Dad's Toy

[Air Dog]

Originally Posted by dadstoy

Derek, you should be here at Burning Man with us! We are on the playa at BM. Woke up this morning to lightning, thunder and hail. Neighbor is kind enough to be providing wifi...imagine that way out here in the desert! MH is working flawlessly.


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Sounds like the dust and heat should be down.


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[dadstoy]

Yes, so far temps are perfect and no wind nor dust!


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[dadstoy]

Burning Man 2014, another successful trip! Only issue on the trip this year was a rotted fuel return hose from the mechanical pump to the hard line. I replaced those lines only a year ago so didn't have any extra fuel line with me...mistake of course. I cut out a section from the genset fuel feed. Got home with no other problems!


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[dadstoy]

A few images...

[dadstoy]

Can't wait to get the MH out there again...soon!

[Vycan]

I am guessing the clear plastic drop behind you is so the Dash A/C is functional instead of blowing cold air a few inches.

[dadstoy]

Originally Posted by Vycan

I am guessing the clear plastic drop behind you is so the Dash A/C is functional instead of blowing cold air a few inches.

Yes! Someone on the forum had mentioned that they do this...thanks to that person! This really did help out. I bought a $5 clear shower curtain and some Velcro. I didn't want to do anything permanent nor spend a lot of money before I tried this out. The Velcro tape didn't stick well, but it was good enough for the trip to Nevada and back. I will try to figure something out to be able to do this again.

[crazeevw]

Maybe I haven't been reading enough about your Burning Man preparations, but am I seeing a solar panel set-up on trailer behind your Airstream? Was it able to keep your batteries topped off without having to use genset? At least until roof air was needed?

Thanks, Derek

[jdalrymple]

Glad you made it home ok.

We did too.

It was nice to meet you.


Regards,

JD

[dadstoy]

Originally Posted by jdalrymple

Glad you made it home ok.

We did too.

It was nice to meet you.


Regards,

JD

Hello JD,

Alex and I both want to say hi to you and your wife! Thank you so much for stopping by and introducing yourselves. We really enjoyed meeting you. Glad you got home safe and sound. Other then the fuel hose, it was smooth sailing for us. I'm glad I have as part of my checklist to do a under chassis inspection with engine running. I was leaking so much fuel that it would have caught fire and we would have had to declare it as a burning art piece! Hope to see you folks again some day!

Dean



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[dadstoy]

Originally Posted by crazeevw

Maybe I haven't been reading enough about your Burning Man preparations, but am I seeing a solar panel set-up on trailer behind your Airstream? Was it able to keep your batteries topped off without having to use genset? At least until roof air was needed?

Thanks, Derek

I've been using the solar panels for a couple years now when we go to BM and Yosemite. A couple years ago, Costco was selling this unit from Coleman. It is a 65 watt system.

If I had the money, I would have myself a 300 watt system and if I had just a little bit of money, I would have as a minimum system 150 watts. But this was inexpensive and it is still working!

This 65 watt system provides about 3 amps when panels are clean and in direct sun light. My MH with basically nothing running but the refrigerator electronics, propane leak detector and well I don't think anything else, requires about 1.5 amps. In that situation, the system will then only be charging the coach batts at 1.5 amps per hour. Not enough to charge batts from much of any a discharged state.

I'm guessing that throughout a day/night, I use about 30+ amps and that is with very little usage of MH lights, water pump and the fans ( up to three of them). If the panels got a good ten hours of sun light, that would only give me about 15 amps of charging over the basic amp requirements.

I bring with me a Yamaha 2000 portable generator and when I'm at Yosemite, I probably run it about three hours a day total to keep the coach batts charged. At BM, I'm running the Yamaha a lot! Everyone does, so no need for me to fret. I have 110v led string lights and a "small" boom box that I use a lot as well as run the interior fans when there is no dust clouds visible. I have another batt and an inverter on my flat trailer. I charge this batt with the generator too. But, I discovered this trip that that batt will no long charge, so I used the generator a bit more this year.

I used about 5 gallons of gas for the Yamaha 2000 over the week. No problem since I brought an extra 25 gallons of gas with me. I think the Yamaha burns about a gallon every 8 hours, where the Onan genset I believe burns about a gallon an hour.

I did use the Onan genset twice so that we could run the rood A/C to cool down the MH on two late afternoons. Hell why not, the super rich millionaires at BM have electricity 24 hours a day and run their A/Cs 24 hours a day! At the higher altitude, the genset runs pretty rough until it's warmed up and I finally adjusted the mixture screw so it wasn't pumping out so much black smoke!

Speaking of batteries, my iPad I'd about to die so I'll post this and maybe add more later.


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[dadstoy]

My solar panel mount...

Nothing fancy nor expensive here. I manually turn the panels toward the sun throughout the day. I use my tie downs to secure it against the wind.

[dadstoy]

I made a new genturi this year for the genset. I tossed out the other one that I made out of used 4" pvc. It was just too bulky and heavy and I didn't want to store it any longer. When we were getting close to BM this year, I knew if I wanted to run the getset at all, I would need a new genturi. I can't run the getset for any more than 5-10 minutes without the CO2 detectors sounding. I was going to buy the real thing but decided the cost was too much.

I wanted it to be a bit simpler as well. I used 2" pvc only because Home Depot didn't have any 3". I picked up two flexible 1 1/2" exhaust pipes and one 1 1/2" hard 90 degree exhaust pipe from one of the auto parts stores. I used a small flat aluminum bar that I cut and bent to connect the exhaust pipe to the pvc. In keeping it simpler, I used some existing straps to secure the pvc pipe the awning brackets.

It worked, but 3" pvc pipe is actually required. The 2" just didn't create enough of a venturi affect to adequately draw in colder air and I also think the 2" is too restrictive. The bottom end of the pvc also got hot enough to deform a bit. I used all of the 10' pvc pipe that I bought, but also think the length was a bit too long which also makes the pipe too restrictive. Next time I will cut the pipe at about 1 foot above the roof line.

If I remember right, the desert is at about 3000' and so the genset was running way too rich for this altitude. Even after it warmed up it was pumping out a bit of black smoke. So I reached in and adjusted the mixture screw at the back side of the carb until it ran better which eliminated almost all black smoke.

I ran the genset twice in order to run the roof A/C. One of those times, I ran the getset and A/C for about an hour with no real problems.

I have a habit of checking for oil/gas leaks while running the engine and genset. After the genset had been running a bit, I checked and saw I was leaking oil. I put a pan on the ground under the genset in time to catch any oil from dripping on the ground...a big no no! I reached in and tightened the oil filler cap! I also cleaned up as much oil as I could around the base of the genset.

[dadstoy]

Drove the mh into town today to get it smogged. It failed . It's a very expensive trip into town and back with gas prices where they are. I did go to a truck wash to get the Burning Man playa dust off it however. It sure looks nice when it's all cleaned up!


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[mayco]

Sure does! Beautiful coach


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[dadstoy]

Originally Posted by mayco

Sure does! Beautiful coach


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Thanks!


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[dadstoy]

Here is the fuel pump return line that rotted out. The original is a molded curved line but it is no longer available. So I'm guessing I'm going to have this problem again.

[ScrapIrony-2]

An adjustable, spring-loaded curtain rod will hold your shower curtain in place. A noodle will seal the top gap. The folks at the border check station got a kick out of it...

[ScrapIrony-2]

Noodles are really handy...awning bar headache softeners, windshield wiper blade protectors for longer term stays, cheap pipe insulation...
I have 2 Kyocera 130's top mounted to a Blue Sky controller, and this satisfies electrical needs for daily living...LED's cut use a LOT...m

[dadstoy]

I'll have to try the spring loaded curtain rod. Not sure how you are using the pool noodle with it though. I do have my pool noodles for the awning bars since I have knocked my head on them many times!


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