In yesterday’s post, I wrote about the RV mishaps that are posted on the RV forums and how I try to avoid them. I have a couple of examples of mishaps that I’d like to share.
Driving a large motorhome requires your full attention. When I worked for the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office, we had mandatory driver training called the Emergency Vehicle Operator’s Course (EVOC). One of the lessons that was repeated many times in the EVOC training was to always back up your vehicle as if you’re about to hit something. What they meant was, if you have it in mind that you’re likely to back into an object, you probably never will.
Reversing a large motorhome can be challenging. But driving in reverse isn’t the only time you need to think about the rear of the coach. I posted before about swingout, but I’ll go over it again. The rear overhang of the coach causes swingout. For example, the distance from the rear axle to the back of our coach is 11 feet. If I make a sharp 90-degree turn to the right, the rear of the coach pivots around the rear axle. This causes the back of the coach, 11 feet behind the axle, to swing out to the left. It can swing out nearly three feet.
In the photo below, the driver pulled into a gas station. He then realized that he pulled up to the wrong pumps – there wasn’t a diesel pump in his lane. He carefully backed out of his lane. When he started forward, he cranked the steering wheel full lock to the right. What he didn’t notice was a pole at his left rear. The swingout of the rear end caused his coach to make contact with pole. The rear fiberglass cap was ripped away from the body. This happened in a matter of a couple seconds.
Rear fiberglass cap ripped from coach
To add insult to injury, he then found out the station was out of diesel fuel!
I don’t have the full story behind the next photo. I don’t think the coach was driven into this position. It may have been a failure to set the parking brake, which allowed the coach to roll down the driveway, across the patio and drop into the yard.
Oops!
They posted a video of the recovery of the coach on Facebook here. I’m guessing it was an expensive endeavor.
Yesterday I rode the scooter down to the NAPA auto parts store and bought six feet of 7/64″ rubber tubing to re-plumb our windshield washers. The nozzles for the windshield washers are located on the wiper arms on our coach. There’s a fitting where the wiper arm mounts to the body and another fitting at the nozzle where the blade mounts to the wiper arm.
The washer fluid flows from the fitting on the body through a rubber hose to the fitting at the nozzle, where it sprays the windshield. For some reason, the hoses on our coach came off of the lower fitting and shrunk. They wouldn’t reach the fitting anymore, so I couldn’t attach them.
I removed the old hoses and cut new tubing to the proper length. I put the tubing over the fitting at the wiper arm mount.
Windshield wiper mount with washer fitting
Then I threaded the hose through clips on the wiper arm and pushed the other end over the nozzle fitting.
Windshield washer nozzle on wiper arm
It was a quick and easy repair. Before we leave Mesa, I’ll replace the wiper blades. I didn’t do it yesterday because I don’t see the point of putting new blades on just to have them cook in the sun while we’re stationary.
My next task will be washing and waxing the coach and cargo trailer. I know I said that last week, but I also said I would spend a few days thinking about it. After giving it some thought and reading how others wax their coaches, I decided to order a 10-inch 120-volt orbital waxer/polisher from Amazon. With my Amazon Prime account, it ships free and should be here tomorrow. I’ll let you know how that works out.