docj

With all due respect, your recommendation is not necessarily valid any longer. Within the past coupe of years Dometic has switched most, if not all, of its models to using telephone wire (which it calls communications wire) with RJ11 connectors rather than traditional colored thermostat wires. The communications cable is needed for multizone installations. Until this year, several A/C models were sold in single zone and multi-zone configurations, but according to Dometic Customer Service this is not longer the case. The Penguin units I was interested are now only available in the multi-zone version. This may not be a problem if you have a newer MH, but my "vintage" Beaver has traditional single zone thermostats with "normal" wiring. As a result, I knew that installing new Dometic Penguins would necessitate running new wires and that would have been an issue since one of our thermostats is on a slideout and would have been nearly impossible to rewire. For this reason (and a couple of others) I decided to go with Coleman Mach 8+ 15,000 BTU heat pumps made by Airxcel. The installer was successfully able to reuse the existing thermostat wiring. So far I am very impressed with the units (although, obviously, I haven't yet tried the heating function! 😃) The cooling power is impressive; last night I measured 55 degree air coming out of the ducts with outside temperatures in the high 80's. On the low fan speed setting, they are quieter than our old Penguins and on high speed the air circulation is impressive. Airxcel provides a 2-year warranty and a 3-year parts only) extension is available for $90.

Well said. The pandemic will continue until everyone understands they have a shared interest in making it go away. If people reject the "inconvenience" of giving up some "freedom" to help others, we will be doomed to it running its full course which could take years and kill millions. JMO

Picky, picky! It's a state somewhere in the "middle" that starts with an "I"! 😄

You don't say what brand of leveling system you have, but if it's an HWH the company is headquartered in ID. Maybe you could schedule an appointment there.If it's just the springs and foot pad it's not that difficult a job to replace them.

In SD I can self-certify that I am not engaged in driving that requires a medical card. That way I can keep my CDL without the need for a physical.

Since you're just starting out, I suggest that maybe you should begin with an indoor unit. The rooftop router can always be added later and the two will integrate and operate from one on-screen control panel. The rooftop unit provides longer WiFi range. if you expect to use a lot of park WiFi that would be its primary advantage along with slightly faster throughput because you would have two radios rather than one. As for comparisons between WiFiRanger and other hardware, I recommend that you check out the Mobile Internet Resource Center (MIRC). They provide accurate and unbiased information on a broad range of hardware. Joel (AKA docj)

I can't understand why you accepted their 85% offer. That's what they wanted you to do so now you have no case against them. Two months ago I had no difficulty getting CapitalOne to reverse a credit card charge for admissions to an event for which the event operator was playing "hard to get" on a refund. If you can get a credit card company to do a "chargeback" the vendor has no say in the matter. The vendor has to show the credit card company why it is entitled to any of the money; it gets removed from the vendor's account immediately.

We have an inexpensive Humana Dental PPO that works with our SD address. It covers our cleanings (when we used to have them before COVID) and it gives us a bit of a break on other services. I have a hunch that implants are still going to be expensive. Prior to COVID lots of folks in south TX would go across the border to Mexico for implants. Not sure if that would work now.

I agree. The 12 liter engine in a 34,000 pound MH makes it a dream to drive! People who've never driven a big block diesel with that much torque don't understand how it affects drivability.

One place where I find downshifting really helps is in rolling terrain on 2-lane roads with speed limits in the 55-60 mph range. I like to drive with my compression brake on but it downshifts to 4th when it engages. By manually downshifting to 4th, the Jake engages and disengages without any shifting which makes for a smooth, easy ride.

On very steep grades I will often manually downshift to 4th. My rig easily does 60 in 4th and the manual downshift avoids having the transmission "hunting" gears as the speed and grade vary. Using the lower gear pretty much eliminates any heating issues.

That's not just an activation fee, that's the fee charged every month in which there are tolls charged to the account. I guess if I visit my son in NC and incur a few 35 cent tolls going to and from his house I would see a $14.95 fee on my account for that month, in addition to the actual toll charges. No thanks! Nominal monthly service fee of $14.99 charged ONLY on months when toll charges are incurred, otherwise there is no service fee I'm glad that $14.95 is nominal for some folks. I'll stick with the MD EZPass transponders that we have. MD charges us $1.50/mo in the 3 months following use of the pass. Beyond 3 months, if there are no tolls there is no monthly fee.

There are plans on AT&T sold through resellers that don't have capped data limits. And Visible, by Verizon, is a low-cost unlimited plan. There are options without having to use Sprint/T-Mobile

There is no simple answer to your question. Despite the fact that there are many people on this forum, including myself, who could offer good advice, I always suggest to newcomers that they start by reading some of the material on the Mobile Internet Resource Center (MIRC) website. MIRC is a well-respected and unbiased entity whose only mission is to assist "mobile individuals" with obtaining internet connectivity. The MIRC website can be found here: Mobile Internet Resource Center Joel (AKA docj)

I assume someone had you verify that the APN was correct? It's possible that the APN reverted to a stored one that isn't correct for this plan.

In the cellular world, the kind of plan that FMCA sells is called a "reseller plan" since it isn't sold directly by the carrier. Many (most?) reseller plans don't work in the "extended range" portions of the coverage maps. I'm not sure why yours did work there before, but that's probably the reason you're having so much trouble now. Historically, Sprint has always been the weakest of the cellular carriers with more holes in its coverage map than the others. Supposedly Sprint customers can now roam on the T-Mobile network (as the first phase of the merger) but I don't know if that applies to reseller plans. IMO T-Mobile's coverage is also pretty poor compared to Verizon and AT&T so, as a full-time RVer, I won't consider them either. I have low-cost unlimited connections with both Verizon and AT&T and use both of them in a load balancing router. That's what it takes to stay connected all the time and even that solution isn't perfect.

I've had Hankooks on my steer axle for ~5 years and now have them on the drive axle as well. In general, our experience was a better ride and lower noise. I'm no fan of Michelins for my cars or my MH. IMO they are overhyped and overpriced.

Putting the transponder in a foil pouch solves that problem. No need to remove it from the vehicle.

In my experience, T-Mobile's coverage map has to be taken with a grain of salt. If you expand it way up you can see that there are "shading" differences in the regions that get 4G coverage. The darker shading is is supposed to be "really good" coverage and the slightly lighter shading is "not quite as good". My home is in that second, lighter shading and the service here is pretty poor!

I'm not aware of any coverage map provided by T-Mobile that shows where Band 71 is available. Here's a map from a year ago created by others. I don't know how much the coverage has been expanded since then, but it was pretty limited at that time: T-Mobile Band 71 coverage

If your countertops and sinks are a solid surface material (the generic term for Corian) you can use this kit to polish them up and remove nicks and scratches: Corian repair kit In addition, my wife uses a mild bleach and water solution to remove surface stains when she does her weekly cleaning. Just put a bit of bleach in a sinkfull of water and let it stand for half an hour. FWIW, normally Corian is not polished to a high gloss finish because it is an inherently soft material and the finish will rapidly dull. A "satin" finish is easier to maintain.

If you're looking at an Aspen without LTE functionality then you might as well save a few dollars and buy a Spruce. The processor is the same in both. All these routers can connect to hotspots using WiFi but many people like the sense of stability provided by a hardwire connect. More importantly, if the hotspot and Ranger are communicating via a tether the WiFi broadcast from the hotspot won't interfere with the Ranger even if you leave the SSID enabled. When they are linked via WiFi there can be a risk of interference if all your electronics are close together. Through the use of an inexpensive USB hub, WiFiRanger products can USB-tether up to 3 cellular devices and use them all in a Load Balanced connection. As for the use of USB 2.0 rather than 3.0, the max rated throughput speed of USB 2.0 is 480 Mbps. I haven't encountered any internet connection lately that would be anywhere near that fast. 😂 This is a case where there's no practical need to upgrade the spec and no particular benefit to doing so.

I don't see what's so unusual about what your're looking for. In your Variation #1 you use a cellular hotspot device as your primary method of connecting your "local network" of devices to the internet. In your Variation #2 you use the park's WiFi. At present, I use my WiFiRanger Aspen router for both of those purposes. I have three cellular hotspots connected to it via USB and Ethernet tethers and I have our park's WiFi connected via 2 GHz WiFi. Rather than limiting myself to your two cases I use all of my sources in a Load Balanced configuration, but I could easily use them one at a time as you propose in variations 1 and 2. If I'm missing some aspect of your situation, please explain. There are a number of other brands of routers with WIFi as WAN capability that could do the same thing. I'll mention Pepwave and Cradlepoint as two examples

Those anecdotal examples have no significance with respect to what benefits any individual person will receive.

The trouble is that using anecdotal examples doesn't provide a basis for being able to know what any specific individual's benefits would be. Just because you know of two people who were treated this way, doesn't provide a precedent for any future benefits for others, particularly since that's not the way the benefit language is written. I, for one, sure wouldn't want to make the assumption that I would receive those benefits since they exceed what the plan is obligated to pay for.