This is the last installment of the mods blogs…. I have been posting pics in alphabetical order in the previous blogs of the things we have done to our motorhome.
THERMOCELLS:
Now this one is gonna sound like a commercial… but honestly, in Wisconsin with the mosquitoes being our national bird, this new device is totally necessary!!! We use them at home on our back deck overlooking the river, and have them in the camper for when we are in the woods. GREAT for the grandson, we don’t have to slather on icky poisonous repellant lotions or sprays on his tiny skin and hands and fingers… you know how babies put everything in their mouths! These just set on the endtable, out of reach, and all the mosquitos are gone!
First time we used them, we were sitting out at a lake where everyone else was huddling inside or dashing to the outhouse, flailing their arms like windmills to beat off the skeeters. The skeeters were awful, this was May, and they were attacking in droves.
We were sitting in an area where you could virtually see the skeeters buzzing about 10 feet around us… above us.. along side of us… but not daring to come near! Our dogs even huddled closer once they realized the skeeters were not biting them when they laid by our chairs. Soon folks were asking what those things were, and the next day, the nearest Walmart was a destination goal for all the folks who were camped near us. They sold out about noon! LOL
TIN FOIL BOXES:
Technically this isn’t a modification, but I read it on a camping list, and it sure has made outdoor cooking easier! Did you know most tinfoil and plastic wrap boxes have little *tabs* on the ends that can be pushed in to help hold the roll IN the box, instead of flopping out on you each time try to unroll some?????
Seems they have been doing this for 30-40 years on the boxes and most folks never knew….
TOWEL RACK:
I am always looking for neater, more compact ways to store items in our motorhome. We had a hunk of wall between the sink and the shower stall that really was not in use. other than for a stupid little round hoop towel holder. I saw this on Ebay for $15 but it was silver. My wonderful step-dad bought shiny metallic gold spray paint and went to work on it for me. After several coats, it was left to dry in the warm Florida sunshine. Soon it was mounted and all my towels are off the floor of the closet, and onto the rack, just like some swanky spa or hotel, huh?
TUB PROBLEM AND SOLUTION:
A really stupid design flaw on Safari’s part….. well, we sure fixed it!
TELEVISION REPLACEMENT:
Yes, with all the hoopla on the digital changeover, we decided to swap both of our aging televisions, though we don’t watch them very much. We kept our same crankup batwing antenna and it pulls in the stations just fine. We found some very interesting televisions in 2008 at Walmart that were BOTH digital and analog built into the same tv set. Neato! They are still the larger CRT type (big bump on the back) but the electrical drain used on each of them was about 1/3 of what our old tv’s were. So just by that fact alone, we are saving on power consumption.
And seeing as both tv’s are the same, if we lose one remote, we can always grab the other and it works for both! LOL Many of the low power transmitter towers in the U.P. of Michigan where we often camp are NOT changing to digital. And there are even some new broadcasts on analog too, smaller religious stations that sometimes have very good movies on them. When parked in our yard, the digital portion pulls in more stations than our home antenna and converter box.
ON EDIT: Because we removed the couches and put in a reclining love seat, it faces away from the mounted tv over the drivers seat. We have since changed to a lightweight LED tv that sets on a little table and uses even less power. We ran an extra antenna cord to the passenger side of the rig to plug it in. The TV rides flat on the bed while in transit.
WATER BANDIT:
WATER FILTER:
Our little water station compartment… it has a control panel where we can turn the water on or off to each area of the rig, and also take care of draining, filling and winterizing. Once we fill the tank with water, even from home, we open the filter container up to let it air dry so we don’t have mold growing in the filter housing.
WINTERIZING THE WATER SYSTEM:
Each year, when that dreaded task of winterizing the rig rolls around … we dread it because it means the end of the camping season! ARGGGHHH
We blow out the lines first with compressed air. Steveio made up this little device to hook from his air compressor right into the water fill inlet on our rig. We carry an air compressor on board, so we can winterize on our way home from Florida vacations each Feb or March as soon as we hit sub-freezing weather.
We blow out all the lines, then unhook the water heater and bypass that, and then finally we pump in the pink stuff to all the lines by hooking a hose onto the inlet side of our water pump. Going around the rig, we open each faucet one at a time till the pink comes through. This picture was taken at a wayside in Indiana, where we stopped to winterize.
We also run the pink right up to the ice-maker and disconnect that. We also dump some pink down each drain… and then we make sure the washing machine is filled with enough pink to get into each hose, Hot and Cold, and start a cycle on Warm Wash to get it into the machine. Then we dump some in the drum, and run a bit on Spin so it gets into the pump and drain too.
WINEGLASS STORAGE:
WINDOW REPLACEMENT:
We had a leak in the dual pane window on the driver’s side. It would fog up right where we need to look out into our side-view mirror. Fortunately for us, our son works for a large commercial glass company and was able to make us a new window to fit the existing frameworks. So we removed the window carefully and taped everything off. Right below this window are all the electronic shifting pad controls, cruise control, exhaust brake and cigarette lighter, all within inches of this opening. So we REALLY had to watch the weather….
The new window came in finally and using new black sticky butyl tape, we lifted it into place.
WINDSHIELD SHADE:
I did a complete post about installing this MCD powered windshield shade here:
Stay tuned, ya never know what we are gonna modify next! LOL
OK, Karen, what does the Easy Bake Oven run off of, propane? I too have no oven only a convection and would hate to have to give up my 3 huge drawers to install an oven.
ReplyDeleteIt can run off either, a 1 pound tank, or else a hose to a larger LP tank.
ReplyDeleteWe got ours from Camping World, but I have seen them from time to time at our local farm chain called Fleet Farm. I think Cabellas and Gander Mountain may have them too.
If you call places to ask, the name is Coleman Instastart Oven, NOT to be confused with the Coleman square box camp oven that sets on top of a Coleman cookstove. Those are not the same thing. When you call, sales clerks don't seem to know the difference. This is in a long rectangular green box, not the taller square box.
Yes, I also didn't want to sacrifice three drawers or cut into our Corian either. This is the best compromise we found.