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Weighed at Love's for the second time in a month, this time with the loaded trailer hooked up of course. Increased my gross by 9,700. Max on my Ventana is 15,000 so I'm good there plus my tongue weight was great. Discussed the whole length issue in prior posts. Just like this trip we are staying on interstate highways and U.S. highways. We will see what happens. In my CG at Upriver I am certainly not the longest combination here. There are some 45' coaches pulling 28' to 30' triple axle enclosed.

I guess we are in the same group then. Someone in Clermont told us that the CG was their HQ and flagship park! OMG, if this was one of their nicest parks I'm not sure how they ever get any RVer to sign up for a regular membership. What really put us off was our camping neighbor. He was outside his big Dutch Star and didn't bother to introduce himself but instead just went into a sales pitch on Thousand Trails membership and then right into another sales pitch on the Newmar Kountry Club. I told him we had looked at both of these options and were not really interested. His DW went into their coach and returned with handouts. Told him again we were not interested. That was it, they were done talking to us and went on about their business. I finished what I was doing and threw away their stupid handouts. It was obvious he was trying to get us to sign up for something so they could get some type of credit or discount. I'm sure there are many great folks using the Thousand Trail's membership, this guy certainly wasn't one of them.

I was confusing Escapees with Thousand Trails for some reason. The park in Clermont we visited was Thousand Trail's, the Escapee's park that does the 4 corner weights in Florida is Busnell. We will be making a run to Tampa next month for a few days to watch our grandson play baseball, then in March we will be staying in St. Augustine for a few days on the way out of Florida. I may try to get up/over to Busnell for that weigh in during one of these runs.

I was confusing Escapees with Thousand Trails for some reason. The park in Clermont we visited was Thousand Trail's, the Escapee's park that does the 4 corner weights in Florida is Busnell. We will be making a run to Tampa next month for a few days to watch our grandson play baseball, then in March we will be staying in St. Augustine for a few days on the way out of Florida. I may try to get up/over to Busnell for that weigh in during one of these runs.

This will be like hijacking my own thread, but since Wayne brought it up......yes, wide turns! When we hooked up and left our site there were no issues. We are just over 72' long and our site is around 85'. With the turning tag I only cut into about 3 feet of grass at the end of the site leaving. Went up U.S. routes to Clermont and though a couple construction zones, no issues. Got to the Thousands Trail's park, backed the trailer into a space and dropped it, no problem. Found a pull through site we could fit in without trailer, not an issue. When we left you have to exit back out onto U.S. Route 27. There is no cut median and you have to go north only (right turn). So I went north and turned into a Publix, followed the edge of their lot to another side exit, turned right, followed a service road one block to another right turn, and that road came back out onto Rt. 27 and a stop light intersection. Of course I had scoped all this out on the Harley the day before. There were some close turns and I needed more than my lane but never once touched my trailer tires on any curbs (gold star). Returned to CG in North Ft. Myers via I-4 to I-75. Stopped in a rest area on I-75 south of Tampa. Confirmed that we are slightly longer than 90% of the big rigs out there. Again, pulling out from a space was close but not an issue because I really think the turning tag makes all the difference in the world. When we got to our site I had to do some serious slow cuts and then saw it back and forth twice on my site to straighten it out, but again no problem. The whole trip was a pleasure and I can't wait to get on the road the end of March!

We just returned from a 3 day stay at the Thousand Trails CG in Clermont. The only reason we picked it was there were friends staying there for a week and we needed to do a shake down cruise in our new coach. There were pluses and minuses to the park. However we would never consider staying there again. It was a plus that it is so close to Disney. I am sure that was why there were so many camped there. The only other plus was that the hook ups where good. The sites were very narrow and most of them positioned you so that your door side was next to your neighbor's door side, with maybe 10 feet between. The MH in the site next to us put their awning out and it was within 2 feet of touching our slide! I realize they have a pool and clubhouse but $67 per night for grass/gravel narrow pull through sites is a joke. I'm not sure why anyone would actually join this organization on an annual basis unless some of their other parks are much nicer.

We looked at what 1,000 Trail's had to offer in their membership packages a few years ago. It just wasn't for us at the time. We wanted to make another short "shake down" run in our new coach so we are currently in their CG up in Clermont FL. Some friends of ours had a few free nights and were camped up here so we made the run. Naturally that led me to review all their information again about signing up. It still seemed a little expensive unless you strictly obligated yourself to constantly stay in their parks and no place else. Based on what I am seeing being up here in their Clermont facility, no thank you. There are some positives here. When I pulled in with my 24' enclosed I already knew that there were no sites either long enough or I could possibly get to hooked up. They had a parking area with plenty of space to drop my trailer. However, you had to be skilled with the limited space and even at that if my coach did not have a turning tag I don't think I could have spotted my trailer and dropped it. They have a restaurant on site which we thought was a plus. We visited it last night with our friends. They paid and got their dinner and when it was our turn they informed us they were out of food. Should have got there around 4pm I guess. The negatives are many. You will probably never see another CG with tighter sites, most of which position you door-to-door with a neighbor. We were next to a Dutch Star and he was faster at putting his awning out so ours had to stay in. On our other side is a nice young family so there are bicycles and toys thrown all over the place. The good thing is with all these winding narrow roads and 900 plus sites it is easy to find our spot when returning because we just look for all the junk sitting around. I suspect many visit this park simply because you can visit attractions in Orlando. I can't imagine staying here longer than a few days.

I was stewing so much about this stupid receipt from Loves that I called the manager of that facility yesterday. I provided him the information from the "hold" receipt and it only took him about 30 seconds to pull up my actual pump receipt. He gave me all the details of the transaction and asked me if I wanted him to email the actual receipt that will be charged. We then had a conversation about how to avoid this in the future. He hinted around that the clerk should have given my DW a second receipt showing all the actual transaction information. He gave me the general information on some type of loyality Loves card also. He also said if an RVer called Loves corporate offices it "may" be possible to obtain a business type credit account so you could do all transactions at the pump and not come inside. I agree about most interstate truck stops being higher priced on fuel. When I fueled that day Loves was 3.13, the closest Pilot was 3.09, and most of the city stations with diesel, which I could not have used anyway, were anywhere from 2.95 to 2.99. We always stuck with Flying J's and Pilot's before due to using our card/PIN at the pump to get things started. On the diesel truck lane side you will have to go inside to get the final receipt but so do 90% of the truckers, and I never minded that part of it. You usually always have a place to park if you want to take a break, assuming that is you can back your rig up.

When we got our first MH it was a gasser. Coming from a fiver one of the things I missed the most was fueling in truck lanes at truck stops. We generally liked Flying J and Pilot but would use a Loves once and awhile. Yesterday I stopped at a Loves to top off and run across the scales. I had the DW run inside with a CC since the pumps in the truck diesel lane wouldn't take it, plus I knew as soon as I was fueled up I wanted to pull around and get on the scale. When all was said and done the DW came out and we took off. When she looked at the receipt closer to record our mileage and gallons used she discovered that the clerk had simply provided a receipt for a $150.00 hold on our credit card! No gallons, no exact amount, nothing. I'm going to have to be running out of fuel before I ever visit another Loves again. She told me what the conversation was when she initially went inside. He wanted to know the amount we were going to pump. She told him probably around 50 gallons. He said he needed an amount. She told him she wasn't sure the price per gallon and asked him if he could just figure an amount for around 50 gallons since we wanted to top off. He must have thought that was too much effort and just ran the $150.00.

That isn't the only Escapees park in Florida because we are headed to one in Clermont (outside Orlando). That would have been great if their park in Clermont was where they did 4 corner weights! Pretty fired up about heading out. Little tight getting off my site with this wagon train but the real issue will be putting it back on this Thursday. I have left and returned with the coach but never hooked up to the enclosed. Will be putting that turning tag to the test.

What I have always done is divide the axle weight in half of course. Then I generally add a couple hundred pounds or go up to the next set number on the tire chart. I see your point though. My current rig has FWS with frig, couch, and dinette among other things in it. Other side has smaller couch, galley, and bed. Depending on how holding tanks are mounted along with the Oasis down below I guess one side could be a few hundred pounds different than the other. First things first, tomorrow morning will be the first fully loaded trip pulling enclosed trailer. When we take off I will head to the Pilot station to top off and run across scales again. I really want to get an idea on what tongue weight I am going to have. Then I will probably start thinking about where to get 4 corner weight done.

I've always considered myself picky about knowing my axle weights and keeping my tires adjusted accordingly. I have never felt the need to go out of my way to have a 4-corner weight done. What is everyone's experiences that have these done? Do you find that one side is 2,000 pounds heavier than the other? There would have to be some pretty extreme differences to even show up on a tire manufacturer weight chart, therefore leading you to make adjustments. Just wondering.

Just started our second month of the Verizon Unlimited (they now call it Beyond Unlimited). We never stream or download anything, just look at a few internet sites and the DW checks FB a couple times a day. The first month on this plan our MiFi blasted threw the 15g in less than 3 weeks. Yesterday we used almost 10g!!!!!! I was on a couple forums and some other sites for about an hour at two different times and my DW spent a couple hours running TurboTax doing our annual "pay Uncle Sam". I couldn't believe how much data two laptops blew threw and was convinced it was either a Verizon issue or our MiFi was broke. Spent about an hour on the phone with Verizon and finally ended with a tech who could pull up everything that was taking data from our MiFi yesterday. Both of our laptops are running windows 10 and there was a big update for both, plus she had not booted hers up for about a month and there was almost 3g of extra updates. So thanks Windows 10 for using just under 10gigs of my 15gigs of 4g for the month! I tired to shut down automatic downloads but it seems with Windows 10 you can not do this anymore.

Thanks matteucci, I was thinking after spending some time on the escapees forum that I had found about the best "melting pot" of full timers around. I try to check 3 or 4 of the RV forums each morning and find I can learn something I didn't know almost every session.

As much as it pained me to do it, we had a Winegard Trav'ler satellite dish installed on the roof. The last coach we had the Ft. Myers CW install one. Let's just say that was a nightmare experience never to be repeated! We had Steve's Satellite provide the Winegard and do the install. Not only was he cheaper than CW but he did a very professional job right at my camp site. He is from over by the Coco Beach area of Florida and been doing Satellite work for over 25 years. I'm not sure how far he will travel in Florida but I certainly would recommend him. I'm certainly glad Steve decided to come over to the small Ft. Myers RV show last week and set up a booth.

Are you referring to the clear plastic product that some coaches have over the front cap?

When we did our first stint of full timing we gained a ton of information and help from a brand specific forum. We had a Montana fiver and their owner's forum was packed with information about the brand/model plus a lot of information about full timing. We also belonged to Good Sams and Passport. This time around we found a brand specific forum, FMCA, Good Sams, Passport, KOA, and just joined Escapees. What else is out there that we may be missing. We are always looking for ideas and information on CG discounts, dry camping, and other issues related to full timing. So far the Escapees forum seems to have a ton of information about full timing.

For anyone considering going the "no toad" route, this was our experience last summer. Technically we had a toad because we had our Harley on a trailer. But there were several times when we were required to rent a car (wedding, rainy week, etc.). The first obstacle to renting cars is the price. Generally speaking if you can do it on-line and well in advance you can stay around that $14.00 to $16.00 a day rate. But sometimes you get stuck at $25.00 to $30.00 per day, so it can add up. The other thing we found is that depending on what city/town you are in effects how good the rentals are. We were in the Peoria IL area and a couple of the cars a rental company tried to give us had stains on the seats and were nasty. They were new cars too! Anyway, traveling all summer it didn't seem like we rented a vehicle very often but ended up spending just under $900.00.

Is that for a 10 year tag?

IMHO, you can get by with just running it over any truck stop CAT scale to get your individual axle weights. Maybe later down the road you may want to get more specific and get your 4 corner weights but I wouldn't worry about it for now. Most truck stops (Flying J, Pilot, Love's....) will only charge $10 or $11 for the weigh, quick and easy. If you take the coach to a honest alignment shop they will check it and only charge for what they have to do. In other words, my shop quoted me $145 for an alignment on my new coach recently. When they got it set up they discovered the alignment was good from factory, but they did need to re-center my steering wheel, final charge only $45.00. But now I know 100% my loaded coach of aligned perfectly. Any 36' to 38' coach on a Ford F-53 chassis (loaded for travel) is going to lean from side to side to a certain extent. Depending on your wheel base length it may lean more or less but it is still running down the road on a spring chassis. I would take a test run in moderate windy conditions before putting the Sumos on. If a 20mph cross wind blows you around, or when a semi passes you it is a real adventure, then you will probably be like I was and rush out and get the Sumos. I did all my modifications in stages, hoping that I would never have to end up with Sumos. But IMHO a 2014 Thor Challenger 37GT was impossible to travel cross county in without them.

It would be my belief now that Newmar does an alignment prior to the coach leaving the factory after build. Our 2014 Thor Challenger needed an adjustment when we got it. I was the second owner and I never could find out if the original owner had an alignment done. If your tires are wearing okay Jim I would think you are good to go.

If you are asking this Joe, then stop on by and we can have a beer and go over it (ain't real savy on photographing stuff and figuring out how to get it on forum). Steer - 13,660 Drive - 22,020 Tag - 2,860 Total Gross - 38,540

They said the toe was almost perfect so no adjustment made, simply centered the wheel to the correct position. That makes me suspect that Newmar actually aligns them before they leave the factory and do a pretty good job. Even though the coach drove out great and didn't pull to one side or anything I'm still glad I took it in after loading. Wouldn't want to find out an alignment was needed after my front tires started to wear bad. North Trail quoted me $300 for a front end alignment. This one ended up costing me $45.00. Honest shop to do business with.

Can't really add much advice than has already has been given. Like others have said, the very first step when deciding on tires is to have the coach weighed. The easiest way to do that is to stop by your closest truck stop (Love's, Flying-J, Pilot, or any with a CAT scale). Just go in and tell them you want to run across the scales. It is usually a $10 or $11 charge. You drive onto the scale area, listen for them to tell you via the speaker that they have the weight, then pull off and park. Go inside and get your weigh ticket. The ticket will break down your steer (front) axle weight, drive axle weight, and tag if you have one. You are not getting individual weights from each tire (corner) of your coach but a regular scale will get you close.

The Sleep Number mattress that came in our coach is extremely comfortable. Each side has it's own settings also. Since some manufacturers are putting these in their RV's I would guess an RV king would be available for purchase.