Category: Lance

Anniversary Trip 2025 – Humboldt Redwoods

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Boondocking, Campgrounds, HAM, Harvest Hosts, Lance, RV Life, TravelLeave a comment

Hard to believe that it’s been 38 years since my wife and I eloped; and took my family with us. This year we decided to take a trip up to Humboldt Redwoods Avenue of the Giants for the week. We packed up the trailer and went to church and afterwards headed off to our first stop.

Incidentally, if you look closely you see a white strip above the black bumper of the trailer. Just under the ladder you see a small black dash in the white strip. That black dash is my travel mug for my coffee. There’s no telling how long the mug rode along on the back bumper of the trailer. All I know is that it was never seen again.

Nelson Family Vineyards

Since it was a long drive we decided to break it up into two days. We drove up to Nelson Family Vineyards, a member of the Harvest Hosts program, to stay our first night. It was absolutely gorgeous and peaceful. It was cloudy when we arrived but the clouds cleared off that night and the stars were unbelievable. We enjoyed the walk along the vineyards and the old-school playground they had there for the kids. Probably installed back in the1960’s. Very quiet stay; the only noises we heard were coyotes.

Ancient Redwoods RV Resort

The next day we made the short 2 and 1/2 hour drive up to Ancient Redwoods RV Resort. Per our reservation it told us to drive directly to our site, no check in needed. We did and found our receipt and reservation information on the power pedestal. We were parked up near the front in a pull-thru space. There was no RVs next to us the entire time. There were some 5th wheels and Class A’s clustered together toward the back of the park but we had plenty of privacy and a great view. The pictures below were taken at the entrance to the RV park.

The Redwoods

We spent two days exploring the redwood groves. Not two consecutive days; we tried to break it up between beach days, shopping, and forrest. Here are some of the pictures we took.

Our first redwood day was spent walking on the Founder’s Grove trail. Just a short two-mile round trip walk in the woods.

On another day we visited the Garden Club of America Grove which was technically closed but only to automobile traffic. We walked in and enjoyed the peace and quiet of the end of the season.

We also drove down onto a gravel bar on the Eel River. We spent some time enjoying the peace and quiet of the river.

Victorian Architecture

We also spent some time exploring some of the wonderful Victorian-era architecture of the area. There were two great examples in Eureka and and then the entire town of Ferndale. They just don’t build them like that anymore.

Eureka

Ferndale

Coastal Drive

We also spent a couple of half-days at the local beaches. Just walking and breathing in the clean air. We pretty much had these beaches all to ourselves. The first was Samoa Beach, the second was Clam Beach. I don’t have pictures of the sandy beaches we walked on because they were pretty featureless very long strands of beach. I did get photos of the coastal cliffs and rocks we explored, and those are below. They were taken just south of Trinidad, Ca.

Shopping and Dining

Of course what trip would be complete without shopping and eating out, including coffee-getting. I’ll be honest, we were hoping to get some good seafood being that Eureka is a coastal town. However, the reality is that most fishing off the north coast has been shut down. Most of the seafood is deep-fried, sadly. However, one gem we did find is Vista Del Mar. It’s half-bar, half-cafe that served some killer grilled fish tacos. The other restaurants were so-so. Cristy did do some shopping in their downtown and picked up some oysters at another bar. While she was off doing this I was playing ham radio while parked on a waterfront street. I contacted the USS Iowa in Los Angeles and some guy doing Parks On The Air near Boise, ID. Not bad for a battery powered mobile high-frequency rig.

Coffee

Although it never used to be, coffee has become a passion of mine. I hated coffee growing up but within the last 5 years or so I’ve experienced a sort of coffee renaissance. A few mornings I made my own coffee using some some coffee I pre-ground before the trip. My favorite coffee is purchased from Revive Coffee in Sonora, Ca. Their Confluence Espresso blend is my absolute all-time favorite so far for just straight-up coffee. On one of our coastal excursions we decided to try a local place. The highest rated in Eureka was Witness Coffee Roasters. We ordered caramel lattes, with Cristy getting her customary decaf. We were a little disappointed in how weak the coffee was. Looking to console ourselves we drove to Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate and got THE best coffee of the entire trip. It was rated lower that Witness but was much more flavorful. I ordered ANOTHER caramel latte and it was really good, but the magic happened when we poured the drinking chocolate Cristy ordered into my latte. We mixed to two and Cristy’s brain just lit up! Second best coffee of the trip was at Mind’s Eye Manufactory & Coffee Lounge in Ferndale.

And since all good things must come to an end our trip came to an end on Saturday when we drove back down to Nelson Family Vineyards to stay one more night before driving back home. It was just as peaceful as the first time we stayed there. These trips always feel too short when we’re on them and have to come back. Our consolation this year was that I wouldn’t have to rush home so I could get back to work next year! Looking forward to it!

Pahrump Trip 2025

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Campgrounds, Harvest Hosts, Lance, RV Life, RV Parks, Travel1 Comment

For a few months now I’ve been looking at home prices in Pahrump Nevada. Why Pahrump? Well, it has the cleanest year-round air, no risk of flooding, and no sever weather (unless you count heat). So for my first vacation this year we decided to head to Pahrump and look at the housing market there.

Rather than drive from our home all the way to Pahrump in one shot, a 9+ hour drive, we decided to break it up into 2 days. We stayed the first night at a Harvest Hosts location at the Tehachapi Winery. It’s free to stay but you are encouraged to patronize the host. It ended up costing us more that one night than any one night at both of the other RV resorts we stayed at. Still, it was a beautiful, peaceful place to stop over and break up the trip.

After a peaceful night off the beaten track in Tehachapi we began the drive down to Baker, CA and then on to Pahrump. Our route was Highway 99 to Bakersfield, then Hwy 58 to Tehachapi and on to Barstow. Highway 58 used to be single lane with stop lights through Boron and Kramer Junction. It’s now a 4 lane highway all the way to Barstow. We jumped on I-15 north towards Las Vegas until we got to Baker, CA where we got onto Hwy 127 which took us to Shoshone where we hung a right onto Hwy 178 and then all the way into Pahrump.

I should point out here that I got the best mileage ever while towing on this trip heading out to Pahrump. For most of the trip we either had a quartering tailwind or a full tailwind. I was seeing MPGs of anywhere from 18-22 MPG! I usually get about 12 when towing the trailer. It was all fun and games until I got to a rock formation called the Charlie Brown Outcrop where the 35mph tailwind I had been enjoying turned into a direct cross wind when I rounded a curve. That was mildly exciting but nothing the truck couldn’t handle. Woke me up for sure. After that it was an easy trip down into Pahrump.

Here is a pro-tip for travellers to Pahrump: DRIVE THE POSTED SPEED LIMIT. We were told by the realtor that Pahrump and Nye County make a lot of money from traffic violations and if the other drivers in town are any indication, they have a zero tolerance policy for exceeding the speed limit. Not even the internationally accepted standard of driving 5mph over the posted speed limit!

Now, sadly we didn’t take any pictures of the RV park but you can find many online. The name of the park was Wine Ridge RV Resort and Cottages. It was clean, quiet, and had a hot tub; everything I require of an RV park. We rested the first day and spent the next two days looking at area homes that were for sale. The first day was with a realtor and her adult realtor son. She guided us around to about 5 houses. Some were nice, others were not quite as nice. One home was absolutely beautiful but it was in a trashy area and smelled heavily of cigar smoke. The second day we drove around Pahrump on our own so we could see the neighborhoods at our own pace.

Biggest takeaway from Pahrump is that the city is very spread out. Lots of space between homes and neighborhoods. There is no centralized shopping district unless you count Hwy 160 which runs between Las Vegas and I-95 to the north. Lots of casinos, fast food, and a few supermarkets including Walmart. The city is about 10 miles across as the crow flies which is pretty big for a relatively sleepy desert town. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Pahrump has two brothels on the extreme southern border of town. With a landing strip between them. We didn’t make it down to that part of town but Google Maps showed all we needed to see. Also, we were there in the Spring which is a windy time for Pahrump so windy and dry did not do well with our skin. That was the only major detractor we found.

On Wednesday we drove down to Las Vegas. The reason for the trip was to visit Red Rocks National Conservation Area and also to drop in on a vendor of mine from work to see his new home near Red Rocks. This is an absolutely stunning and underrated area on the southwest side of Las Vegas. We spent some time hiking in Calico Basin which is literally a desert oasis. Red Spring feeds a small meadow of grass and trees in the middle of the barren rocks.

Probably the best view of Red Rocks NCA is on the Hwy 160, also known as Pahrump Valley Highway as it comes into the Red Rocks area.

After our hike we drove to the visitors center and then drove the scenic loop around the canyon. Those puffy clouds you see in the above photos turned into a rain storm along the hills. But it stayed along the hills. All the rainfall in the mountains must be what feed the springs around Las Vegas.

After visiting Red Rocks we drove over to get some lunch at La Madre Canyon Grille. Lunch was delicious and since I hadn’t had my coffee yet that day their Cinnamon Roll Latte really hit the spot for a dessert. Then we headed over to my vendor’s house and was given the grand tour of his home and visited for a while. He and I really didn’t get along very well when I first started my job at San Joaquin General Hospital but we’ve since become good friends. Commiserating about the state of politics and Extreme Networks, the products he sells, helped us build a common bond over the years. Afterwards Cristy did some decompression shopping at Summerlin Downtown, a shopping plaza design to look like a downtown shopping area. Then we headed back to Pahrump.

The only item on the agenda for the next day was to hang around town and relax after all the driving I’d done lately. I did want to tick one more item off my list for Pahrump; to visit the Art Bell Memorial. If you’ve never heard of Art Bell, he was an AM radio personality who had the dubious distinction of having a radio show that played from midnight to 6am in many markets. I began listening to Art Bell on KGO as I commuted from our home in Modesto to my workplace at Lockheed in Sunnyvale at 3:30am. His show was always about UFOs, Sasquatch, chupacabra sightings, paranormal stuff. Think X-Files. It was “out there” but it helped keep me awake on my commute. We found his memorial at a park in Pahrump called the Calvada Eye (because it’s looks like an eye from above). The other pleasantly unexpected surprise at this park was the horse that came galloping into the park while we were there. I’m still not sure if they were wild horses or just abandoned horses. The western romantic in my wants to think they were wild horses descended from the ponies the conquistadors let loose many years ago.

After a few more restful days just hanging around the park and stocking up at Walmart it was time to head back home. The wind had picked back up in the night and it made me a little nervous about what the wind would do the next day but it actually died down a bit. It also had switched directions so we again had a tailwind on the way back to Tehachapi. However, long before we got to Tehachapi, we got caught in the middle of the 34th Annual Baker 2 Vegas relay race. Apparently it’s a big deal in the law enforcement community. A local friend of mine is a police lieutenant has even wanted to run in it. All I know is that it generated a ton of traffic and our only white-knuckle moments as we were driving back. Let’s just say cops generally don’t believe the rules of the road apply to them and leave it at that. Most were well-behaved though. Each runner was followed by a car and they had “stages” of the race they were assigned to run and then hand off the baton. Luckily they were all running the opposite direction. Much to the chagrin of non-participating traffic trying to get to Pahrump.

We finally made it through the races and back over the hill into Bakersfield were we decided to stop for the night at Orange Grove RV Park. The next day we headed home and called an end to our week-long Pahrump adventure. Will we be back to Pahrump, maybe. Will we move there, probably not. The biggest takeaway of the trip was how much we loved travelling. It’s funny, it’s hard to get ourselves to leave home but once we do, it’s even harder to go back. Don’t get me wrong, we love our home and family, but we just want to travel and see more things. Until next time…

10th Annual Red Hills Fly-in

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Aviation, Boondocking, Lance, RV Life2 Comments

Ten years ago my friend Joey Myers and I were sitting in the living room of our dear friends Jack and Myrna Moyle. They have a 110 acre ranch near Jamestown in the Red Hills Area of Environmental Concern which is managed by the BLM. Joey and I had flown in to say hello. After a bit I mentioned that his ranch would be a beautiful place to host a fly-in and campout. Without hesitation Jack said, “Well you should put something like that together.” So I did.

But before I tell that story, I need to tell the story of this ranch. Jack and his wife Myrna bouth the ranch over 50 years ago. There was one small shack on the property, no trees, no electricity, no utilities of any kind. Jack and Myrna were raising their family of 7 in a one room shack. When they weren’t working Jack and Myrna disassembled some chicken houses on another property they had purchased. Myrna pulled the nails out of the wood and straightened them while Jack was hammering those same nails back into those same boards to expand their small home. They added on three more rooms, a barn, some other makeshift outbuildings and planted a bunch of trees to keep their house cool in the summer. No utilities remember?

One day a mutual friend named Jim Hembree landed on a dirt road that ran through Jack’s property to stop for a visit. Jack was enthralled and wanted to learn to fly too. He firgured that dirt road would make a great runway to fly from. Being a heavy equipment operator by trade he expanded that dirt road and graded it and then had a runway! He bought a Piper Cub up at Columbia Airport and began getting flight training in it. He had the instructor fly him down to his runway on his ranch and teach him how to land there. After that Jack completed his pilot training by taking off from his runway, flying up to Columbia, taking his lessons, then flying back home to his runway.

Fast forward a few years and a few months and we had our first annual Red Hills Fly-in on Memorial Day weekend. This past weekend was our 10th annual and likely last fly-in. So much could be written about it but I like pictures so I will let the pictures tell the story.

We got to spend two wonderfully peaceful nights in the company of friends in a beautiful setting. You can’t ask for more.

Shingletown Lance Owners of America Rally – Part 1

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Campgrounds, Lance, RV Life, RV Parks, Travel4 Comments

We attended our first Lance ralley ever this year. It was the 9th annual rally held at Shingletown/Mt Lassen KOA Holiday. What a wonderful kampground and very nice bunch of people!

Day 1

We drove up I-5 through California’s Central Valley and encountered the usual traffic along the way in Stockton and Sacramento. But as soon as we got past Woodland all the traffic just seemed to disappear. We didn’t even see the trucks leave the freeway, they were just… gone. We stopped for lunch at Granzella’s in Williams and then finally arrived at the KOA at 3:15pm.

We were warmly greeted by both the KOA staff and the Lancer’s who were organizing the rally. This rally is put on by the Lance Owners of America and is only one of many. Lance campers and travel trailers have a very small and loyal following. I got the trailer levelled and set up (with not a little help from Cristy) then went and got the T-shirt I had orderd, got a raffle ticket, and then we took a nap. Usually one of the first things we do on a travel day. The day ended with an appetizer pot-luck and introductions. We were the only new people so only we got introduced!

Day 2

The next day was a free day so we took off and went up to Mt. Lassen National Park. I haven’t been there since I was 12 or so. We took our time and stopped at the Loomis Museum and Ranger Station at the north entrance to the park. It was only a 15 minute drive from the campground. We took a walk from the ranger station down along Manzanita Creek down to Manzanita Lake. A quick 15 minute walk. Then we set off along Lassen Peak Highway.

We drove along until we came to Summit Lake and got out to stretch our legs a bit. It was pretty but there really weren’t any trails so we moved on.

We drove on and finally stopped at Kings Creek Trailhead. It was lunch time and we were ready to eat. We walked down to the creek and found some nice rocks to sit on next to a small cascade in the creek.

We continued on up the highway, and I do mean up. We took time to stop at some pull outs and admire the views.

Finally we made it up to the summit. We were determined to see how high up the summit trail we could hike. We made it from the parking lot to the sign that said, “Summit Trail” before we decided to turn back. A couple of flatlanders attempting to climb the summit of Mt. Lassen with no preparation, what could possibly go wrong. We decided that the truck was an excellent mountain climbing vehicle and we had made it as high as we were going to go. Incidentally if you zoom in on the picture on the right, you will see the foolhardy souls who opted not to drive their truck up to the summit. Also, that rocky point in the picture on the left is NOT the summit, it is quite a bit higher than that.

At this point the road finally started sloping downward. It was a very short drive to Helen Lake. I had a lot of fun telling people we drove to Helen, took some pictures. It makes more sense if you say it out loud.

Mt Lassen

Our next stop (about 500 ft away) was Bumpass Hell Trailhead. I will cut to the chase and say we did not hike all the way to Bumpass Hell but we did make it about half way until the altitude and lack of water got to us and we turned back. Still there was some beautiful scenery (and shenanigans) along the way.

Our last stop before turning around and headed back down the highway was the Sulphur Works. It gives you a small preview of what Bumpas Hell is like but without the hike.

Boiling mudpot at the Sulphur Works.

And that was about all we had energy for. We made the hour and 20 minute drive back to our campground, cooked dinner, and watched Thursday Night Football. All in all a great 2nd day!

The Refrigerator Saga

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Boondocking, Lance, RV Life, TravelLeave a comment

Last January (2023) I noticed some cracking on the interior plastic of my refrigerator. The fridge still worked but I hated looking at the cracks and at the time we had no clue as to what had caused them. Knowing that I want to sell this trailer some day I decided to replace the refrigerator. Watching the videos on YouTube showed that it wasn’t that complicated. So I ordered a refrigerator and then had it shipped to my house. I hired a mobile RV tech and we gave it a go.

We got the old refrigerator out of it’s cubby hole and then tried to get it out the front door. We couldn’t. There is a sharp, narrow 90 degree bend to get around the kitchen cabinet and out the door of the trailer. Try as we might we just couldn’t do it. I helped him put everything back and gave Lance Parts and Service a call. The appointment was 3 months away and I had to ship the fridge down to Lancaster, CA where they were located. That turned out to be another whole blog post. Let’s just say, I finally got it down there.

We told them we would be arriving the night before so we could be there in time for the 7am appointment. They said we could stay in their parking lot where they had electrical and water hookups. We took advantage of the electrical, didn’t need the water. The drive down was fairly exciting, just a normal day on Highway 99 and the Tehachapi Pass.

We spent the evening in their parking lot but they have wonderful landscaping so it felt more like an RV park. Also, the temps were low enough that we didn’t need the AC. We sat out in the grass and enjoyed the cool evening breeze before turning in. We dropped the trailer off at the service location which is basically the delivery entrance for the manufacturing plant. It took an hour to get it all checked in. The lady at the service counter said she’d call me when it was done.

It took them longer than they expected because the fridge was the same width but slightly shorter. They didn’t want to give it back to me with a gap above the fridge so they had to fab up a new piece to close the gap. That meant it would take an extra day.

Sidebar: The lesson I learned was that I should have ordered the replacement refrigerator through Lance. That way it would have fit the existing cutout. I tried to save a few bucks by doing it myself and ended up paying more. Lesson learned.

Cristy and I had to stay at a hotel over night so we chose one next to food and shopping down in Palmdale. I have to admit it was kind of cool to see the Lockheed Skunkworks hangars. I thought they would be a bit more secretive. The two Lockheed Martin hangars dominate the landscape. The next morning at breakfast I got a call from the Lance service department that the trailer was ready. That was good news as I thought we wouldn’t get that call until late afternoon. We finished breakfast and drove back up to Lancaster.

When we went to pick up the trailer we found they just left it right outside the gate.  Barely any room to maneuver my truck to hitch up.  No place to turn around.  They expected me to back out past two parking lot entrances and out onto the main road.  With the way people drive down there I told them no way.  I asked them to turn the trailer around.  They ended up moving it out into the turn lane in the center of the street. 

So what are my thoughts on the whole experience?  Lance did swap out the fridge and did a good job fabbing up the new wood surround.  The fridge was the same width but a bit shorter and they finished it off nicely. The door swung the wrong way.  I asked them why they didn’t go ahead and reverse the door swing so it would match the old refrigerator. I basically got a “not our job” answer from them.  They then told me the door isn’t reversible anyway.  Uh-huh.  I reversed the door this morning with zero experience.  Took me about 30 minutes.  They could have done it in 10.  Not a huge deal but geez.

I also asked them to look at the gap between the bathroom wall and the ceiling.  They said it didn’t look right but didn’t look like a huge problem either.  If I want them to investigate why it happened I’d have to bring the trailer back at another time and leave it with them for a day while they measured things.  Okay, we may do that.  I’m also going to take a picture of the gouge they put in the door frame when they swapped the fridge.  They can fix that next time too.

So I guess I expected more from them.  Maybe I expected too much.  I feel like it was the same service level I get at the DMV.  Just… basic stuff.  No going out of their way to make the customer happy.  Just doing EXACTLY what the customer asked and no more.  Okay.  That’s fine.

I really like our 1995 travel trailer.  We enjoy travelling in it. That being said the customer service is lackluster.  We will probably not be a repeat customer.  We will be wanting something bigger next time anyway.

Sedona Trip 2021 Day 3

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Lance, RV Life, RV Parks, TravelLeave a comment

This was the first full day of our vacation. We could wake up when we want and not drive anywhere if we didn’t want to. It was the first chance we’d really had to take a look at the RV park we were staying in. The night before we just had time to set up before the sun went down. So glad I picked this place!

The view from site 23 at Rain Spirit RV Resort

After enjoying the view for a bit we wanted coffee. We don’t drink coffee enough to actually have a coffee maker. It’s just a once or twice a week thing for us. We decided to head into the old town area of Cottonwood to see if we could find some place to get a good coffee. After some searching we ended up at a place called Crema Craft Kitchen. The coffee was delicious! Cristy couldn’t help herself and ordered a breakfast salad (oh the irony, salad for breakfast?) It was actually delicious! But not a good as the huge, gooey cinnamon roll I ordered. That plus the latte I ordered made for a very decadent breakfast (I usually don’t eat breakfast). If you’re ever in Cottonwood, AZ I highly recommend you give them a try!

Breakfast at Crema Craft Kitchen

After our late breakfast we decided to try to do some hiking. I wanted to hike to a place called Devil’s Kitchen. However when we got to the trailhead in East Sedona we could find no parking. So we drove back towards town a little, found a place to pull off the road and hiked on one of the city’s trails.

  • View from the city park

After our short hike we headed back to the trailer to take our usual afternoon nap, cook dinner, watch a movie and pretty much call it a day. Well, we did go on a walk around the RV park just before dinner.

  • The picnic area right behind our RV spot

Sorry it’s taking so long to update these blog posts. My pesky job keeps getting in the way!

More to come…

Sedona Trip 2021 Day 1 and 2

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Lance, RV Life, RV Parks, TravelLeave a comment

I’m going to group day 1 and 2 of our trip into one post because it was mostly driving to get there. Our plan WAS to drive to Barstow, CA the first day and then from there to Cottonwood, AZ the next day. Well, Clarkdale really, it’s right next to Cottonwood. However, the weather wasn’t cooperating. There was a high wind warning between Mohave, CA and Kingman, AZ. I didn’t want to drive through those kinds of winds so we elected to stop in Bakersfield, CA for the night and get an early start the next day.

Eating lunch just across the AZ border from Needles, CA

The next day the winds were gone and we had a save uneventful drive most of the way… Until we passed Williams, AZ. The clouds started to darken and BIG rain drops began slowly falling on us. Then there was lightening and thunder and the heavens poured forth their bounty. The big rigs didn’t seem to mind they just flew through the torrent on the winding mountain highway like it wasn’t even raining at all. Between the rain and the mist the truck tires were throwing up visibility was maybe 100 feet. I just gripped the wheel with my white knuckles and slowed down and took my time. Eventually we arrived in Flagstaff, AZ, the rain had stopped and it was literally all down hill from there. We finally arrived at Rain Spirit RV Resort (ironic name, huh) at 5:45pm. The office closed at 5pm but the hosts came back and checked us in. 7am to 5:45pm on the road is way too much!

We set up the trailer, cooked some dinner, and went to bed. Too bad the thunderstorms kept waking us up all night! More about that in the next installment.

Latitude Awning Issues

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Lance, RV Life3 Comments

We love our Lance 1995 travel trailer. Everything on it has worked well except for one component. It’s not that it doesn’t work. It just doesn’t work very long. I’m talking about the wind sensor in our Carefree Latitude awning. It has a motion sensor in it that detects awning movements caused by the wind and is there to protect the awning from wind damage by automatically retracting the awning. It is powered by two hearing aid batteries and they only last for about 6 weeks or so. It’s maddening. The sensor connects back to the awning controls via Bluetooth and when the batteries in the sensor go dead, of course it stops communicating. When it stops communicating with the awning controls the awning will retract half way, and then beep every 30 seconds. If you put the awning back out, it will again retract half way, and of course the beeping will continue as long as there is power to the awning. Even if you retract it all the way!

The workaround is to extend your awning and then turn the power off. Voilà! No more beeping. Of course if it gets windy the awning will not retract and could be damaged by the wind. Well, for about the 10th time since I’ve owned the trailer my awning started it’s beeping routine again. I removed the wind sensor from the awning (it’s under the front end cap) and opened it up.

Changing the batteries were not going to do any good as water had intruded through the screw holes and corroded the circuit board.

I called Carefree and after waiting on hold for 40 minutes was told that they would send me a new wind sensor for a little under $90 US. I did some research on the Lance Owners of America website and found that many people had received an updated sensor that takes AAA batteries and had received it for free. I decided to try their automated DIY warranty process on their website. I put in all the requested info an uploaded the above picture to them. I then received an email from them:

This was very good news to me. Not only are they sending me a new wind sensor but an entire Bluetooth kit! Free of charge. I was starting to wonder about Carefree’s customer service after having no luck getting hold of anyone the first time I called (6 months ago) and then told I would have to pay this time. I’ll post an update after I receive the kit and install the new sensor.

Installing A SoftStart On The Air Conditioner

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Lance, RV Life2 Comments

In case you don’t know there are two ways to power devices in your recreational vehicle. There are batteries for running battery powered devices such as your lights, water pump, awning, and 12 volt TV if you have one of those. Then there is the AC power cord that plugs into the electrical service at the RV park. This runs basically two devices in my trailer: the microwave and the air conditioner. Since we do most of our camping primarily in the western US, we need an air conditioner! This limits us to camping where electricity is readily available.

But there’s another option, a generator! You can plug your trailer’s AC connection into a generator and run your air conditioner that way. There’s just one problem. You have to make sure that the generator has enough power to start the air conditioner, once the air conditioner is started, it uses far less power. It’s just that initial start. This is where the soft start module comes up. You see inside the air conditioner is an electrical motor that basically runs the pump that pumps all the freon around your air conditioner. When motors start, they generally use a ton of electrical current to get them going, and then once started, they use much less current. That initial kick of electrical current is called inrush current and will bog a generator down as the generator struggles to supple enough electrical current to meet the demand. Many smaller generators will just blow their breakers or shut themselves down.

But what if you could limit that inrush current to a manageable level that the smaller generator could keep up with? Then you wouldn’t have to buy that bigger more expensive generator. This is what the SoftStart module does.

Imagine electrical current as water. When you flip a switch to turn on your AC, it’s like turning your water faucet on full blast. When you flip the switch off, it’s like turning the faucet completely off. But what if you could just turn that faucet on slowly until it reaches full blast? This is what the Soft Start does. When you turn your air conditioner on, the fan comes on, and then a few seconds later the compressor comes on with a loud “thunk”. This is the motor responding to a full blast of electrical current, like the water faucet being turned on full blast, and the motor is trying to respond to that full blast of current. It’s hard on the motor and uses a lot of electrical current to FORCE that motor to start running at full speed almost instantly!

So the Soft Start ramps up the electrical current slowly so that the compressor’s motor comes on more slowly, thus using less electrical current and also being gentler on the motor and associated components. THIS means you can use a smaller generator than you normally would because it doesn’t have to supply as much current to start your air conditioner.

(For my sister, you can tell our brother than this device OBVIOUSLY uses TRIACS to limit the inrush current)

Installation was pretty easy. They have detailed instructions for every model of RV air conditioner out there complete with pictures. It’s a matter of mounting your Soft Start module inside the AC unit, finding the electrical box, and start wiring it in. All the wires are color coded and there are only 4 of them to connect so it’s hard to go wrong.

The Micro-Air EasyStart Soft Starter

I used strong, double-sided tape to mount it out of the air flow in my AC unit. I then routed the grey cable containing all the wiring over to the electrical box. I forgot to take pictures of my wiring but I’ll include a sample from the instruction manual.

Wiring from the EasyStart over the fan motor, and to the electrical box.

This was all the wiring that was necessary. Connect a white wire where the other white wires are connected, connect an orange wire where all the red wires are connected. Connect the brown wire to the white wire going back to the compressor, then cut the blue wire (not the red wire, never the red wire) and splice the black wire into the middle. Tuck all the wiring away nicely. Remember you’re afraid of heights. Don’t fall off the trailer.

After it’s all connected up it’s time to “teach” the Soft Start device about your air conditioner. You do this by turning the AC on, wait until the compressor comes on, let it run for 30 seconds, then adjust the temp so that the compressor turns back off, adjust the temp again to make it come back on (it will make you wait 3 minutes before it turns back on but be patient, it will turn back on.) And then repeat this 2 more times. That’s it. The Soft Start module has now learned your AC’s inrush current particulars. You will notice that the compressor no longer “klunks” on. You just hear a gentle humming begin. Very nice.

Then it was just a matter of closing the AC back up and taking a nap! Now to shop for a generator.

Battery Monitor Install

On By The Flying DutchmanIn Lance, RV Life4 Comments
BMV-700 - Victron Energy
BMV-702

I just completed another mod on my Lance 1995 travel trailer. I installed a Victron BMV-702 battery monitor. It’s a simple device that displays the charge state of your battery. Rather than measure the voltage level it measure the amount of current that flows into and out of your battery. It learns over time and will give you an accurate reading of how much battery power you have left.

It was a simple install but getting at all the locations I needed to get to was somewhat of a challenge for my bad back. The first decision was where to put the shunt. A shunt is used by an ammeter (a device that measures electrical current). Normally they are built into the instrument but with the current levels involved with two car batteries it’s just not practical. You install the shunt between the negative terminal on the battery and the trailer’s ground. A wire then goes from the shunt to the instrument head to provide power and current measurements.

Luckily for me there is a convenient access panel next to the bed where the negative terminals of the batteries connect to ground.

The black wire with the blue tape goes to ground. The other black wire goes to the 2nd battery. The black wire with the blue tape goes on one side of the shunt, and then a cable I made up goes from the other side of the shunt to the terminal with the unmarked black cable on it. This places the shunt between the batteries and ground.

First I had to mount the shunt. I screwed it to the side of the access compartment. The wood screws protrude into the wood block that the back of the nightstand drawers secure to. This made for a very sturdy mount for the 1 pound shunt. I also had to find a way to get the cable that connects the shunt to the instrument head down to the baggage compartment where I was going to mount the instrument. I did this by drilling a hole in the bottom of the access compartment down to the baggage compartment directly below.

Here is a photo of the connected instrument cable. The red wire goes to the positive side of the battery to provide power to the instrument. The only photo I forgot to take was of the battery grounds connected up.

The next challenge was mounting the instrument in the baggage compartment. I decided to put it next to the battery disconnect switch. It’s the first switch you turn on when taking the trailer out of storage so it made sense to put the battery monitor there. Why not mount it inside next to the other instruments? I didn’t want to run that wire all that way and if I messed up the install, I’d rather it be out of site in the baggage compartment!

I had to use a 2 inch hole saw to cut the hole. I then used a Dremmel tool to cut a small mouse hole at the top to run the cable through. I’ll use some clear RTV to secure the cable to the side of the baggage compartment. It took a little patience and some extra work with the Dremmel to get the main hole just right but in the end it all worked out. There is a bluetooth add on that I’m going to get so I can check the voltage from my phone inside the trailer. I’ll add that later. For now I’m just glad I can get a better idea of how the batteries are actually performing and when I need to charge them.