jleamont

Agreed! Nothing like sitting on the side of the road to make a trip interesting

Vince, I am in the process of purchasing the BF Goodrich product for our coach. Pricing was fantastic and the product looks like its big brother, Michelin (same company now).

Carl, you don't. Either suffer through it or stand up and do something about it to keep the wheels rolling.

thanks Carl for reminding me

I found this on the web, looks like a winner. I tried all options and she wants stone or metal tiles as Kay mentioned. While the stone doesn't weigh much, hanging it on the wall really concerned me as you never know the road you are going to encounter until you are on it. http://www.flextile.com/index.htm I was struggling with self sticking stone (peel and stick) or glue and grout. After finding the link above I may just go that route, glue them on and grout the products above.

Falcon6251, nice work! There are options out there but they all require $$$ to toss at them which in my opinion shouldn't be the consumers problem.

So far everything we like requires mastic and grout. I am apprehensive to do that on a coach, house ok....not on a motorhome. I keep picturing it falling off or the grout cracking and falling out. Thoughts?

Personally, I would buy the higher end coach for several reasons if its in your price range; first is the quality of construction and materials used to build that coach are far superior than the lower level coaches. superior engineering of the product. resale value it will out last the lower end coaches and give you less headaches, because of #1 and 2. Just my thoughts on this

Mike, I leave mine all year, but the coach is at home. I think if it were me I would mark them with a Sharpe, so you can put them back in the proper position, place them in the coach and pull the batteries out. Our system the batteries last a year, some have made it almost two. As far as the toad goes I remove them since its my DW's daily driver when we return from a trip and mine are marked and in the Jeep glove box. The last toad just sat, they stayed on.

Carl me neither but for longevity they do hold up as long as you can get them to seal. They do look pretty .

If you look closely under the alternator you can see the lower hose connecting to the pipe that runs along the rear of the frame, it 90's into the engine connection. At the radiator its just a straight 5" section, no problem there.

Brett, do you know if its available with a 90 degree bend? Trying to navigate their website and not having much luck. Not much of a fan of Silicone hoses either. My lower hose at the engine has a 90 degree bend and that is what made me go silicone on the lower only at one spot. The upper hose I am running with this product at both connections since they are straight. https://www.napaonline.com/napa/en/p/NBG666/NBG666_0226457337

While on the topic, I am considering replacing the rubber hose sections with this product. http://s7d9.scene7.com/is/content/GenuinePartsCompany/1268596pdf?$PDF$ Anyone have any experience with this or something similar?

No! The new Powerstroke, not a bad engine and in the previous years back prior to 2003.

Often wondered why Ford never got into this with the F53, maybe as an option.

Carl is right, I will post photos of it when I am done, he knows me well enough .

Herman, I bought them pre bent and I just have to cut them down and Weld them together so it matches the original with the bends pointing in the right direction. Here is the link to the pipe; http://vibrantperformance.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=1528_1065_1239&products_id=1416 I have a Tig and Mig welder in the garage, so time to break out the Tig Welder with some stainless rod and go to town. Worse case scenario I have a friend that builds custom boats, I will go over to his shop if need be.

Update: called the tube manufacture. They wouldn't give me the time of day. Tube Specialties http://www.tubespecialties.com/ I asked to speak to their tech support department as I wanted to know the thickness of the tube and ID/OD. Refused again to help and told me to call Monaco, I already went down that road and got no where, Monaco/REV told me to call the tube manufacture and they only had the part number of it and that it was discontinued. So I threw in the towel and ordered the pipe to build it myself based off of the measurement of the Cummins water outlet and radiator inlet both measure 2.25" so the pipe between will also be the same size OD and 16 gauge T304 Stainless. $111.00 in parts and three days from now I will have them.

Tireman9, thank you for the input. I spoke to one of the tire dealer's (large east coast truck tire installer) we use at work. They recommended the 315/80R22.5 however my wheels are too narrow. I inquired about the 12R22.5 we both looked at the specs online and they are narrower .5", so I can have them safely mounted on my wheels and I have plenty of clearance for the extra 1.1" taller. 12R22.5 Seems like the path to take.

Phil what year is you coach? The new engines can be a real pain in the tail. I'm surrounded by them all day at work dealing with the constant breakdowns and engine lights. I couldn't imagine dealing with it in our coach, my wife would flip.

Tracey, keep us posted, I know I am curious to hear what they find. Be sure to locate an authorized Aqua Hot repair facility.

Herman, ours is the same, true workmanship. I showed Kay when we met up and he was surprised how nice the electrical is laid out with a plastic schematic riveted to the doors in both side compartments also. I love the old school simple way also.

Craig and Jane, Welcome to the FMCA forum! Always glad to see new members. For us this is our 2nd motorhome, it was a live and learn type of adventure with the first one. The second unit......I will say we shopped for a while and were very disappointed! I became so disgusted with the condition of used coaches and the condition the dealer was willing to show them in. I asked my wife (not working at the time) to run and look, if it passes her white glove test I will go and look. I opened cabinets, pushed against walls in and out, looked at the roof and condition of sealant (if it looked new I was on the opposing side looking for signs of a leak) once I realized the walls were real solid wood, and didn't budge I was happy). I also looked under the coach at the chassis construction and design, how wiring was routed and secured, tested the coolant to make sure it was properly serviced, smelled the fluids to see if something was off, looked for signs of oil leaks that had been wiped off. I crawled all over the coach for at least 4 hours in a jump suite. Made sure everything worked, then drove it. Surprisingly the dealer (small mom and pop dealership) were ok with all of it. I think they were happy to get our old coach on trade after seeing how particular I was. I identified a few problems, they paid to resolve and I asked them for a 30 day internal warranty which they agreed to and we bought it. That was the 2nd time we bought a coach from a small dealer, both times they were great to work with, very personable. We looked at new coaches also, as we were so disgusted with the overall experience of the used market. Believe me I did the same inspection with the new ones honestly it took less time to see something horrifying and walk away onto the next manufacture for more disappointment. After six manufactures and their new unit inspections a few upset salespeople, I told her we are buying an old bus (Silver Eagle was one I always admired) and we are going to do a conversion. The used ones had issues with quality of construction(depending on the manufacture) and previous owner issues i.e. cleanliness and maintenance and the new ones were absolute junk! Wiring laying all over the place out of loom, not secured, plumbing was so flimsy you could squeeze a drain pipe and crush it with bare hands, screws missing, slides binding and the materials used were low budget. You can really feel out a coach manufacture after you look one over that has bounced up and down the highway for a few thousand miles and see what it looks like now. The new ones couldn't make it from manufacturing to the dealer without a problem, that has to say something for the quality . She recalled a place 20 minutes from home that had a Prevost and Newell parked on their lot (not an RV dealer rather a used car lot that also would, on occasion sell a RV) a few months back and decided to go up and talk to them. Low and behold that was where we found the Imperial, at the time it was our coach and a Travel trailer were all they had in the way of RV's and it had been the first Monaco product I looked at used. I will say after that experience the next go round I am not looking forward to. I think our next coach will be a top end unit (Foretravel, Newell, Prevost) older of course. I prefer pre emissions engines, as I am in the Diesel repair business now and I want nothing to do with the problems and expenses of the new Diesel technology.

I feel your pain. Our last coach was a leaker and it was everything but the roof. I had the side walls pulled, wood replaced and fiberglass reinstalled, the place that did the work did a nice job on that but didn't seal the windows and appliances properly. So I pulled them all out when it started to delaminate again and repaired it myself, reinstalled the windows and appliances.

Carl, "System Heat" switch is a Monaco thing. The 12v heater in the wet bay was standard on my coach and is controlled by this switch. According to my manual, "System Heat" is not part of the Aqua Hot system. It controls the snap disc thermostat for the 12v wet bay heater and if equipped with the cold weather package it also turns on the Fresh tank, Grey tank and Black tank heating pad elements. Best bet would be to call REV @ 1-877-466-6226 to confirm what the vin in question was built with, that would be a huge help in determining what isn't working properly.