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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #50 – November 17, 2012, 01:10:32 am

They didn't say where it went in Knoxville but it's at Detroit Radiator now.

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #51 – November 24, 2012, 04:16:14 pm

RRadio,
I have been reading about your predicament and am truly sorry for your misfortune. I live in Knoxville...If I could be of help to you in any way please feel free to contact me.

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #52 – November 26, 2012, 01:55:41 pm

Thanks so much for your kind offer of assistance James, I really appreciate that.

Here's an update on the challenges of sitting in a parking lot for several weeks. The black water and gray water tanks were full and someone from the church sent a septic tank truck over here to pump it out for me, and they even paid for it, which was unbelievably nice of them. I've been walking over to the truck stop to use their restrooms since my black water tank filled up. The pastor told me I could dump the gray water tank on the church lawn but I didn't because the temperature went down to 21 degrees for a couple of nights and I thought full water tanks would be less likely to freeze. The cold weather has created a huge amount of condensation, even inside the walls of the coach. It has shorted out at least one light, which I don't need so I removed it, and is apparently draining the coach batteries every day. I'm trying to figure out how to get rid of the condensation. How do people camp in RVs in cold climates anyway? I think I'm going to pull out all the fuses and see if I can determine which circuit(s) are shorted. I think the cause of the whole problem is the condensation, so if I could get rid of that the short circuit(s) would probably go away... Anybody have experience with cold weather RVing and condensation problems?

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #53 – November 26, 2012, 03:31:57 pm

We have camped in cold weather for a few days each year for the last three years. We are parked up to five days in temperatures of 0 to 40F. We've had no problems with condensation.

In the coach are two adults and a large dog. We cook very little in the coach. We generally spend a lot of time away from the coach during the day. However, we do shower, shave, brush, etc., inside the coach. I leave the vent over the kitchen open a bit and leave a small window near the passenger seat open about one to two inches. We use the coach's two propane furnaces to keep the inside and the bays warm.

We have had good results by allowing some fresh air to flow through the coach via windows and vents, avoiding using the propane stove, and avoiding using anything that burns fuel inside the coach (candles, catalytic heaters, gas appliances).

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #54 – November 26, 2012, 05:00:48 pm

JD has said it all. You need to have air passing thru (cold air is good for you) just put extra sweaters on and open windows and do not cook with out that window open. Bathroom vent should allways be open. Maybe you should get a tow truck to drag you next to the church so you can hook up to it for power and pay them a few bucks for the use. Brett will be able to say if just a short tow will do any damage. I do not know but if you turn ign on and select N on trans maybe that will allow the short move to happen. It would be good to know from others whether this last comment of mine is correct or not. 27 deg is not cold but "fresh"
John H

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #55 – November 26, 2012, 05:05:49 pm

Quote from: John Haygarth – November 26, 2012, 05:00:48 pm

27 deg is not cold but "fresh"
John H

So YOU say. A bit "chilly" for us "southerners".

Roland

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #56 – November 26, 2012, 05:11:08 pm

A small dehumidifier (we set ours under the kitchen table) will dry out the coach overnight.
No more wet windows or walls. Much more comfortable with less heat.
But you do need to have 120 volt power.
 

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #57 – November 26, 2012, 05:13:08 pm

if you lived in Canada you would have to be used to a lot of things like fighting off Bears and Wolves to get to the car, and treck thru 10ft of snow to put the garbage out!! We sleep at night in the same clothes as we wear during the day, but pull lots of sacking around us and the dog too. At least that is what you Americans think of life "up north"  correct??

ps  we do not have a dog now so we steal next doors pet when it gets real cold.

This is a joke, guys.
John H

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #58 – November 26, 2012, 09:38:42 pm

Easy on the wolf jokes, John. I know of one that opens oven doors to get at the pizza but not people.

Might think you guys are "loonie".

Pierce

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #59 – November 27, 2012, 05:50:01 pm

I cleaned the mud dauber nests out of the front furnace so it runs fairly well now. I don't dare use it without the generator running because I think it will be too much for my coach batteries until I get the short circuits figured out. I've been running a propane powered radiant heater all night long with the ceiling cabinets open to dry out the condensation. I noticed an amazing improvement, to the point that I got a nosebleed this morning! (laugh) The windows still have condensation in the morning though. I guess motor homes aren't a good place to conserve energy by leaving the heat off in the winter. I connected the dashboard voltmeter to the coach batteries instead of the cranking battery so I can monitor my voltage at all times without turning on the backup monitor. I will reconnect it back to the cranking battery after I get the radiator reinstalled and start driving it again. I took out all the fuses from the circuits powered by the coach batteries and connected an ammeter inline and found shorts in several of them. I think I found about 1 ampere of short circuits or more all total. I left all those fuses out and replaced the fuses in the circuits with no amperage draw on them. Fortunately the circuits I actually use didn't have shorts in them. I will test this one more night to see if the coach batteries lose voltage with nothing running. I discovered that my boost solenoid doesn't work when I needed to jumpstart myself after the coach batteries discharged too low to crank the generator. For some reason the wires going to the boost solenoid switch had been disconnected upstream of the switch. There appears to be a couple of fusible links or something in those wires and that's where they were disconnected. The drawings I have show diodes but they appear to be fusible links... so I don't know... I cut off the fusible links and put disconnects on them to test it. I got the boost switch to light up and the voltmeter moved slightly but the generator still wouldn't crank. I left the wires to the boost switch disconnected just in case those really were fusible links and they melted apart or something (?) I temporarily connected a 10 gauge wire across the boost solenoid and it was enough to crank the generator and recharge the cranking battery. I removed the wire afterward so all three batteries wouldn't discharge through the short circuits... and that's about all I know for now... no news on the radiator coming back from Detroit at this time.

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #60 – November 27, 2012, 08:50:21 pm

I burned up the diodes on my boost switch wiring after I installed the wrong boost solenoid.  I put in one that was only rated for intermittent duty instead continuous duty.  I forgot to check that little detail.  After several days of being on, the coil finally overheated and shorted to to ground.  It melted the diode and the several inches of wire on either side along with the second diode wiring.  I could have started a fire and burned down the coach but I think it stopped there because it melted the solder and created an open circuit.  When I rewired it, I installed a fuse going to the solenoid to prevent such a mishap again.  The purpose of the diodes, if haven't figured it out, is so that the boost solenoid will get power from either battery bank regardless of which one may be depleted.
I wish you the best of luck in getting your coach back on the road.

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Re: Fiberglass radiator fan explosion!

Reply #61 – November 27, 2012, 11:33:46 pm

I cut both diodes off because they appeared to have melted in two. I installed disconnects on both of them instead. I have both wires disconnected currently. I will probably reconnect one of them after I figure out what's going on. If I ever need to I can swap batteries by connecting the other one... so I'll be my own diode I suppose... I don't think the solenoid is working currently anyway. I will have to test it and see.

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