Category Archives: Maintenance and Repair

Full Plates

Sometimes it seems like there aren’t enough hours in a day. I know that’s hard to imagine – after all, we’re retired and usually don’t have any pressing matters on our daily schedule. But, we’re active and have a number of things we like to do on a regular basis. None of it really can be regarded as work – I define work as any activity that occupies my time when I’d rather be doing something else.

My day usually involves a couple of hours on the pickleball court, a couple of hours practicing guitar, and sometimes I get on the air with my ham radio and make contacts all over. Sometimes I may have a household project to tackle. Donna is busier than I am. She plays tennis as well as pickleball, lines up a couple hours of work doing various things for others here in Viewpoint, she’s on the board for the Viewpoint Concert Band and also volunteers as a street captain. And she’s actively involved in the tennis club. Now she’s learning to play golf too.

I’ve been taking a deeper dive into electronics – particularly vacuum tube amplification. To that end, I recently bought a couple of pieces of equipment that will allow me to take a more certain approach to troubleshooting, maintaining and repairing amplifiers. I bought a signal generator – more specifically a Direct Digital Synthesis (DDS) signal generator that can create various waveforms and frequencies. I also bought a Rigol DS1102 Digital Storage Oscilloscope (DSO).

I used the DDS signal generator to feed the input of the DSO and calibrate it. I also made a resistive, non-inductive dummy load to act as a speaker load when I test an amplifier. Amplifiers should never be operated without a load – usually a speaker. But to avoid annoying, loud tones while testing, a dummy load that doesn’t produce sound is the way to go. The signal generator can produce a consistent, known waveform to aid signal analysis. I also made an input jumper to connect the DDS signal generator to the amplifier input.

Now I can create an input of a known frequency and amplitude into the amplifier and check the signals progress through various stages of amplification with the oscilloscope.

DDS signal generator and digital storage oscilloscope

Improperly triggered waveform on the oscilloscope

100-watt resistive, non-inductive dummy load

After building and playing my Dumble-style Trinity OSD amplifier, it became apparent to me that my Trainwreck-inspired amp didn’t sound as good as it once did. I built that amp nine years ago and it rattled around in the basement compartment of our motorhome for eight years.

I pulled the Trainwreck chassis and ran a 100 kHz signal though it. It appeared as though the tubes were breaking up and distorting earlier than I expected. I’d recently replaced the preamp tubes, so I figured it was time to replace the power (output) tubes – they were the nine-year-old original tubes. I had a matched pair of EL34 tubes on hand so I changed them and reset the bias. I made a boneheaded mistake doing that. The idle current through the tube should be set with a bias potentiometer to around 42 milliamps. I couldn’t get it under 100 milliamps! This was no good. After futzing around and scratching my head, I realized I was still running a 100kHz signal through the amp. It wasn’t idling – it was powering up the signal silently into the dummy load! I disconnected the signal generator and made the bias adjustment with no issues.

The amp sounded much better after getting new power tubes, but I want to analyze the circuits further. I wanted to only make one change at a time, but I think I see a couple of things that I can improve to make this high-gain amp operate with less background hum. I’ll get busy on that soon. I may offer guitar amplifier maintenance and limited repair service for something to keep my mind active and make me feel useful.

I made myself useful last week by preparing Memphis-style dry-rubbed babyback ribs on the Traeger wood pellet-fired smoker/grill.

Rack of Memphis-style smoked babyback ribs

Donna served it with a medley of roasted vegetables and a loaded baked spud.

It looks like a small portion of ribs – it’s only two bones. But let me assure you, Donna and I had second servings of the ribs. They were outstanding!

Donna came up with an Asian-inspired flank steak recipe that also hit it out of the park!

Asian-inspired flank steak strips with brown rice and broccoli

The weather here in Mesa, Arizona keeps getting better and better. For the last week, we had highs in the mid-to upper 80s with overnight lows in the upper 50s. Today the forecast calls for a high of 82 degrees and the long-term forecast calls for highs around 80 and overnight lows in the low to mid 50s. Very pleasant!

*Just so you know, if you use this link to shop on Amazon and decide to purchase anything, you pay the same price as usual and I’ll earn a few pennies for the referral. It’ll go into the beer fund. Thanks!

Going Home

The last week was a transition time for us. On Tuesday, we pulled out of Paradise RV Park in Panguitch, Utah as planned. The day before, I made a trip to Ace Hardware in town and bought some JB Weld adhesive. I bonded the panel surrounding the left front tire to the mounting points. Although I’d managed to make a temporary repair to the front mounting point by installing small screws where the rivets failed, the rear of the panel was loose and it moved back and forth due to aerodynamic forces. We had over 400 miles to go and I didn’t think my temporary repair would hold up unless I secured the rear of the panel.

We were out of the park by 10:30am and had a long day ahead of us. Our plan was to travel about 220 miles to Cameron, Arizona where there’s a newish RV park across the highway from the Cameron Trading Post. Our route had us on US89 south all the way. This is a scenic drive as US89 cuts east south of Bryce Canyon and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Diesel fuel in Utah was over $4.00/gallon, so I held off until we crossed into Arizona at Page. I filled our tank there at $3.33/gallon. A year ago, I wouldn’t be too happy with that price, but in the current situation, I thought we did okay.

We found the RV park in Cameron, but it wasn’t what we expected. The website showed a nice looking park, but in reality, it’s a poorly laid out dirt lot. To check in, you have to go to the motel at the trading post and pay, then cross the highway and pick a site. It seemed like there was plenty of space but due to the poor layout it wasn’t easy to get a big rig into a site. And we had to unhook the truck because the pullthroughs were not long enough. And we only had 30amp at the pedestal so we could run only one AC unit.

Once we were settled in, Donna phoned the Elk’s Lodge in Payson – that was our next planned stop. They have 12 sites with 30amp hookup and we hoped to snag one so we could run our air conditioner because the forecast for Payson was 95 degrees. The lodge doesn’t take reservations and unfortunately they told us all of the sites were occupied. We had a back-up plan to go to the casino in Payson and just run the generator for air conditioning. After talking it over, we decided we would make the 240-mile run all the way to our park model home at Viewpoint in Mesa, Arizona.

I know you’re thinking 240 miles doesn’t seem that far. The route I chose had us on US89 south to Flagstaff, then we hit I-17 south to Camp Verde. US89 has a tough climb up to 7000 feet above sea level in Flagstaff. At Camp Verde, we exited onto AZ260 which turned out to be a tougher drive than I expected. The last time I drove this highway was more than 10 years ago and I was riding a motorcycle. I didn’t recall how steep some of the grades are and also how narrow some sections of the road are. It was hot and I had to keep a close watch on our engine coolant temperature – this meant slowing down and gearing down on the steep climbs. From Payson, we took AZ87 (Beeline Highway) to the Bush Highway exit, went over Usery Pass and were back in Mesa.

The alternative would have been to take I-17 all the way to Phoenix, then follow Loop 101 to Loop 202 to Mesa. I didn’t want to take that route as traffic would be heavy and people drive like maniacs through Phoenix.

We parked the coach in front of our home at 12:20pm – we’d gained an hour when we crossed into Arizona. Our caretaker had the air conditioner on in our house – he said he would turn it on two days before we arrived. We came in a day ahead of schedule, but the house was cool although we had triple digit temperature outside. By the way, the JB Weld repair held up fine – I had no issues with the panel on the coach.

We went right to work unloading the coach and moving back into the house. I took some time to get the swamp cooler running in our Arizona room – a 400-square foot room addition to our park model home. The coach was hot sitting in full sun in front of our place and we worked all afternoon. Donna did most of the moving while I got things like electrical breakers and the water heater going. Our goal was to empty the coach first, then we could take our time sorting things and putting stuff away. One plus was that it didn’t take long to defrost the refrigerator thanks to the heat!

On Thursday morning, we took the last of our stuff out of the coach. I drove the coach to the Apache Sands Service Center about a mile away from here where I filled the propane tank, dumped the holding tanks and filled up the fuel tank with 31 gallons of diesel fuel at $3.00/gallon. I wanted the fuel tank full while it’s in storage to minimize air space in the fuel tank which, in turn, minimizes condensation of moisture in the tank. The coach is in a covered storage lot at 202 RV Valet with a 20-amp electrical hook-up to keep the batteries charged.

We were both ready to get off of the road and settle back in at Viewpoint. Coming back this early risked high temperatures and we’ll have them. The forecast calls for triple digit heat for the next week before things begin to cool. Triple digit heat in the afternoon lingers after nightfall – overnight lows are in the 80s.

The fairways and greens on the golf course are brown at this time of year. Some grasses go dormant in the heat of summer in Arizona, just like some grasses go dormant in the winter up north.

Dormant grass on the fairway and green of the fifth hole behind our house

The previous owner of our place had internet through a local provider called Jabba. The high-speed internet wireless receiver antenna was still on the carport and he left the router. Yesterday, I set up an account with Jabba and hooked up the router. We now have truly unlimited data usage with a speed of 15Mbps for $44.95/month. I also suspended my Dish service while the motorhome is in storage – we have free cable TV here at Viewpoint.

Donna restocked our refrigerator and pantry yesterday and last night, she manned the large gas grill we have at the house and grilled a coho (silver) salmon filet and bok choy. She made a soy sauce, worcestershire and honey based marinade for the fish. It was outstanding.

Donna and I love our time on the road, but we’re both happy to be back in Mesa and settling in to our home. We only spent about six weeks here after we bought the place last spring. We’ll probably stay here until May.

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the tragic events of 9/11. We should take a few moments to remember the innocent victims and never forget the horrors of terrorism.

Snail Mail

It has been a real whirlwind week with lots of activities for us. It started last Sunday when we met our friends Bob and Carolyn Ower for dinner at Main Street Brewery in town. We had good food – I highly recommend the Down Da’ Bayou plate. I had it with beer battered catfish smothered in Cajun blue crab sauce (shrimp can be substituted for catfish). It was excellent! We had a good time and lingered for nearly two hours telling stories.

One thing that definitely isn’t a whirlwind is the United States Postal Service (USPS). I have a couple of examples – I ordered a replacement accelerator pedal assembly with position sensor for our Nissan Frontier. I don’t normally like to replace a part based on a Diagnostic Trouble Code (DTC) in the control module – I prefer to test the components in the system containing the DTC to drill down to the faulty part. But, this is an intermittent issue and everything is working fine right now, so troubleshooting won’t work.

In our case we had an accelerator position fault. In my experience with Volkswagen, this could be anything from a pedal position sensor to a wiring harness or connector problem – rarely did I need to replace a pedal position sensor. Bob Ower runs a repair shop and has much more experience with Japanese cars than I do. He said he’s found this fault usually means a bad pedal assembly on Japanese cars. A search of Nissan forums seems to confirm this. So, I ordered a pedal assembly from Amazon and they shipped via USPS.

Well, USPS Priority mail doesn’t seem to have much priority these days. It took about a week to get the part. It didn’t look like they treated it too kindly during that time.

See the red sticker – and the crushed top of the box

Luckily the part inside was intact. Removal of the old part was fairly easy – I just had to remove the wiring connector on top of the assembly and remove three mounting nuts with a 12mm socket. The hardest part was wiggling into position to reach it.

I noticed the pedal didn’t appear to have much wear. Once I had it out, I had some misgivings about replacing it. I found the production date code on the assembly – it was 49/19. This means the pedal was manufactured during the 49th week of 2019. It had been replaced some time after that.

Production date code in lower left of sticker

The replacement pedal I received was produced in March of 2021, so there appears to be a lot of turnover of these parts. Hopefully I’ve solved the issue. With the new pedal installed, I had to go through a process for the Engine Control Module (ECM) to “learn” the pedal position parameters. I printed the pages with this procedure from the Nissan service manual – it involved turning the ignition to the “on” position for a few seconds, then “off” for 10 seconds with the pedal released. Then another series of key on and key off cycles with the pedal pressed through its full travel three times in five seconds. No big deal. A couple more procedures set the idle air control and idle speed and it was job done.

I have another beef with the USPS. I ordered our mail from our service in South Dakota on the second of June. I received tracking information that showed it arriving at the Sioux Falls, South Dakota USPS distribution facility on the third. Then no new notifications until yesterday, June 10th. It showed the package left the Sioux Falls USPS distribution facility on June 9th – six days after it arrived there. This is a USPS Priority mail envelope!

Donna and I played pickleball on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday morning. Our plan was to take Thursday and Friday off in preparation for another Shoot Out scheduled for Saturday (tomorrow). Besides, we had other things planned.

On Wednesday afternoon our friends Mike and Jodi Hall from Mesa and their granddaughter Swayzie checked in to the KOA Campground about a mile down the road from us. Donna prepared a potato salad and pounded chicken breasts which she seasoned with a dry rub and we went to their site at the KOA. Donna grilled the chicken there and we had dinner together at the picnic table in their site.

Jodi, Mike, Me and Donna (Jodi Hall photo)

Thursday morning we met up with them and drove nine miles east to Mesa Verde National Park. Mike and I both have America the Beautiful Senior Lifetime Multi-agency passes that get us into National Parks and other places free of charge. We drove about 26 miles into the park to the Wetherill Mesa area where we parked and hiked to the Step House. This is a cliff dwelling in an alcove facing northeast on the steep side of the mesa. It’s well protected from the elements. The hiking loop was about a mile long in total and we dropped about 100 feet down the side of the mesa.

They think 30 or 40 people lived here in 500-600 AD and again around 1200 AD.

Last night we joined the Halls for dinner again. This time Mike grilled pork chops. We all eat well, even when we’re roughing it.

This morning we met up again and they followed us up to Dolores where we hiked up the trail from the Canyon of the Ancients Visitor Center to the Escalante Pueblo and the McPhee Reservoir overlook.

These ruins date back to 1100 AD.

By the time we made it back down to the parking lot, it was lunch time. We drove through the town of Dolores and found Montezuma Mexican restaurant. Donna had heard good reports about the food there and they turned out to be well-founded. We sat on the back patio deck right next to the Dolores River and enjoyed some really tasty dishes.

Dolores River from Montezuma’s rear patio

Tonight we’ll meet up with Halls again to go to the fairgrounds for the rodeo. Donna bought tickets for all five of us a couple of weeks ago and we have reserved seats.

The pickleball club is having a social at Montezuma’s in Dolores on Sunday afternoon, so we’ll go there again. The Halls are scheduled to head out to visit friends in Ignacio Sunday morning before they return to Mesa, Arizona.

The weather has been on the warm side with daily highs in the upper 80s and even 90 degrees. This weekend is supposed to be warmer – well into the 90s. We might see 100 degrees before we leave next Thursday. I need to start planning a route out of here.

Sand Canyon Cliff Dwellings

Last year when we were here in Cortez, we met a couple at the farmers’ market that have a small ranch. Their names are Bob and Carolyn Ower, and they sell fresh eggs, produce and beef from their ranch. I wrote about visiting their place here. Last week, Donna contacted Carolyn to see about getting some eggs.

We went to their place on Saturday and had a nice visit. Carolyn kindly gifted Donna with a dozen farm fresh eggs and a couple of zucchini squashes. Carolyn’s eggs always look like Easter eggs because she keeps a variety of chicken breeds and they lay different colored eggs.

A strange thing happened as we were leaving. As I started to pull out of their driveway, our truck suddenly lost all power and wouldn’t rev above idle. I shut off the engine, waited about 10 seconds and restarted. It ran fine but the check engine light as well as the traction control symbol were illuminated. Lucky for us, it happened in the Owers driveway – Bob runs a small auto repair shop on the property. He was kind enough to connect a scan tool and read the fault codes. We had P2127 and P2138. These relate to an accelerator pedal position error.

Bob cleared the codes and they didn’t return. The most likely cause of the error is a bad pedal position sensor – modern cars are drive-by-wire, there’s no cable providing a physical connection between the accelerator pedal and throttle. It’s strictly electrical with a pedal position sensor and an actuator at the throttle valve. I’m still debating whether I should order a new pedal assembly which includes the sensor or not. The fault hasn’t returned and I don’t like throwing parts at a sporadic fault.

Sunday, while I watched the Formula 1 race from Monaco, Donna hiked the Sand Canyon Trail. The full trail is about 6.5 miles – she started at the bottom and the full length to the top gains significant elevation. Donna went about four miles up, then turned back. She saw many cliff dwellings – ruins from an ancient Pueblo tribe. Here are a few photos she took on her hike.

A collared lizard she came across on the trail

We had some rain on Friday and high winds which carried over to Saturday. The temperatures were much cooler – officially the high on Friday is listed at 66 degrees, but I don’t think we reached that here in the RV park. The night time temperatures really dropped with lows around 32 degrees over the weekend.

I put up my HF ham radio antenna – a Buddipole Versatee Vertical – Monday and broke out my ham radio rig. Conditions were good Monday afternoon and I made contact with Janez Celarc (S51DX) in Vhrnika, Slovenia – about 6,000 miles from Cortez, Colorado. I had talked to Janez last year when we were in Idaho. He was working a contest this time and didn’t want to chat – he was trying to record as many North America contacts as possible in a given amount of time. He just took my name, callsign and location, then moved on to the next contact.

As I’ve mentioned many times before, we’re not camping, we’re living the RV lifestyle. We strive to eat fresh cooked homestyle meals that are nutritious and healthy, just like we did in a sticks-and-bricks house. On Saturday, I made Japanese fried rice and Donna grilled jumbo shrimp to go with it. Delicious.

Jumbo shrimp with tare sauce over Japanese fried rice

We love fried rice and I make use of any leftovers. On Sunday, I made omelettes filled with fried rice for breakfast.

Last night, Donna grilled zucchini marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt and pepper. After grilling, she sprinkled the zucchini with a mixture of chopped kosher salt and lemon zest. It was a great accompaniment to spaghetti with clam sauce.

Tomorrow is Donna’s birthday. Traditionally we go out for a nice dinner at a restaurant of her choice. Last year we were in Springerville on her birthday and with covid restrictions, we had to settle for Chinese take-out. This time we have a reservation for dinner tomorrow at Olio Restaurant in Mancos. Olio is run by chef Jason Blankenship and his wife, Michelle. Chef Jason has 25 years experience as a chef in the Houston, Texas area and Durango, Colorado. His restaurant here is exclusive – it’s only open Thursday, Friday and Saturday – reservations are required. The menu changes weekly and everything is prepared by Chef Jason – no big kitchen staff. We’re really looking forward to it and I’ll tell you all about it in my next post.

Motion is Lotion

We had a fairly quiet night at the Ute Mountain Casino truck lot Saturday night. There was a truck with refrigeration unit that ran a generator all night. To me, it’s just white noise and I don’t pay much attention to it, but for Donna, it’s bothersome. We had a leisurely breakfast at the casino restaurant – we were in no hurry as we were only 11 miles away from Cortez.

We checked in at La Mesa RV Park in Cortez, Colorado around 12:30pm. There was a camp host expecting us and he directed us to site 9. After backing into the site, I confirmed Dish Network satellite reception before setting up. I wasn’t going to stay for a month in a site with no satellite reception. We set up without any issues and I was done in plenty of time to watch the Moto GP race from France at 3:30pm.

Our site backs up to the car wash at the Speedway gas station next door. This can be a little noisy during the daytime, but we haven’t heard anyone at the car wash after dark. When we checked in, I asked about Shiree, whether she still spends much time here at the park. Shiree and her husband, Ames, own this park and one in Springerville, Arizona. The camp host gave us some bad news.

He said Shiree wasn’t doing well. In February, she had some dental work done which involved removing a tooth with an old filling. Apparently, mercury leaked from the old filling and poisoned her. She’s not able to get around on her own and is undergoing chelation treatment to remove the metal. We’re hoping she makes a full recovery.

Over the last week, I’ve been complaining about a sore right knee. I had surgery on this knee about 35 years ago. I injured it in a ski accident on Mount Hood in Oregon. I had a partial tear of the anterior cruciate ligament and a torn medial meniscus. At that time, the surgeon told me he had to trim the torn meniscus as it wouldn’t regenerate. Over time, he thought this might lead to arthritis from bone on bone contact. I was thinking it might have finally caught up with me.

But then a curious thing happened. On Wednesday morning, I went with Donna to the pickleball courts. The soreness had improved so I thought I would give it go with a compression sleeve over my knee. After a few games, I didn’t feel any soreness at all. I thought it would be sore later in the day, but it didn’t happen.

Thursday morning we went back to the pickleball courts. I had the compression sleeve over my knee again, but wasn’t experiencing any pain. I played several games pain free and my knee remains pain free now. I don’t know how to explain it – maybe there’s something to the adage “Motion is lotion” and my knee is well lubricated again.

Pickleball courts at Centennial Park in town

They have six courts at the park and a group of players that show up regularly. We were invited to sign up for a tournament a week from Saturday, which we did. The tournament format is basically a round robin with individual scores tracked. I’m curious to see what group they put Donna and me in – we’ll see how they rate our level of play.

Wednesday afternoon we drove out to Mancos – a little town about 17 miles east of Cortez. The locals pronounce it MAN-cuss. After a couple of wrong turns we found the Mancos Brewing Company and stopped in for a couple of beers on their outdoor patio. They have several good brews on tap.

Other than pickleball, we’ve had a quiet week. I had one small project. The inlet to our canister water filter system was leaking. The inlet has a hose fitting swaged onto a 3/4″ pipe thread. Over time, it had worn where the hose fitting rotates on the 3/4″ pipe threaded into the plastic canister. I couldn’t find a direct replacement, but the hardware store had a short 3/4″ pipe threaded on both ends with the threads oriented correctly to add a hose fitting to it. So I bought those and figured I had it made.

I came home, shut the water off and removed the old fitting. Then I found I had barely enough teflon tape to put one wrap on the pipe threads. I put it back together and it leaked! I made another run into town for a $1.50 roll of teflon tape. This time I double wrapped the threads and put it back together. No leaks at the filter. Job done or so I thought.

Later I saw the area near the filters was still wet. Now the end fitting on our fresh water hose was leaking. I don’t remember how old the hose is, but I suspect we’ve had it for at least five years. I ordered a new drinking water hose from Amazon – it should be delivered today.

Today won’t be a good day for outdoor projects though. After having daily temperatures of 70 to 80 degrees, we have wind and rain today and the thermometer is only expected to reach 62 degrees.

I had another package delivered yesterday. I knew I would come across something that I needed, but left behind in Mesa. I tried to set up my Yaesu FT3DR handheld transceiver to work the local repeaters – one on a mountain top out side of Mancos and the other up in Dolores. But I didn’t have the cable to connect the radio to my laptop to program it. I ordered one from DX Engineering and it was delivered yesterday – but it was the wrong cable. I phoned them and we sorted out which cable I actually need and I shipped the wrong cable back to them. I should have the correct cable in a few days.

I’ll close with a couple of dinner plates. Wednesday, Donna grilled chicken that she simply seasoned with salt and pepper. She made creamed spinach and a baked spud to go with it.

Delicious chicken thigh and wing with creamed spinach and baked potato

Yesterday she marinated a pork tenderloin with her mojo marinade. I sliced garlic for the marinade. Donna asked for thin slices but I made them a little thicker than she usually does. She wondered how that would affect her recipe. It turned out to be an improvement – having the garlic 1-2mm thick added texture with no loss of flavor versus slicing it paper thin.

She grilled the pork last night and served it with sweet potato mash and French-cut green beans. We’ll use the leftovers to make street tacos for lunch today.

Mojo marinade pork tenderloin with sweet potato mash and French-cut green beans

Curtains Up

The annual exodus from Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort is well underway. Most of the Canadian visitors have already departed. This morning, our next-door neighbors headed back to Iowa. The neighbor on the south side of us stays here year ’round. We’ll be here through the first week of May.

Things are slowly shaping up in our new-to-us park model home. This week, I hung drapes in the front room. Donna’s been watching the Facebook Marketplace and found some deals on rods and curtains.

New drapery and rods on the front window facing Superstition Mountains

Construction of these park model homes is different from what I’d expect to find in a regular sticks-and-bricks home. When I drilled holes for the curtain rod mounts, I didn’t know what I was drilling into. It turned out the center mount was on a solid header board. If I had known that from the start, I would have drilled smaller holes and tapped wood screws directly into the wall. But, having drilled oversized holes I had to insert anchors. It worked out fine. The end mounts were into thin plywood and required anchors.

The front window is curved. Donna found an articulated rod made for bay windows that fit perfectly. When I installed the curtain rod on the side window on the north side of the front room, I piloted the holes with a small drill bit first to see if I would be in solid wood or thin ply. Once again, the center mount went into solid header board while the end mounts needed anchors inserted into thin plywood.

Another thing I worked on this week was getting my guitar amps and pedal board set up and working. The amps have been locked away in a basement compartment of our coach for nearly eight years. I’ve really neglected my guitar and hardly played at all for the last couple of years.

I expected trouble with the vacuum tubes in the amplifier. They had to get shaken up on some of the roads we’ve traveled. I was pleased to find my Egnater Tweaker amp fired up with no issues at all. Then I was surprised to find the Marshall 18 Watt clone I built in 2011 worked fine. My luck didn’t hold out on the Trainwreck inspired amp I built in 2012 – it just crackled and made a few really fuzzy tones.

I suspected one or more vacuum tubes were shot. When I was a kid, back in the 1960s and ’70s, you could find a vacuum tube testing machine in almost every hardware store and even pharmacies and supermarkets. Nowadays, these testers are just a fading memory. Without any way to test the vacuum tubes, I broke out my credit card and ordered a complete set – three 12AX7 preamp tubes and two EL34 power tubes (plus an extra 12AX7 to keep on hand).

When the tubes came, I almost switched them all out with the new ones, but then I decided to do one at a time and see which ones were bad. The first tube in the V1 position was a Tung-Sol 12AX7 and I had ordered one of these. These are made in Russia. All of the new production tubes I used are made in Russia or China. Vacuum tube manufacturing completely disappeared from the Americas and Europe as the technology is no longer used in most consumer applications. At one time, every television set had a complement of vacuum tubes and high-quality tubes were made in the USA and western Europe and were readily available. Today, it’s a niche market for audiophiles and guitar amplifiers.

After I installed the first tube, I plugged in the amp and tried it. It worked fine. The V1 position was the only bad tube! The Tung-Sol tube was under $20, but now I have three Shuguang 12AX7 tubes that I use in the V2 position of the Trainwreck and in two positions of the Marshall clone. I also have a Sovtek 12AX7LPS and two Ruby EL34s. So I’m set with spares, but if I could’ve tested first, I wouldn’t have ordered $130 worth of tubes.

I have the amplifiers stacked to save space and I can easily switch from one amp to another when I play. I also set up my pedal board and I’m happy to report that all is well with my effects pedals. I’m back to playing my guitar, but man am I rusty.

Top to bottom – Egnater Tweaker, Trainwreck type, Marshall 18 Watt clone and Egnater 1-12 speaker

Donna had her second Moderna COVID-19 vaccine on Tuesday. She got the shot in Fountain Hills and while she was there, she was able to visit two of her friends in the area – a gal she met through her church and a former neighbor, both of whom she hadn’t seen in a few years. She also enjoyed a solo alfresco lunch at her favorite Italian restaurant on the lake before heading to the pharmacy to get her vaccine. She felt fine when she went to bed, but woke up in the night with severe chills. By morning, she had a fever of 101.7 degrees. She was ill all day Wednesday and most of Thursday. She’s fine today and played tennis this morning.

I mentioned in my last post the Teruyasu Fujiwara Maboroshi gyuto I bought. You might wonder why I would want to have two Japanese chef’s knives. My two gyutos have completely different character with their own strengths. The Kintaro forged by Yoshimi Kato has a thin, light blade. The cutting edge of the blade is 215mm long and the knife weighs 131 grams. My TF Maboroshi is more stout – it has a cutting edge 200mm long and weighs in at 195 grams.

The Kintaro excels when slicing cabbage. It seems to float right through the produce like a ghost. But I have issues using it on potatoes. Potato slices stick to the side of the blade like they’re suctioned on – I practically have to peel the potato slices from the knife. The Maboroshi cuts cabbage fine, but it doesn’t have the feeling of just floating through. It’s super sharp though and excels on carrots and potatoes and just about anything. Potatoes do not stick to the hammered finish on the blade.

Lately, I’ve been handling the dinner prep – Donna tells me what’s on the menu and what she needs. I break out the cutting boards and prep whatever veggies she needs. This saves her some time and we both participate in the meal preparation.

On Monday, I made Japanese style fried rice while Donna grilled salmon and shishito peppers. It was a great meal.

Grilled salmon, shishito peppers and fried rice

On Tuesday, Donna kept it simple. She sauteed onions and mushrooms and baked spuds while I grilled filet mignon. Donna wrapped the filets with a strip of bacon. The filets were delicious and tender.

Bacon wrapped filet mignon smothered with mushrooms and onions with baked potato and broccoli

Last night, Donna made a new recipe. It was crispy chicken with turmeric-lemon cabbage and peas. It was a labor-intensive recipe that took nearly an hour and 15 minutes to prepare. The meal was great, but I don’t know if Donna wants to put that much effort into making it again.

The hot weather held over the weekend and through the start of the week. It was in the 90s until Wednesday when the high temperature was 87. Thursday cooled to 81 degrees for a high and today we expect 80 degrees. Last night was a comfortable 54 degrees. Looking ahead, we should maintain the highs in the 80s with maybe a day or two around 90 in the coming week.

I found the problem with our swamp cooler. There’s supposed to be a standpipe to drain water if the level gets too high. The standpipe was broken, so not enough water was in the sump. I fixed it and now the swamp cooler is awesome. We haven’t needed to run the air conditioner these last few days – the swamp cooler is doing the job great with just a box fan to circulate air to the front room.

Trailer For Sale – Sold

I mentioned another project that needed attention in my last post. Our 10-gallon Suburban water heater isn’t working right. This unit operates on 120-volts AC or propane. When we’re on a 50-amp electrical service, we keep the water heater on electric power.

Apparently, the electric heating element is going bad. It won’t heat the water adequately – we only get lukewarm water – I doubt if it’s much over 100 degrees. We have to turn on the propane gas burner to get hot enough water to shower or wash dishes.

I found a tune-up kit for the Suburban SW10DE water heater that included the heating element online at PDX RV. It also had a replacement thermostat set at 130 degrees. The kit was only $33, but shipping was $15!

I found a heating element wrench at Ace Hardware for $10. This is a thin wall, stamped sheet socket, 1-1/2 inches in diameter. The heating element has a thin 1-1/2 inch hex on top of the threaded portion of the element.

With the proper tool and parts in hand, I got to work. I made a “curtain” out of a plastic grocery bag to keep any sediment that might come out of the tank off of the coach. The heating element had a plastic cover over it and it was behind the gas tube, so I had to remove the gas tube and cover for access.

I had turned the circuit breaker for the water heater off, then I removed the two wires from the element. I used the socket tool, but I found the element threads were stuck in place. I worked on it for about 45 minutes before I decided I needed to try something different. I found a 1-1/2″ standard socket at the auto parts store. I figured I could use my 1/2-inch drive electric impact driver to break the element loose.

The thin hex on the element didn’t allow the socket to fully engage the hex and the impact driver just rounded the tops of the hex corners. Next I soaked it in penetrating oil and let it stand overnight. I found a bar about two feet long that I could use as a breaker bar on the heating element tool for leverage.

I huffed and puffed and gave a mighty pull on the cheater bar and promptly bent the heating element tool without budging the element. The threads remained frozen in place. At that point, I threw in the towel and put it all back together. I’ll have to hire an RV service that either has a better tool or a better idea to get the old element out. I hate to give up, but sometimes you have to admit defeat.

Donna has been busy getting the park model home ready for us to move in. Last Saturday Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort had a community patio sale. Many of the homes here in the park put out items for sale. Donna had a lot of stuff she wanted to get out of the house before we move in. She sold quite a few items. The things that didn’t sell we took to Goodwill.

She’s been working on replacing window coverings with help from our friends, Roxy and Dick Zarowny. They also did some paint touch up. Roxy repainted a cabinet, changing the white finish to gray.

The RV park is slowly emptying out as snowbirds return home. Our friends Chuck and Sue Lines left last week to head back to Illinois. We have about a dozen empty sites in front of our coach and only three RVs in sight.

I ordered set of coarse (400 grit) and medium (1000 grit) diamond sharpening stones and had another go at Roxy’s LC Germain kitchen knives. These stones were aggressive and worked better on this steel than the fine synthetic Japanese water stones I used before. They left a toothy finish that I refined a bit on a medium Spyderco Sharpmaker stick. The result was an acceptable level of sharpness that remained on the toothy side. A toothy edge is good for cutting most proteins or things like thick-skinned tomatoes. A more refined edge is needed to make clean cuts of fish. I think her knives will work better now.

By Wednesday, I had almost everything out of the trailer and needed to advertise it for sale. I was a little worried as I had to have it out of here on the 30th of March – only six days away. Donna wrote up an ad and posted it on Facebook Marketplace Wednesday evening. She had immediate responses! I had searched online to find comparable trailers to set a price and had a hard time finding anything. The closest I could find were either beat-up and selling for cheap or they were really high-end models – I only found a few examples and nothing really matched our trailer.

I told Donna what I expected to get for the trailer and soon found out I under-priced it. We had people lining up to buy it and a bidding war broke out. I sold it for $700 over my asking price and the guy came Thursday morning from Casa Grande to buy it. He paid cash and left with a smile on his face. I thought the lack of trailers this size online indicated a lack of interest – most of the trailers were around the 12-foot length. It turns out there’s low supply and much demand for larger trailers. I probably could have sold for a higher price, but I’m satisfied with how things turned out.

We’ll be moving into our new place over the weekend. On Tuesday, I’ll take the motorhome to a new storage facility that opened on Main Street near the Loop 202. I’ll have it under a covered space there. I think we’ll hang around here until mid-May unless it gets too hot earlier. We don’t have a real plan for the summer yet – we just know we want to leave before the temperatures are in triple digits.

The weather for the past week had been fickle. We’ve had warm, sunny days with the high temperature ranging from the mid-70s to mid-80s broken up by a few cooler days with wind and rain showers in the 60s. It’s cool today with a predicted high of 62 degrees, but we’ll warm up to the 80s over the weekend and may hit the 90s by the end of the week.

It’s Not If, It’s When

We’ve been busy here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort. The painter we hired, Gary, started working on prepping the interior of our new-to-us park model home last Friday. He sprayed the interior, including the ceiling in the all of the interior except for the Arizona room addition. He finished spraying on Tuesday and on Wednesday did some touch-up and clean-up.

Saturday morning we played in the annual pickleball tournament. Donna and I teamed up in the 3.0-3.5 group and had a good time. Went 3-3 but all of the games were close. I really don’t mind losing a game if we’re competitive and put up at least eight or nine points.

Wednesday was St. Patrick’s Day and we had corned beef in two slow cookers. I had trimmed the corned beef early in the morning and Donna got them started by 8:30am. I sliced cabbage and potatoes later. Donna had Irish soda bread in the oven in the afternoon. At 4pm, we transferred everything to our new place.

Our friends Chuck and Sue Lines and Dick and Roxy Zarowny joined us on the rear deck for a St. Patrick’s Day dinner. It was pleasant outside, mostly blue skies and the temperature was in the low 70s with very light wind. I was surprised to find the golf course empty. We enjoyed the company and had lots of conversation to go with our meal. Sue brought glazed carrots and Roxy contributed key lime pie for dessert.

We broke up the dinner party early – around 7:30pm. Chuck and Sue had an early morning on Thursday as they were pulling out with their fifth-wheel trailer to head back to Illinois. I was enjoying myself and relaxing so much, I failed to take any photos!

Donna has been busy taking stuff out of the coach basement storage areas – some things we haven’t used in a long time, but we wanted to keep. Now we won’t have to carry everything we own around with us – some things will remain here at the house.

While she was cleaning out one of the bins, she noticed a wet area. There was a very slow drip coming from the inlet to the electric water pump for the fresh water tank. I crawled under to have a look. Getting into the compartment, I banged my head on the door latch. I had to twist a bit to see the source of the leak. It was the filter – really just a metal mesh strainer with a plastic housing – on the pump inlet.

The small cut on my head was bleeding – even small head wounds can bled profusely. Twisting and turning my head while I was stretched out in the compartment caused the blood to run across my forehead and down my nose. I got out and walked to the door of the coach. Donna and Roxy were outside talking. When they looked at me they thought I had been wrestling in a WWE event – blood was running all over my face. It was a minor cut really and I was able to stop the bleeding quickly with a wet paper towel compress.

I put an oil drain pan under the drip – it holds a couple of gallons – and went online to find a new strainer. I ordered one from Amazon that would arrive the next day. While I was checking the leak out, I thought about the spare water pump I had. About six years ago we were in San Diego when I saw another Alpine Coach. The owner was busy repairing a water leak. I asked him what was up. He told me his water pump was leaking and had to be replaced.

He said it was a common issue with the RV Aquajet pump used in Alpine Coaches. He advised me to order a Shurflo 4008 RV Revolution replacement pump to have on hand. His words were, “It’s not if, but when your Aquajet starts leaking.”

Amazon delivered the replacement strainer on Wednesday as promised. I got back into the compartment to compare the part and see what it was going to take to install it. I was shocked to see we no longer had a slow drip – it went from a drop every 10 seconds or so to a steady drip, drip, drip and it was coming from the bottom of the water pump. The Aquajet pump failed. Now I was glad I had carried a replacement to have on hand for the last six years!

Aquajet pump leaking – line already disconnected from output side

I drained our fresh water tank and removed the old pump. The Aquajet and the new Shurflo are different designs with different dimensions. Luckily, the new strainer I got from Amazon was a direct fit on the Shurflo.

New pump and old pump – different dimensions on the mounting brackets

The mounting brackets were different, but I could see they would fit on either pump with just two screws. Rather than drill new mounting holes in the coach, I swapped the mounting bracket so I could use the existing holes and original bracket on the Shurflo.

When I got the pump mounted, I had another problem. Due to the different dimensions of the pumps, the water line from the fresh water tank to the inlet strainer was now an inch short. I needed 39 inches of water line and it was only 38 inches. I pulled the old line and rummaged around in the trailer. I found a 44-inch length of 1/2″ pex tubing. Perfect. I cut it to size and was back in business.

After assembling it all, I turned the water supply back on and checked for leaks and found none. I filled the fresh water tank about a quarter full and ran the pump. No leaks, good flow and pressure. The new pump is much quieter than the old Aquajet – it’s nearly silent. Job done!

I have another project that’s taking valuable time from our move effort. The electric heating element on our Suburban 10-gallon water heater in the coach is going out. It doesn’t bring the hot water up past lukewarm. We have to run it on propane to get hot water. That project will be fodder for another post.

I’m continuing to work on my kitchen skills. On Monday, I made miso soup. So what, you say. Well, I didn’t make it from a package – I made it from scratch. That meant I had to make dashi first. Dashi is a Japanese broth that’s the base for a lot of Japanese recipes, including miso soup. I made awase-style dashi which is flavored by boiling dried kelp, then adding bonito flakes as it cools. After straining it, you have dashi.

The miso soup had yellow miso, tofu cubes, dried king black (shiitake) mushrooms and chopped scallions. It was good, but I needed to do a better job of reconstituting the dried mushrooms. I served it as an appetizer while Donna made a proper dinner plate.

She made pan seared scallops with lemon-caper sauce and steamed asparagus on the side.

This was a delicious meal – every bit as tasty as the fancy recipe looks.

The weather has been a little crazy over the last week. We had rain showers Friday and again on Saturday afternoon and the thermometer struggled to top 60 degrees both days. By Monday, we had low 70s but dipped down to 60 again on Tuesday. As already mentioned, St. Patrick’s Day was fine with mid 70s and we hit 83 degrees yesterday. Today’s forecast calls for 80s again before dropping back into the 70s for the coming week.

Sunshine On My Headlights

We had more good company this week. On Thursday, we met up with Deb and Jeff Spencer at Fat Willy’s for lunch on the patio. The last time we saw Deb and Jeff was in Kanab, Utah in September. We’ve met up with them several times over the years in various places – that’s how it often works with fellow full-timers.

Fat Willy’s is a pub/restaurant and also has the pro shop for the golf courses at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort. As I mentioned, we took a table on the back patio overlooking part of the 18-hole course. I shot a photo of the view, but neglected to get a people photo.

The photo above illustrates Arizona winter grass. The grassy areas surrounding the course appear to be Bermuda grass, which goes dormant over the winter. Bermuda grass goes dormant and doesn’t produce chlorophyll when the soil temperature drops into the 50s. It will recover in the spring with an application of fertilizer. The fairway is green – presumably it was overseeded for the winter with a rye grass variety. I don’t know what type of grass is used on the greens.

After a couple of hours of pickleball in the morning, I took care of a small project on Friday. Our new-to-us Nissan Frontier had some deterioration of the acrylic headlight covers. This has been a common problem for cars built with this type of headlight over the last 20 years – especially in areas with abundant sunshine. The acrylic covers are coated with a UV inhibitor, but over time, it breaks down – especially here in the desert.

Our Nissan Frontier was originally sold by Peoria Nissan on the west side of Phoenix and has been in the valley of the sun ever since. Our headlights weren’t in really bad shape, but once they start to degrade, it doesn’t get better.

Hazy area on upper right headlight cover

When this happened on our Alpine Coach, I polished the lens covers with a product from Meguiar’s. The problem was, the Meguiar’s polished out the haze, but it also removed any remaining UV inhibitor and within a year, the headlight covers were in worse shape than ever.

After looking around a bit, I found a product made by Sylvania that not only polishes out the imperfections, it includes a new clear lens coating with UV inhibitor! I ordered a kit from Amazon – it was only $19.99 – to give it a try.

The kit included detailed instructions – it’s broken down into three steps. First you clean the cover and spritz it with a liquid etching solution. Then you wet sand progressively with 400 grit, then 1000 grit and finally 2000 grit sand paper. I used a spray bottle to keep plenty of water on the acrylic cover while sanding with fairly light pressure. You sand until the surface is smooth with each grit. At this point, the headlights look really bad – they are completely clouded from sanding. After rinsing and drying, you apply the etch again, rinse and dry again, then apply the clear coat with the UV inhibitor. The results were amazing.

The whole process took about an hour. I’m pleased with the result. Now we’ll have to see how it holds up to exposure to sunlight.

Speaking of sunshine, we have plenty in the forecast. After having daily highs in the mid-60s all week, the forecast calls for 75 degrees today – and we’re well on our way there – and mid to upper 70s for the week ahead with clear skies.

Jaws

Donna has a new assistant. No, not for work – she retired, remember? She bought something she’s wanted for a while – a Shark IQ robotic vacuum cleaner. She actually wanted it for the new park model house when we move in, but she’s been using it in the motorhome. It’s an amazing device.

It docks in a charging station – it’s battery operated. When it’s activated, it relies on a number of sensors as it finds its way around the floor. It will transition from hard floor surface to rug or carpet with ease. It can work in tight spaces such as around chair legs or tables.

It stores information in its memory and becomes more efficient as it “learns” the layout of the floorplan. When it finishes the task – about half an hour for the motorhome – it docks itself in the charger to recharge for the next use! Since it’s a Shark, Donna dubbed it Jaws.

I don’t think it will take much more time to vacuum the park model home – it’s twice the square footage but it’s also more wide-open allowing longer straight runs without a lot of maneuvering.

You might recall back in the beginning of November that I took our coach to Rocky Mountain Cummins Avondale shop on the westside of Phoenix. When they completed the lift-pump replacement, I felt I’d been taken. They overcharged for the work, including charges for work that wasn’t even performed. I filed a complaint with the Arizona Attorney General’s Consumer Protection Division since I couldn’t get any satisfaction from Rocky Mountain Cummins.

The Consumer Protection Division basically just forwarded my complaint to the Cummins Corporate office. They, in turn, sent it to their legal counsel which responded by writing a letter stating they did nothing wrong. I countered their argument with another filing – their position was not justified.

Last week, a representative of Cummins phoned me and we talked it over. He agreed that a compromise solution should be made. He made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. I just have to go to the Cummins shop in west Mesa and sign a release and they will refund me $606. A good ending to a bad experience.

Last week, Donna made an oven-roasted boneless chicken thigh recipe with a balsamic dijon garlic sauce. She served it over brown rice with French green beans with everything bagel seasoning. It was delicious – I loved the sauce.

Boneless chicken thigh with balsamic dijon garlic sauce

I think I said in my last post that experts, like author Kevin Kent, say most home cooks should have a selection of six knives or so. I’m getting there. I ordered another knife, bringing me up to five Japanese kitchen knives.

This time I ordered a petty. A petty is a small knife, usually ranging from 80mm to 180mm. The shorter size is for paring fruits or vegetables in your hand while longer pettys can used for board work. I ordered a 135mm petty from Japanese Chef Knives (JCK) in Tokyo, Japan.

This knife is from the Fu-Rin-Ka-Zan line and it’s made from a core of Hitachi Shirogami #1, also known as White steel #1 clad in soft stainless steel. The White steel #1 is a fine grained simple carbon steel without alloying elements and it takes a wicked sharp edge. The stainless cladding is unspecified, but I think it’s likely a SUS 410 series stainless like the stuff used on microwave oven or refrigerator doors.

This blade was hand forged by Teruyasu Fujiyama in Tokyo, Japan. Teru, or TF as he’s often referred to, is quite a character. He is a fourth generation blacksmith. In the 1970s, he and his father pioneered the art of cladding carbon steel by forge welding stainless steel to it. They had to experiment a lot before they got it right – 80% of the time they failed as the steel either delaminated or cracked. But they eventually got it right. TF is one of the very few blacksmiths that still make san-mai (three-layer) steel by hand forging. Most buy pre-laminated steel from the Hitachi YSS division or from Takefu Special Steel Company.

He makes three lines of knives, ranging from the value-priced Nashiji line to the mid-price Maboroshi and the premium line called Denka. I’ve read a lot about his work and a lot of knife aficionados complain about the lack of fine finish and fitment of handles on some of his work. Then they all rave about the fine heat treatment and geometry resulting in hard, durable blades with incredible cutting ability. It seems TF is rightly proud of his ability to forge great steel, but doesn’t care so much about a few stray grind marks or handle fitment. But the knife-crazy guys will pay upwards of a $1,000 for his top line stuff.

The JCK Fu-Rin-Ka-Zan line is their house brand and the particular knife I bought is sourced from the TF Nashiji line. I used it last night to slice an apple and it does have an incredibly smooth cutting feel. I also ordered a saya (wooden sheath) for safe storage. The simple magnolia wood saya was shown as available when I placed the order, but somehow it was out of stock when they picked the order. Koki-san at JCK took care of me though. He upgraded to the premium lacquer saya at no extra cost – it’s twice the price of plain magnolia!

We had some rain on Monday and Tuesday as a cold front came through. It was much cooler with the thermometer hovering around 60 for the daily highs. We had Midget-san under cover for a week when we finally had a warm, dry day yesterday. I uncovered it and found a dead battery! Something was drawing current from the battery. I put a charger on it. Then our neighbor, Chuck, brought over his charger with a boost function for starting.

I got the car fired up and Donna and I drove over to Basha’s for a few groceries and we picked up takeout from J&M – our favorite Chinese restaurant in the area. It’s amazing how affordable Chinese takeout is – we both had kung pao chicken with rice, spring roll, two crab puffs and soup for $12.50 per plate. And the portions were large enough for each of us to have a second meal of leftovers!

I got back on the pickleball courts Thursday and again this morning. My back is holding up fine. I planned to rest over the weekend, but they needed a player to fill out round-robin play tomorrow, so I’m in. It looks like we’ll end the month with fine weather. The temperature is predicted to be 70 or higher for the next several days.

Flying The Koop

…from real estate to wheel estate and back again

Category Archives: Maintenance and Repair

Full Plates

Going Home

Snail Mail

Sand Canyon Cliff Dwellings

Motion is Lotion

Curtains Up

Trailer For Sale – Sold

It’s Not If, It’s When

Sunshine On My Headlights

Jaws

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