Three other Airstreamer's in the campground...all trailers. One came by yesterday morning admiring my mh. Another came by yesterday evening and just couldn't get over how great the mh looked. That was Dave and Dorthy... Nice meeting both. I gave them a tour inside.
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May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
My tire pressure/temperature system worked nice on the drive to Yosemite. Right now it says I have one tire lower then the min I set. I will have to check with gage to see if that is correct. It is the system from www.tsttruck.com.
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May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
Driving your home home...
Funny, but I didn't notice a generation gap...
Travel well...oh, wait, you already do...
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Michael & Tracy
1989 345 Motorhome CHARTER MEMBERS: FOUR CORNERS UNIT, AND PROUD OF IT!!! We live for the moment, 'cause when you get there, it's gone...
Loved reading your thread...especially since we have purchased a 1982 24' motorhome.....it has the 454 Chevy engine and lots of stuff to do on it.........thanks again. paula
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Paula & Ed
WBCCI # 8252 Air#13593
1982 24'Motorhome (82Ste P)
Loved reading your thread...especially since we have purchased a 1982 24' motorhome.....it has the 454 Chevy engine and lots of stuff to do on it.........thanks again. paula
Thanks Paula and good luck on your soon to be new arrival!
__________________
May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
Back home safe and sound after a great trip to Yosemite. The trip started out from home in the bay area, north 250 miles to Northern Calif in the car to get the MH. Spent the rest of that day working on MH and prepping for the trip. Next, 350 miles south to Yosemite. We started out early, but a couple miles into the trip, we had mechanical problems with the MH. The engine stopped running and I had to coast down the mountain for a quarter mile to a turn out. When the engine quit, it backfired once and the pop was so loud I thought maybe I blew an airbag or tire!
We limped down the mountain and into town. The engine would run, but it would quit once in a while and it would stumble here and there. Well, I figured it was either a fuel starvation problem or an ignition problem. I sort of ruled out a fuel problem. If it was a fuel problem either the engine would not run well at high rpm or would not run at all. The engine stumbled at low rpm as well as high and it would just quit at random times, so not a fuel issue.
Using a volt meter, I checked for 12 volts coming into the distributor...all well. Then I removed a plug wire and checked for spark by using a screw driver and grounding it on the frame. No spark of course when the engine would not start and spark when engine did start of course. Ok, so that meant a problem at the distributor. I disconnected the wires at the distributor and made sure they made a good connection. I could replicated the problem by moving these wires around. I removed the cover off the top of the distributor cap to expose the coil and it's wires. One of the little wires to the coil was pinched. I probably did this a few months back when I changed to distributor. I bet the cold weather was enough to split the wire at the pinched spot. I took a little piece of wire that I found and spliced it between the pinched spot. The engine ran great from that point on.
Since we were in town, I decided to have the two windshield chips repaired. With all the posts here about the cost of replacing windshields,I thought it best to get the chips fixed. It took a bit longer then I figured but all done! I spoke to the window guy about these windshields. I told him some Airstream owners are saying it was costing up to $2000 to replace both pieces of glass...he was surprised. He said you do not need to Replace both sides at the same time since the gasket is separate for each side. He said you don't have to replace the gasket either. He said this gasket is a great gasket and some of the larger Motorhome manufacturers are going back to this type.
This all put us four hours behind schedule and put us into the park after dark. I had to stop after dark and adjust the headlights...I think they were pointing into the sky! They still need to be adjusted better. Only one of the driving lights worked. They both were working the night before when I replaced the bumper. Ended up being a bad ground at the bumper. The MH ran great all the way there. It is quiet a climb up the mountain before you drop down into the valley. The engine pulled strong up the mountain.
More to come in next post...
__________________
May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
When we got to our camping site, I backed in the MH, lowered the jacks and turned on the heater!
Since you are boon docking in Yosemite, conservation of all resources are important. We stayed in Upper Pines campground and there is a dump station at the camp entrance, but who wants to go dump in the middle of the trip?
The MH has a 50 gal water tank, 35 gal gray tank and a 25 gal black tank. We used as little water as possible. We washed dishes in a pan and then dumped the pan into the toilet. That was a great tip I got from this forum. At end of trip, we had 1/4 tank of water left and both waste tanks were full.
We conserved the batteries as much as possible by using the lights sparingly. I ran the heater at night and we used a Mr. Heater propane heater. I used my Yamaha 2000 portable generator for 2-3 hours total throughout the day to recharge the batteries. I ran the Onan GenSet a couple of times when we needed more power. The inverter draws a lot of amps to charge the coach batts so the portable generator runs mostly at full speed. This uses a lot of gas...more then I thought it would. The batteries did well each day and night until about 5 am on the last morning. They went almost dead and the refrig shut off, the furnace fan barely ran and the low batt warning on the propane detected went off! I was surprised! I though the batts got charged enough the day before. I see a solar panel in my future.
It was a beautiful drive out of the valley yesterday. Our day started at 7am and we got home at 2am. It was 350 miles north to drive the MH back to the ranch and then 250 miles south to home (it's only 200 miles direct from Yosemite to home!).
__________________
May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
Great trip by the sound of it!
It would be so easy for any one of these small issues to ruin your trip, but glad you handled it!
I cant wait to get my beast roadworthy, and whilst we plan to shake her down, and all the bugs out with a few trips closer to home, I have to do that trip in the Airstream!
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My name is Steve.... and I am an Alumaholic!
Working in my Garage is like playing TETRIS with Tools!
Great trip by the sound of it!
It would be so easy for any one of these small issues to ruin your trip, but glad you handled it!
I cant wait to get my beast roadworthy, and whilst we plan to shake her down, and all the bugs out with a few trips closer to home, I have to do that trip in the Airstream!
Yup, thought it was over in the first five minutes!
__________________
May a Firefly land upon your shoulder
and bring you good luck, good fortune, and abundance.
I'll bet the heater is the battery drain culprit...they eat like a 454 and a lot of the heat is vented out...a small catalytic heater will warm sufficiently, and you can buy an attachment for your 5 gallon propane tank which will allow you to refill the small green tanks...MUCH cheaper...we refill ours 6 times, then toss...sooner if there is ANY doubt...
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Michael & Tracy
1989 345 Motorhome CHARTER MEMBERS: FOUR CORNERS UNIT, AND PROUD OF IT!!! We live for the moment, 'cause when you get there, it's gone...
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