born2travel

I spoke with a local battery guru. I then charged the batteries. He tested them and he said they were fine. the lowest cell was 1.252 and the highest 1.261. These were tested 3 hours after they were charged. He said he wouldn't change them at this point. His suggestion was that of Herman's. Start pulling fuses. He did admit that with the positive disconnected I shouldn't have a draw. But he did admit stranger things have happened. So when I get some down time I will start yanking fuses. Surgery put us behind the eight ball for having a leisure post storage prep and load-out.

As the saying goes "pulling it is the easy part, getting it stopped is another story."

We have worked there for years. West Yellowstone seems to be a favorite base camp for visitors. But RV site are beginning to get scarce. And they are very proud of the ones there. Grizzly RV park is the Cadillac so far. They are very, very proud of their sites. It is clean, dry and has most of the whistles and bells people want. Other parks in town while not as pricey can quickly become puddle laden. They have full hook-ups, but don't have whistles and bells. Just sites and hookups. Most are very tight. Make reservations no matter where you stay in that region. As long as you have a toad the further out you overnight the more reasonable the prices become. Get to the park gates fairly early in the morning. The entry lines back up quickly. We always use RV park reviews when we go to an unfamiliar area. We ignore the "walk on water" ratings. Probably owners and friends. Unless that is all there is. Then we take out the "quite a dump" ratings. Unless that is all there is. Then we read the other reviews. It will give you a good idea of what an RV park is really like.

We fall into the category of - if something weird can happen it will happen to us. I can't tell you how many times we have heard "I have never seen that before." The batteries are approaching 5 years. I will soon be replacing them. But I would love to find the gremlin's hiding place first. As I said it is a quest at this point. Once I get the answers I will follow up here. Many times I see threads such as this one that leave everyone hanging as to the outcome.

Richard, once I get paired back up with the RV I will get some pics. Also, I have searched high and low for cracks, swelling, low fluids, folds, bends, spindles and mutilates. I didn't see anything. My seeing eye dog didn't see anything either. I think my electrons are pole vaulters. Herman, I will follow your suggestion when I get a chance. Wouldn't they lose power all of the time? Meaning when both sides are disconnected there is very little voltage drop. Wouldn't a bad cell(s) cause the problem all of the time they aren't being charged in some way? I will soon be released from my post surgical restrictions. Being a recliner ranger is fun for a couple of days. After that not so much.

That makes sense but it isn't an issue when both cables are disconnected. It only drains down when just the positive is disconnected. I would think that would eliminate the internal bleed possibility. But being an advanced tinkerer as opposed to a electronic wizard i may be wrong.

They were down from 12.7 to 11.8. That was after between 3 and 4 weeks. With only the positive disconnected it was down around 9.5 in two weeks. Again, I was told of a dead cell issue being the likely culprit but a load test showed they were in good shape, on two separate tests a year apart. The most recent being just before we placed it in storage a couple of months ago. From a time standpoint I probably need to be replacing these batteries but with this issue hanging out there I am procrastinating.

I have cleaned the batteries, the connections and anything else that looked dirty. The normal discharge happens when they are completely disconnected. down a bit but not crazy low. If just the positive is shut off and the ground is left connected is when they dwindle in a couple of weeks. Obviously, this isn't an earth shattering issue. One more wingnut and cable isn't killing me. It is just very puzzling. I have brought it up to fellow travelers over time and they don't have the same issue when they disconnect the positive side, of the ones who do this. It seems like this gremlin has my name. This old girl has had us all over a great deal of the country. Every year we have one thing. Sometimes RV related and sometimes chassis related. Always one thing. And generally that one thing causes us to hear "I have never heard of that before" or "that can't happen."

It is a Georgieboy on a P30 chassis of the 99 vintage. It is a poorboy rig but it has been solid. It has dual 24 (maybe 27) deep cells. The converter is in the "not sure" column as well because the RV is not where I am currently located. It works fine on shore power so I wouldn't think that would be in the loop. I didn't spell this out correctly in my original post. Can't you tell what I am thinking???? To be clear, I removed the ground. The batteries lost power over a few weeks. So then I moved the switch to the positive side. Leaving the negative connected and the positive side disconnected I still had a draw. If both were sides were removed the batteries held their charges. How can there be a phantom draw when only the ground is connected? Once I get my head wrapped around that... I prefer Herman's option from a dollars and cents standpoint. The gadget Richard mentioned is intriguing.

When in storage I have had a problem with my house batteries losing their charge. The first few times I only removed the negative cable. But with grounds everywhere I moved the blade switch to the positive side. Still after a few weeks they are down. I turn the salesman switch off. The chassis battery is switched off (it behaves). I can't find anything easy to check that has power. It was suggested a battery had a bad cell. A load test showed the batteries were in great shape. I have probed, tested, shut off everything I can think of. Now while it isn't horribly difficult to remove the positive and negative cables it is very puzzling, and has become a quest. Obviously when on shore power or driving it isn't an issue. Any electrical gremlin hunters out there who can cause me to slap my forehead with the palm of my hand? How can power leak when the powering side isn't connected?

I wonder how the law would be viewed when a person is called for jury duty but doesn't have a new and improved ID.

There was a KVH R4 on our MH when we purchased it. We use DISH. We were happy with it for several years. I do know there are two keys (on our model anyway) to switch from Direct to Dish. All at once it quit finding the satellites. After some checking we found that Dish had done some type of Voodoo to their satellites. The KVH system we had would require some type of upgrade. I contacted KVH and was informed the fix was to purchase a newer system. Since then some new and improved circuit board to fix the problem may have been made but I haven't heard of it. Hopefully, I hope will get hammered from many directions and informed there is an easy fix, but I haven't stumbled onto one. Our solutions was to purchase a Tailgater. As mentioned, call KVH first.

We got the sewer solution setup years ago and never looked back. No stinky slinky, no worrying about getting the hose down hill and the hose lasts years. It only came with 10" of hose but we got the length we wanted at Lowes.

I go to https://www.pilotflyingj.com/store-locator/ you can search a location or entire route. On the "stores that have" drop down check the "RV Lanes" box and it will only list those. These are dedicated RV Lanes, just watch for the signs for where to enter. We have had very few problems with these. Most of the time it is has been from a person fueling then going inside to shop for an extended period.

Having worked there for five years we have been in and out of each entrance, with the exception of the northeast entrance, with the motorhome towing. Plenty of room. Large semis make deliveries every day. The biggest problems will be the "it's all about me" people who decide to stop in the middle of the road and stare at something. The visitation starts picking up in June, the later in June the more traffic there is. 26 to 191 will take you in the south entrance. Enjoy Teton National Park if you go that route. As previously mentioned, 14 from Cody is a great road. Don't be in a hurry and enjoy the scenery.

We have been getting wind that Park County Wyoming will begin enforcing a state law requiring out of state worker $50 per month, per vehicle fee for Yellowstone National Park workers. A quick google search confirmed the prevailing wind. A car and an RV equals $100.00 per month, up to four months. After that you have to register the vehicles in Wyoming. When you register the vehicles that requires transferring the title to a Wyoming title. Doesn't your driver's license have to match your plates? Then you get to change your insurance. The full season puts all seasonal park employees into the change everything category. Not to mention seasonal employees have a PO Box address. Those aren't acceptable for DMV purposes. Talk about a can of worms! The law has been on the books a long time but nobody can find information on it being enforced on seasonal workers. It doesn't sound like any of the employers are giving anyone a warning about this. Maybe they feel once you show up you are trapped. Every state has some kind of similar language about registering vehicles for long term residents. I haven't heard of the registration being forced on people who are moving down the road after the season ends. I don't know how they plan of enforcing it. It doesn't seem they are going after any of the other summer season RVers that work in the region. Just those at Yellowstone.

I have had Allied for many years on everything. Never a problem.

The first year we used it (2011) that happened over the winter. When I called the second time to get it fixed I wouldn't even tell the person my problem I simply asked for the person that specializes in RV accounts. After a moment of silence she transferred me. I was told that the $5 per month fee is for people that are under a contract. You have to make it clear to the person that takes your call that you are an RVer not under contract and the $5 monthly fee does not apply to you. They have been putting you in the wrong category when they shut it down. The caveat is if you are leasing equipment from them it may still apply. We haven't had a problem since when we shut it down during the off season.

X whatever we are at for the ReadyBrute Elite.

We used West Yellowstone as our base for the park many years. The drive from the west gate to Madison Junction is beautiful and has a great deal of wild life. The park is laid out in a figure 8. Once you hit Madison Junction you are just about in the center of the figure 8. Just pick the half of the park you want to see that day.

We have never used DNS. We just call and have our service area changed and get the new locals within 10 minutes. Once in a great while we get a call taker that can't spell RV much less understand what you want to do. We just ask for another representative and it takes 15 minutes instead of 10 minutes. And there is no additional fee.

I have to ask - why is it the "dreaded" PEX. It is mostly bullet proof and simple to work with. PEX joints and lines are way more forgiving to elements and bouncing down the road than PVC joints and pipes. You can always use an air compressor to pressurize (at low pressure) the holding tank and see if you have a leak. Spritz it with soapy water and see if you get any bubbles. That way if/when you find a leak you don't have gallons of water draining to a level below the breach.

Have it, love it, never an issue. Very low maintenance. We have it hooked up and we are able to drive away in less than 5 minutes. While I have seen naysayers beating it up - I have yet to see a post where the person writing it had one and returned it because it didn't function as designed. With many naysayer's postings it is a second cousin's next door neighbor's meter reader's ex-wife's attorneys paralegal's boyfriend's brother-in-law who had a problem.

They wanted a "home" address when I activated my receiver but did not require a home system setup. If you got that information from Dish network I'd call back and get someone who can help with an RV activation. If you got it from someone else I suspect they have no first hand knowledge. The ViP211k is a fairly inexpensive receiver and has served us well on the road and was HD ready. To record you attach a external hard drive to the receiver. There was a one time fee for the recording setup.

We have Bigfoot levelers on our MH. Each leveler has its own pump so they are relatively simple to install. The support has been great even on an older rig. If you are close to them they install as well. A few years back I helped a friend install theirs and we were done in a day except for finishing the wiring in the cab and control pad install. The only downside I have found is one of the four levelers is a bear to get at to do any work on. There is always one no matter what you are working on. So far I have only had to replace one hose (on the bear to get to leveler of course) and two limit switches. All in all they have been very dependable. http://thebigfootleveler.com/