Workin

As aforementioned in the previous post, work has re-begun on our 1988 Fleetwood Bounder motor home!  Since we are planning to take our first RV trip next week, there are a goodly amount of projects needing to get done to get the rig ship shape.  Here is what we have been working on as of late:

Curtains and dinette seat covers are almost finished thanks to mom-in-law!  The seat covers are secured with velcro and look super good when stretched tight.

Katie has been painting the bedroom a nice minty/aqua blue color.

I removed the entire A/C unit and cleaned everything.  It was quite a project.  The guy who sold us the RV told us that there was a leak around the A/C during downpours.  He was right, the aluminum roofing around where the AC unit seals had corroded leaving small holes.  After removing the unit, I swept the debris away then used a wire brush to rough up the aluminum.  Then I cleaned the underside of the unit and used leftover roof sealant to solve the leak issue.  Cleaning the indoor side of things was awful, since the leak had caused mildew stuff in the baffles and filters.  I'm glad I took care of the whole thing before we had to live with that thing.  Here is a look at the spot where the outside part of the unit was.

















Yesterday, there was a severe deluge and I could detect no leaks afterwards!!

Another project that has been a pain is the engine belt situation.  The great belt dilema.  Changing belts on most rear wheel drive vehicles is fairly easy, especially ones with spring tentioners.  The Bounder is very different, in many ways.  Ways that make engine work less enjoyable.  The main problem is accessibility.  The engine is completely surrounded by frame and steering components.  The other factor is that this set up has 9838 different belts.  There is a serpentine belt for the alternator, a v belt for the AC pump,  two parallel v belts for the power steering, and a v belt that runs up into a mysterious realm of the engine compartment that has remained unexplored by humans for at least a decade.  Most of these belts are either old, or loose, or in the case of the serpentine belt, shredded into oblivion.

As long as the weather permits, these issues will be solved on Friday.

Chchchchanges

Jeepers, it has been a aeons since our last post!  Much has happened in those aeons, and I'm here to bring everyone back up to speed.  Since our last post we discovered that Katie will have to have her wisdom teeth out, so there went our budget for our great road trip adventure that we had been scheming about.  After that we received word that due to our friend's home owner's association's rules we would not be permitted to even park our RV on their property.  Since we were planning to live there in Camden whilst finishing school, it was a major setback.  Things were looking pretty grim for the ol' Bounder.  We questioned whether or not we should just try to sell the thing before having to resort back to conventional (expensive) housing.  We decided to investigate possible contingency plans, and put the renovation process on hold.

Thankfully, we slowly began to see some hope for our quest, starting with the help of our good friend Keith.  He proposed to our school board to allow us to temporarily stay in our RV on campus.  Katie and I both had our doubts, but MACU came through for us, graciously permitting us to park on campus for a semester at least!  We will have to pay for utilities and parking, however it is still a good deal since we are so close to class and homework resources.  This is especially good news since we used school money to purchase the rig.

Another ray of hope came when we ran into our friends Kim and Erin from the OBX.  Mrs. Kim shared some life experience wisdom with us, recommending that we keep the RV if at all we can since we would probably regret selling it later in life.  This was very poignant advice for Katie and I because we have a marriage where we try to live our dreams (within reason of course), even though it sounds cliche.  I'm already living the dream, waking up to her pretty mug every morning.  Anyways, we decided to heed Mrs. Kim's advice and keep the rig.

Furthermore, we have just confirmed our reservation at a KOA campsite ("kampsite" I am annoyed when people change the letters just to be "cute") in New Bern, North Carolina to celebrate our first year of marriage!  This will be our first excursion in the Bounder so far.  I got really excited and bought a bunch of stuff to make the trip better, like a new sewer hose (Rhino Flex-seems really nice), a new faucet, a new smoke alarm, and some sweet Walmart camping chairs.

This last few weeks, we have been working diligently on finishing our renovation projects:
-New carpet and vinyl is done. (decided to leave the cab as-is)
-New curtains are almost done.
-Trim is down
-Electric water heater conversion is successful
-Exhaust leak has been found and repaired.**  Thanks to Jonathan for the parts!
-Generator problem has been isolated
-Engine belts still need to be tensioned/replaced
-AC and furnace still need to be cleaned and checked out
-Mom-in-law is working on new covers for the dinette seats

In conclusion, we are stoked once more.  Hopefully, we will be posting more updates soon.

Since every blog post needs pictures, here is a before and after of the exhaust leak.  Note that this is on the inlet side of the muffler, also that there is no catalytic converter on this vintage motorhome.  "What does that mean?" you say? It was LOUD.

I used aluminium foil as a sort of gasket and clamped a piece of flexible pipe over the hole.  Works nice.