Dodge Ram 5500 motorhome
- Thread starter Healeyjet
- Start date
Healeyjet
Explorer
Overland East is starts October 8th. You should plan to attend. There will be some great rigs there for sure.
http://www.overlandexpo.com/east/
Ward
http://www.overlandexpo.com/east/
Ward
Petrolburner
Explorer
Just read all 58 pages. Great design. I'd think you would want to live with it for at least a year before building version 2. Spend all four seasons with it, never know what you might discover. Glad to hear the whole process was bearable enough that you're ready to do it again though.
Healeyjet
Explorer
Our trip to Expo East 2016 has begun.
We left home last Wednesday. After just over a week we are at around the 1500 mile mark.
Mostly pavement so far. Maybe 100 miles on gravel. No campground stays yet.
Our first night we spent parked in front of the parliament building in Regina, SK.
A couple days and nights working in Winnipeg and we were on the road again. Off to Emo Ontario then through International Falls into MN. Over the hills and through Ely, MN brought us to the Lake Superior shore. Wow, if you haven't been, take the trip. We spent a night parked in the overlook looking at the Split Rock Lighthouse. Watched the moon come up in the evening and in the morning were treated to an amazing sunrise.
On to Stillwater, MN but it was too "touristy" for us so we had supper and moved on. 15 miles south of Stillwater we stopped for the night in a church parking lot. Annie attended mass in the morning so we felt less guilty LOL. After being invited for coffee and muffins we were on our way again. Down to Red Wing MN we went. Had to go to the Red Wing store. Didn't buy anything but will stop back again on our way home. Then down t Winona area for the night. We were going to Winona to be at Teakworks4u.com . They made up the template for a teak mat for our bathroom floor as well as a boot scraper for the top step into the camper. More photos on that once we pick it up on the way home.
So far the truck is running great. Fuel mileage is at around 12 mpg as I have dialed back the speed to just under 60 MPH. We installed balance beads into the wheels before we left home. So far we are liking the difference. We are off to Oskaloosa IA tomorrow morning to meet the guys from Kelderman.com so they can have a look at the camper and how the system works for us. So far we are very happy with the Kelderman air ride and love the way we are able to level the camper when parking for the night. After that we are off to Ames, IA to meet up with our friends who own AnythingScout.com . If you haven't heard of them check them out. They graft an International Scout body onto a Jeep Wrangler chassis. We can't wait to see them again and tour their shop. Annie has only hit about 4 or 5 quilt/fabric shops so far as she is pacing herself I believe. So far so good on the 135 square feet of the camper hasn't seemed too small at all. Loving the floor plan for sure. The only issue we had was this. Our water pump is a demand pump but we can shut it off and turn it on near each faucet. even if the pump is turned of you can still get enough residual pressure to do a quick hand rinse. At one point I thought I heard water running. I opened the bathroom door to ind the faucet running full tilt into the sink. I think what happened was that one of us did a quick wash with the pump off and left the tap on without knowing. Then we probably turned the pump on at the kitchen sink and inadvertently turned the bathroom one on. We filled our grey tank but luckily not totally full as that would have ment water pouring out of the bathroom sink, yuk. Luckily it would have been clean water but still. We used up probably 20-25 gallons of our fresh water but learned a lesson so all is good.
More down the road.
Ward
We left home last Wednesday. After just over a week we are at around the 1500 mile mark.
Mostly pavement so far. Maybe 100 miles on gravel. No campground stays yet.
Our first night we spent parked in front of the parliament building in Regina, SK.
A couple days and nights working in Winnipeg and we were on the road again. Off to Emo Ontario then through International Falls into MN. Over the hills and through Ely, MN brought us to the Lake Superior shore. Wow, if you haven't been, take the trip. We spent a night parked in the overlook looking at the Split Rock Lighthouse. Watched the moon come up in the evening and in the morning were treated to an amazing sunrise.
On to Stillwater, MN but it was too "touristy" for us so we had supper and moved on. 15 miles south of Stillwater we stopped for the night in a church parking lot. Annie attended mass in the morning so we felt less guilty LOL. After being invited for coffee and muffins we were on our way again. Down to Red Wing MN we went. Had to go to the Red Wing store. Didn't buy anything but will stop back again on our way home. Then down t Winona area for the night. We were going to Winona to be at Teakworks4u.com . They made up the template for a teak mat for our bathroom floor as well as a boot scraper for the top step into the camper. More photos on that once we pick it up on the way home.
So far the truck is running great. Fuel mileage is at around 12 mpg as I have dialed back the speed to just under 60 MPH. We installed balance beads into the wheels before we left home. So far we are liking the difference. We are off to Oskaloosa IA tomorrow morning to meet the guys from Kelderman.com so they can have a look at the camper and how the system works for us. So far we are very happy with the Kelderman air ride and love the way we are able to level the camper when parking for the night. After that we are off to Ames, IA to meet up with our friends who own AnythingScout.com . If you haven't heard of them check them out. They graft an International Scout body onto a Jeep Wrangler chassis. We can't wait to see them again and tour their shop. Annie has only hit about 4 or 5 quilt/fabric shops so far as she is pacing herself I believe. So far so good on the 135 square feet of the camper hasn't seemed too small at all. Loving the floor plan for sure. The only issue we had was this. Our water pump is a demand pump but we can shut it off and turn it on near each faucet. even if the pump is turned of you can still get enough residual pressure to do a quick hand rinse. At one point I thought I heard water running. I opened the bathroom door to ind the faucet running full tilt into the sink. I think what happened was that one of us did a quick wash with the pump off and left the tap on without knowing. Then we probably turned the pump on at the kitchen sink and inadvertently turned the bathroom one on. We filled our grey tank but luckily not totally full as that would have ment water pouring out of the bathroom sink, yuk. Luckily it would have been clean water but still. We used up probably 20-25 gallons of our fresh water but learned a lesson so all is good.
More down the road.
Ward
nick disjunkt
Adventurer
I have a switch at the main control panel so that I can easily isolate the pump in case of a plumbing failure, but I cannot see a benefit to having one at each tap.
Also, would it not be better to have a breather/overflow for the grey water tank outside the truck, so that when it's full it just empties onto the ground? That way if the tank is full and you cannot empty it, you can still use sink. I guess you could put a bucket under the overflow if you needed to.
Also, would it not be better to have a breather/overflow for the grey water tank outside the truck, so that when it's full it just empties onto the ground? That way if the tank is full and you cannot empty it, you can still use sink. I guess you could put a bucket under the overflow if you needed to.
Healeyjet
Explorer
Scott, the idea behind the switch at each position was to turn on the pump before you use the faucet or shower and turn it off after to avoid the incident that happened to us. It's just that Annie was tired of turning off the pump so we decided to leave it on while we were in the camper. This inconsistency though leads to a bit of uncertainty which is what caused our problem. ITB's thought was to not have the pump hot all of the time, only when needed. Not sure of any other thought that that but I will ask. Nick, I like your overflow idea and will bring that up next time we are through ITB.
Ward
Ward
Hi Ward, have a great trip! We use a main breaker and the pump is hot while we are in the unit, shut it off for travelling, and have an overflow on the fresh tank. With 120 gallons of fresh we've used it a few times! Easy enough to plumb into an existing system (usually).
Ours is hot all time when traveling and we flip the breaker when not. With your approach, I wonder if using a timer switch might be a good choice? They can be purchased with preset intervals, so you could put 1 minute on the sink, 5-10 minutes on the shower etc. would limit the potential for a disaster, water all gone etc.
Healeyjet
Explorer
Mark (Jeep) our system has 1 pump and instead of 1 "breaker" at the main switch we have a small push button that electrifies the pump near each faucet. We also have an overflow on the main fresh tank that empties outside. I will have to ask about having an overflow for the grey tank installed. It is a spot to keep from freezing when it's cold though. So far all of our systems are working great. We grabbed a camp site last night just south of Rockford, IL along a river. Gave us a chance to top up the fresh tank, plug in the system electrically to see if there was anything needed there as well as dump our grey tank this morning. If we were looking for a campsite this one last night was real good, except for the black walnut fruit that was dropping in the wind. I am sure it would give you quite a headache if it got a direct hit. Annie walked with her hands on top her hear as she felt safer that way.
Sitting in Aurora, IL today then heading across Chicago tonight and over to Grand Rapids, MI for tomorrow.
Ward
Sitting in Aurora, IL today then heading across Chicago tonight and over to Grand Rapids, MI for tomorrow.
Ward
