72 IH + ‘85 Alaskan = Questionable Judgment...
- Thread starter Nailhead
- Start date
Nailhead
Well-known member
It just has to let air & water pass unhindered while excluding bugs. I haven’t really devoted much energy to a solution because so much other crap has been going on. Some sort of screen sounds about right.
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Pacific Northwest yetti
Expedition Medic
Sory about that, Inflatable Kayak. 
fritz
Traveler
A piece of scotch bright pad in the outside end of the vent lineSeemingly no sooner than I got this solved, another train wreck came my way.
I’d just learned about Cat Scales, and I was excited to weigh the truck so I could order rear springs. I’d looked around town for a couple years, didn’t find any easy options, and then I find out I can get my truck scaled out— axle weights included— from an app. Hell yeah!
As a prerequisite to weighing, I had to load up the truck like was taking an epic trip: big cooler on the back, solar suitcase and inflatable kayak inside, with dumbells in the cooler and on the inside to approximate food & beer.
I also filled the water tank, and in the process some things happened that I dismissed in my enthusiasm to get weighed. I didn’t see any returns through the vent hose like I usually do when the tank is full, and the front wall of the camper suddenly bulged forward, prompting me to immediately shut the water off. Then when I removed the hose, water came shooting out the filler. Huh… weird. Whatever, let’s go!
Cat Scales are super easy, IIRC: open the app, drive on the scale, weight is provided, credit card is charged:
Large-boned:
Cool— now I can replace these beat springs.
I get back home, open the camper door to unload the weight I’d added and noticed to my growing horror things aren’t looking quite right in here, s I start raising the top. This foreboding is compounded exponentially when I step on the water tank cover (like I always do) to access the cabover, and it falls onto the tank within:
Something is really ************ up in here.
The explanation for the squeak I heard when the front wall bulged starts to reveal itself:
The bulging water tank had pushed the dinette almost an inch to the rear on both sides. Apparently, the vent hose was plugged (upper hose in pic):
Several hours spent with ratchet straps, various jigs, hammers, and even a small hydraulic jack, and I had everything essentially back in its place:
All this panic and work caused by bug building a cocoon in the tank vent. No lasting harm done, and took the opportunity to add a hold-down to the water tank:
I still haven’t come up with a way to exclude bugs from that vent, though.
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ITTOG
Well-known member
That is a well known hack in my area and are keen to attracting mud dobber nests.
Nailhead
Well-known member
Sory about that, Inflatable Kayak.
It’s an Advanced Elements Straightedge, and I love it:
Because it lets me go places like this:
It’s a little bulky & heavy, but nothing unmanageable:
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Nailhead
Well-known member
Your dog would have to really work at puncturing that material, and it would have to be puppy teeth doing the work. It’s tough stuff.
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Nailhead
Well-known member
Bear in mind, it’s not the largest IK you can get:
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Nailhead
Well-known member
I’m a little concerned the jet of water that spurts out of there when the tank fills would shoot that Scotchbrite out of the tube.
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Todd780
OverCamper
Don't need anything too big. One it would just be me and the other the wife and our small terrier.Bear in mind, it’s not the largest IK you can get:
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If I could fit a rod and small tackle box onboard that would be a bonus too.
ITTOG
Well-known member
We have a blowup that will fit two people. It would be cramped with a dog but would work. I think you need a canoe.
Todd780
OverCamper
We each use our own kayak. Me solo on one and the wife and our terrier on the other.
Thinking the inflatables discussed above would be easier to transport.
Nailhead
Well-known member
Most definitely: think “big duffel bag”.
This has saved me the trouble of fabricating a roof rack for the Alaskan, with the reduction in gas mileage and increase in clearance that would go with it.