Another new TV

Funny, we have a list of about 15 projects we want to take care of, and a wish list of maybe 5 things we might, I say might, hope to do.  So, which do we do, one of the items on our wish list, of course.  We have been looking to upgrade our front TV, a 37" 720p HDTV that comes down from the ceiling.  The vertical dimension is the constraining factor, it could not be greater than 25.5", so in our looking we tried to find the largest 1080p HDTV that would fit in that space.  Whenever we were in Costco or Walmart or Best Buy, we would would check out the measurements of all the TV's and if they were promising I would take a picture with my phone so I could compare them later.  At first it seemed the largest TV would be a 42", but after looking around more and more we found several 46" TV's that met the requirements.  We didn't want a 3D TV nor did we want a Smart TV, one that connects to the internet and is WiFi compatible.  We just wanted the biggest decent TV with 1080p that would fit.  By last weekend I had accumulated several TV's that met the requirement, and Jason happened to need to go to Costco, so I went along with him.  While there I noticed one of the TV's in question was on sale, $50 less than it had been.  So even though Jason wanted me to buy it right then and there, I was more reluctant, so we took very detailed measurements to be absolutely sure it would fit.  We came back and sure enough we thought it would work, so the next morning we went and got the new TV.  Jason and I ripped down the old TV and in only a couple hours, and with only a few blips, got the new TV installed, and man o man do we love it!

The old TV on the left, quite a difference, huh?
Nice we got Bert's help in the picture!

One of the biggest challenges was getting the cover off the back of the lift, it was not obvious how it was attached, but after messing around with it we managed to get it off, and found out the lift was pretty innovative.

The bars or channels that you see are adjustable
from side to side and the mounts on the back of the TV
are adjustable vertically, so in essence it will take any size TV
and pivot it up into the ceiling.

The mounting plates are just squarish plates that fasten to the back of the TV, and then slide up into the channels.

The mounting plates

Sliding it into position

Checking it out

All done except for the cover

Putting the cover back on was the biggest challenge. We found we had changed some of the dimensions when we slid the brackets around to accept the new TV, but Jan and I through trial and error got it up!

Complete!

So just in time for the Super Bowl, sounds good, doesn't it, although really we couldn't care less about the game, but are looking forward to the commercials :-))
If we keep adding projects that aren't on the list, we might have to extend here in Florida for another month to get them all done?

A boat?

I try to post more often than I have been, but not a lot is happening while we sit here in Florida.  Don't get me wrong, we are really enjoying ourselves and the weather.  My mom took another big turn for the worse, so for 2 1/2 days we were by her bedside.  Mom's good friend Carole helped so very much!  Somehow the "energizer bunny" is back up and around again, so we've been able to get back to the motorhome and our routine.

The weather has been glorious, a bit cool, 70's in the day and cools off to lower 50's at night, fantastic!  As you know we have two kayaks, and I must admit Jan enjoys them more than I do, and we both have been talking about having a larger boat of some kind to explore the larger lakes, and to be able to fish out of without rolling over into the water.  Probably just my problem:-)  When we went to Alaska, we took a 16' plastic canoe, a Mad River Adventure 16 with built-in seats and it worked very well with one exception, it was really heavy, and seemed to get heavier each time we took it off the roof of the Jeep and especially when we put it back on.  We sold the canoe after we got back because we didn't want to deal with the weight of it any longer.  The kayaks have been pretty good, except for the logistics of loading and unloading them on the Jeep.  And on our new Jeep, they changed the way they constructed both the hatch and the rear window so we can't use either one when the kayaks are on the roof, a real bummer! We have been going round and round to try to figure out what to do.  We met one of our neighbors, Mark and Sue, who have inflatable kayaks made by the Saturn company.  They are very pleased with them and use them a lot.  Well, in our discussions Mark mentioned that he also has a boat that he left at home called a Kaboat, kind of a cross between a boat and a kayak.

Pretty cool, huh?

  They can be rowed or paddled, or you can use a motor as they have a rigid transom.  We have been doing a lot of research on these boats and are almost ready to make the move for a 14' or 15' Kaboat and a small outboard motor.  You can see them on this website, Saturn Boats  We think this would probably solve our dilemma.  The boat folds down into a manageable package, and a small outboard will lay down and be light enough to deal with.  I will sell my kayak, but Jan wants to hold onto hers.  Still haven't quite made up our minds but we're getting closer, what do you think?

Slow but steady progress

Slow is better than no progress.  We just finished up one of those half hour projects that morphs into 2 days.  We have a powered hose reel on our coach, you just pull out the hose to hook up to campground water and then a motor pulls it back in when you unhook.  We managed to get something on the hose, at least the last 15 feet of it that caused the hose to become almost rigid, and when you are trying to get it to roll onto the reel it doesn't work too well.  I called the company that makes the reel, and figured I could just buy a new hose and stick it on the reel.  They explained that I could do that, but they recommended for a little more money it would be better to replace the entire reel with hose already attached as it was fairly difficult to install the hose on the end. They said that way by only removing one big nut I could replace it and get not only a new hose but a new reel complete with new bearings, so we went for it.

I started the quick little project yesterday and found out immediately that the coach manufacturer would have had to really outdo themselves to put it in a more inaccessible spot!  And the nut is 1 1/2", no I do not have a socket that big.  I decided to see if my friend Harvey or Jack had one instead of buying one.  Struck pay dirt, Harvey had one.  Good, simple now, just crawl in the basement and loosen the nut, pull out the reel and put in the new one.  Noooooooooo!  First off I can't get to the reel without disconnecting several water lines, easy enough.  Then I put the socket on and........I CAN'T BUDGE IT!  I try using a long breaker bar, no luck, hitting it with a hammer, no luck, call my strong son, still no luck.  Run out of time and energy, hook up the water line again so we have water.  Today our son Jason comes back with new vigor, crawls in, and no he can't get it either.  Decide to remove the whole assembly from the bay.  Have to move lots of wires, remove a switch, cut a wire, move a couple water lines and connections, and we finally manage to wrest it out.  Then we try the nut again, no luck.  Finally with both my son and I using a 5 foot pipe we get enough leverage to get it off!  Man they sure wanted that nut to stay on!  Putting it back in only took an hour, so we are good to go.

We have 75,000 miles on our coach now, so we have decided to get new shocks and an alignment.  I have been shopping on the internet for shocks and discovered there are two main manufacturers of shocks for motorhomes.  Koni and Bilstein.  Both have great reputations and have been building shocks for many, many years.  I've read a ton of opinions and comments on several different forums and find both are well liked by folks who have installed them.  I have decided to go with Bilsteins, both have lifetime warranties, and Motorhome magazine actually did a test of the various shocks and found they liked the Bilsteins the most.  But the best part is the fact the Bilsteins are HALF the price of the Koni's.  

There is an alignment shop in Orlando called Josam's that is considered the best on the east coast for alignment and chassis work for motorhomes and trucks.  So we are going to buy the shocks, and head up to Josam's to have them installed, adjust our ride height, and do an alignment.  It's a 130 miles from here, so it will give us an opportunity to run the motorhome a little bit in the middle of our 4 months here.

Almost forgot.  Our strut issue under our bed has been solved, although no one was able to figure why they all of a sudden failed.  We sent our original non locking strut and the new broken locking strut back to Alliance Coach, and they couldn't see anything wrong either.  So what we did was replace the locking strut with another regular strut.  It makes it very easy to raise the bed, and we will use a dowel to make sure it doesn't come back down until we want it to.  Alliance made good on the bad strut so all is well.

RV Show

We ran up to Tampa today to go to the Tampa Super Show, one of the biggest, if not the biggest RV show in the country.  We went with our friends, Ray and April.  We got there just as it opened at 9am with 5000 of our closest friends.  To say it was packed is an understatement.  We wandered around the many vendors, asked a few questions, saw a couple new things that were interesting like a new lithium battery.  Very impressive stats, as well as being just 15% of the weight of an AGM battery!  Although at 2 to 4 times as much money.  Just like anything else, as production and sales pick up, the price will come down, but it is a very promising technology. 

For fun we looked at the new Navistar Dynasty, Foretravels, Prevosts, Tiffin Allegro Buses, Newmar MountainAirs and KingAires, and numerous other motorhomes and proved to ourselves that we are definitely not interested in any of the newer motorhomes.  We like ours the best!

Ray and April were looking at small towables, and they were really cool.  The manufactures are sure packing in a lot of bang for the buck in a small package.  The A-Liners were very cute and attractive, being very light and easy to tow and handle.  I'll tell you, it's hard to see where the economy is hurting when you can't move for all the people at the show, carrying around their purchases, and especially when on the first day by noon seeing a multitude of sold signs on units from trailers to Prevosts!

Success

Jason and I got the new starting battery installed with just one small burp.  The new battery cable had to be drilled out to fit the main positive terminal in the motorhome.  No big deal.

New battery getting installed

With the new wiring required, it's a little tight moving the tray in and out, but that is a small price to pay for increased starting capacity.  And start it did!  The real test will be out on the road.

We got a few more projects completed in between a birthday party for Jan (yon), and several dinners and get-togethers with friends and family, and, of course, seeing my mom.  I haven't reinstalled the WiFi antenna yet because of the weather :-)  It's been too hot and sunny.  I'm laughing just writing that, as I notice the temps all around the country.  Where we are parked there is no shade, so I need a cloudy day to install the antenna or just melt on the roof.

The Taco Bus

As you know, we are big fans of the TV show, Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives, and have visited many of the restaurants in our travels around the US.  We had heard about the Taco Bus in Tampa earlier this year and wanted to get there sometime this winter.  We had tried in December, but were unable to make it.  Since I was so pleased with my new iPhone 5, we felt it only fair that Jan have one also, so we decided to kill two birds with one stone yesterday.  First we drove up to Brandon where the Apple Store is to pick up her new phone.  I digress, but I decided to put her old iPhone on eBay just before we left with a buy it now as well as an auction.  It sold in less than 1 minute!!!  So with the money in our account, we picked her up her new phone, then went over to the original Taco Bus on Hillsborough Ave in Tampa.  It is definitely a divey looking place that is open 24/7, and was fairly busy at 11:45 when we arrived.  They have a small menu that is kind of unique, first you pick out the "way" you want it, then pick the "filling", then your "veggies".  As an example, you say a taco or burrito with shredded beef and onions and lettuce.  We had several tacos between us with barbacoa, shredded beef with seasoning; cochinita pibil, a shredded slow smoked pork with achiote and bitter orange; carne de res desebrada, shredded beef with tomatoes and chilies; and the delicious lengua, beef tongue.  All loaded with veggies.  They were fantastic!  They also have seafood and vegetarian.  A great place to put on your list when in the Tampa area. All the cooking is done in a bus, you can walk up to the window on one side and order for take out, or go on the other side and either eat inside or outside with waitress service.  Very cool.

View of the bus from where we ate

Another view

The walk up window with the lunch crowd just arriving

Sign on the street

Check it out yourselves, they have 4 locations, but this is the original.  The Taco Bus

Our battery arrived today as well as our repaired WiFi booster antenna, so I guess I know what I'll be doing tomorrow.

Kinda quiet

Not a lot to report.  We've been spending a lot of time with my Mom, who has been pretty good, I'm happy to say.  Doing quite a bit of visiting with friends and family, and celebrating birthdays.  Jan went to a craft show and sold some of her post and note cards, and has been tearing up the Mah Jong circuit :-)  We both have been pretty active with walking every day, it's a great activity that I especially, have been a little remiss with.  

Jason and I did an successful evaluation of adding the starting battery that I mentioned, and it has been ordered and is on the way.  I'm very anxious to see if I get the marked improvement I am anticipating.  Our repaired WiFi antenna should arrive today, so I can get that remounted, and see if the new Wifi system the campground has installed will work.  We had another unexpected problem pop up.  Very minor I might add, our bed can be raised at the foot to access storage underneath.  It has gas struts that hold it up, and one actually locks.  We had it up getting some stuff out when we heard a big bang, and down it crashed.  I checked it out and the locking strut had just bent in half!  Weird.  I searched around the internet for a replacement, but had no luck so called Alliance Coach, a repair facility we have frequented in the past, and sure enough they had one.  I had it shipped, installed it, raised the bed and bang, down it came, and bent the new strut in half.  How can that be?????  Don't have an answer yet, it has been on there and working for over 4 years, what would make it fail now, and especially what would make TWO of them fail?  We are investigating the mystery.

Sore butts and projects begin!

We finally got the bikes out for a nice ride.  The day was so pretty and the temps were so right, we just kept going and going, all the way to the southern end of the Legacy Trail, about 8 miles from the campground. As it turned out 16 miles later on our way back, our butts were both so sore we had to keep stopping to walk around a bit to ease the discomfort.  It sure was evident it had been awhile since we last biked!  When I think about it, it was in Durango in October when we had last been on the bikes.  We'll keep it going now so our bodies can reacclimate.  It was a pretty ride though.

End of the trail

Along the way

Round another bend

We are finally starting on the projects.  Jan spent several hours yesterday scraping, chipping, and prying to get the rest of the tiles and adhesive off the wall in the shower.  Once they are off we can reinstall new tile and get that project done.  We have been looking at torn up walls for months.  It will be nice to get it done, but boy, is it a bear to get them off and cleaned up!
The next project is going to be to add another starting battery to the motorhome.  We have had a few issues over the years with reluctant starting every once in a while.  In fact, in 2011, I switched out the original starting batteries which were installed incorrectly, I should say they were not the proper type batteries for starting applications, not that they were installed incorrectly.  Monaco for some unknown reason had installed deep cycle batteries instead of proper starting batteries.  Dummy me, made a poor calculation and replaced them with 2 new batteries thinking that it would have the same starting amperage.  NOT!  With the addition of the 3rd, it will actually exceed the amperage of the originals, and when you are trying to start a huge diesel more is definitely better!  I'm going to enlist my son Jason's help, actually he volunteered, and he and I will clean up all the connections, make sure the grounds are good and install the third battery.  It should take care of the problem and also allow the generator to start more easily.