCO detectors and stinky trees
Two days in and I just got my first lesson in "What not to do with your trailer." One of the first things I did when we brought our trailer home was to hang a pine scented stinky tree inside. My son commented that this particular stinky tree was quite powerful. We've had all the windows open since we brought it home, but tonight I closed everything up for the night. About 20 minutes after the trailer was closed up, the CO detector started going off. There were no cars running nearby and the propane was turned off at the tanks, so I was at a loss as to why the detector was going off. Thinking that I may have a faulty detector, I brought the unit into the house to see if it would go off again in a different environment. After an hour it was still silent. I went back out to the trailer to see if I could find anything and was struck by the overpowering smell of pine tree air freshener. Time for an experiment.... I set the CO detector and the stinky tree on the back porch and waited. About 10 minutes later it alarmed. Lesson: CO detectors don't like stinky trees. The stinky tree went into my truck and the now silent CO detector is back in the trailer. Happy Motoring!1.8KViews0likes8CommentsRe: Introduction and Hello
Thanks John - Good catch on the breakaway cable. I didn't think about the hitch itself coming off. I'll have to move the control box closer to the hitch in order for the cable to reach the truck, but that's not that big a deal. I'll make it part of the project to upgrade from a single battery to dual batteries. We went driveway camping last night and spent our first night in the trailer. It's just like home....my wife was hot, I was cold. Situation normal. Today was The Great WalMart Run. Two carts and $500 later we have everything on the first list. At the moment it's all just piled into a couple of the storage spaces. The plan is to make a weekend trip to Cottonwood in June and sort everything out as we use it. Have a great week!372Views0likes0CommentsRe: Introduction and Hello
Good morning everyone, and thank you for the welcome. icanon - Yes, it looks that way to me also. I asked about the nose high appearance after the dealer set up the hitch and was told that a) it's an optical illusion and the trailer/truck are level, and b) everyone else is doing it wrong. :h I can tell you that it follows wonderfully at 65mph with no sway or bouncing. The truck rides quite a bit better with the trailer on than it does empty. It may be that the hitch and sway bar are covering up a set up that would wag all over the place with a standard hitch. My plan is to spend some time experimenting with the hitch height after loading the truck and trailer to see what actually works best. I'll try it this way for a bit to establish a baseline and then drop the hitch down a notch and reset the tension with a tape measure. My first real question is about the brake controller. My dad taught me to pull a trailer by setting a full coffee cup on the dashboard and throwing a fit if any of it spilled. This was in a '71 Mercury station wagon towing a trailer with surge brakes. The result is that I use the gears to slow down as much as possible and the throttle/brake transitions are very smooth. I have to have the Prodigy P2 dialed up to 6.5 and set to B3 in order to get the brake feel I like. Is it possible that the smoothness of the transitions are "fooling" the inertia mechanism in the Prodigy and requiring what appears to me to be a setting higher than normal on the controller? By the way, the trailer brakes will stop the entire rig without using the service brakes on the truck if I hit the panic bar on the controller, so they seem to be fine.371Views0likes0CommentsIntroduction and Hello
Hello all - My wife and I bought our first travel trailer today. We live in PHoenix and have been tent camping out of the back of a Jeep for decades and finally decided to come in out of the rain. Thank you to all who have posted tips and tricks here...I've already spent quite a bit of time on the forums and have learned quite a bit. Stupid newbie questions will be inbound shortly. Right now we're peering into empty cabinets and making lists. Cheers!2.8KViews0likes17Comments
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