Last days in TX, ready to head north

April 20 – 29, 2015   

We finally made the decision for Patty to have surgery in New Jersey.   Patty first tried with a surgery practice in Buffalo that was affiliated with the University of Buffalo (UB).  After a couple of weeks of back and forth with UB it became apparent that the practice didn’t know anything about what Patty is trying to cure, Brachial Radial Pruritus.  Next, Patty went with a practice in New Jersey who went the extra step and were very proactive.  Although the practice is not familiar with Patty's diagnosis, they can do the surgery.

We now know we are leaving on May 2nd and heading toward Indiana for my class reunion on the 16th of May.  We are planning on going through Oklahoma and then into Missouri so we could add the state stickers to our country map on the RV.  We only add the stickers if we actually stay in the state and so far we have not stayed in these two states.  

We were planning to stay one night near Oklahoma City and a night near Springfield MO.  This will take us a little west but we have the time.  All of our trips are 2 and 3 night stays and we could go straight to Indiana and save a couple of days.  This allows us to modify our trip along the way if we have any issues.  This a lesson learned several times now, always plan with lots of room for changes.

Before we leave our winter site we had a pretty bad thunderstorm hit us.  It was bad but for only about half an hour.  The winds were around 50-60 miles an hour with some small hail.  The storm came out of the southwest, which is good for us as that hits our rig in the rear as opposed to the side.  We also have a 10 foot high metal fence behind us that helps with wind too.  

It was really weird watching the storm approach on the TV.  The station we were watching was located in Weslaco about 15 miles south of us.  Before the storm hit it was hot and humid out but calm, you would never think a storm was coming.  We watched the storm hit the TV station and knocked their power out with 75 MPH winds!  By that time we could see lightning in the distance but still no wind or rain.  About 5 minutes later you would have thought it was the last of days.  The RV shook and the rain was so loud we couldn’t hear the TV.  The heavy part of this storm only lasted about 15 minutes but it was enough to knock out the power to the resort.   

When the electric went out our first thought was to start the generator so we could keep watching the TV and run the AC (of course).  It was howling with rain and wind so hard we couldn’t hear the generator start up.  The resort power was also coming on and off at the same time.  This made for a bad situation electrically for the RV and the generator.  

We finally figured out that we had the generator running and that the resort power was in fact, out. However, now we only had power to the AC and to the battery charger.  I thought I may have tripped the GFI because the outside ground lights were probably under water.  I went out in the rain and unplugged the outside lights and then tried to reset the GFI.  The GFI was not tripped but I tripped it with the test button and could not reset it.  Now I was thinking that maybe I fried the transfer switch between the generator and the line coming in from the outside.  Anyway, that was going to be a troubleshooting experience for tomorrow.  Now it was time for bed as the TV was now out too.

Next morning I set out to figure out why the GFI wouldn't reset. The GFI in most 5th wheels is located in the bathroom as is ours.  I took the cover off of the GFI and then made sure it was wired correctly, which it was.  I went to the internet and googled GFI breakers and found out that they can’t reset if there is no power on the breaker, I didn’t know that.  So out comes my multimeter to check for power and found there was no power to the GFI.  

The only GFI in the RV is this one in the bathroom next to the sink.

OK, now it's apart so I can see what is going on with this thing!

Next I went to the breaker panel in the kitchen.  I found that there was only power to half the panel.  It now seems that I only have half of the 100 amps coming into the RV or only one of the 2 circuits of 50 amps coming in.  

Now to check the breaker panel.  Both the low voltage DC and the high voltage AC have breakers and fuses in this panel.

I was still running on the generator so I thought, just maybe, we tripped a breaker on the generator.  I went outside and took the cover off of the generator and found one of the 2 breakers were tripped, whew!  The breaker probably tripped while we were stopping and starting the generator last night with the AC still on.  I should have first turned off the AC before starting the generator, lesson learned now. That was a whole lot better than fixing a transfer switch though!  Even after 3 years I am still learning stuff about the RV.

The bottom 30 amp breaker was tripped on the Generator.  The two 30 amp breakers are located on the left side of the generator behind the cover.  This is an Onan 5500 watt generator.  It basically gives us 30 amps on each of 2 circuits in the RV for a total of 60 amps.  60 amps is more than enough to run everything in the RV, within reason anyway.

So for the remainder of the day, Thursday, I washed rig.  This is a lot of work and took me 4 hours to do.  I didn’t wash the roof this time as I just washed it a couple of months ago.  I try to wash the roof every 6 months.  The next roof wash will probably be when we are in NJ in August.

That’s it for now.  The next couple of day leading up to leaving on Saturday morning will be mostly about getting everything in order to leave.  After 5 months sitting still in one place you tend to spread out and forget where everything goes.  We also have a lot of errands to run before we leave.

Stay tuned!