2021 – Project: new laminate floor

The carpet in our 2005 Safari Cheetah was original carpet. Also, some tiles needed attention so we decided to go with a cork back, waterproof laminate replacement. We did a similar project in 2015 in our 5th wheel so we knew a bit about the project. I did the work then, but these days I’m recovering from arthroscopic knee surgery so it was easy to decide to pay someone to do the work. We bought NuCore flooring from Floor and Decor. Honestly, seeing how hard the guys worked taking out the old tile I don’t think I would have been able to do the job anyway. In our motorhome, the tile sections (kitchen and bathroom mostly) were mounted on a second layer of pressed wood. I think this was because the carpet was thicker than the tile. They added a second pressed wood layer to lift the tile to match the carpet. Some sections of tile came out as a unit. The rest required breaking tile and tearing up the pressed wood.

Also, our rig has four slides. We decided to leave the carpet on the slides and tile in the bathroom. The slides are full of furniture or cabinets that pretty much full the slides anyway. This also simplified the project a bit – saving us on both material and labor.

The job is now complete and we’re pleased with the result. As you can guess, the final chapter of the story can only be written after a few years of use. For now, though, we are happy with our new floor.

2020 – Quick Tip – Water Filter Stand

We’ve used a whole house water filter for a long time now. The cartridges last anywhere from two weeks to two months, depending on the water supply. I’ve tried other approaches to a stand for the filter but after seeing others suggest using a traffic cone I decided to give it a try. I used the filter wrench to measure where to cut the top off and two minutes later the job was done. The filter slid right into the cone and it now stands upright. If you use a filter like this one this is an easy diy stand.

Six ways to battle the Texas summer heat in a RV

Like a lot of people our travel plans have been preempted by the pandemic. In our case, we had already decided to shorten our travel adventure this year as we are serving as interim pastor at Houston’s Southwest Church of the Nazarene.

And, not that this will come as a surprise to you, summers in Texas are hot! In our case, we are near the Gulf Coast, so not only is it hot but it is humid too. Not a fun mix. Not only that, but there’s no shade.

Our motorhome has two air conditioners. The bedroom a/c does a good job of keeping things cool. The living room unit, though, struggles to keep up. We’ve made six adjustments that make a big difference.

    1. Of course, we keep the front window curtains drawn. Not only that, but we have giant sunshades (similar to what people use in their cars) for these windows. We certainly miss the view out of  our big “picture window” but this is the number one thing that keeps things comfortable in our living room.
    2. It probably goes without saying, but I keep an eye on the air conditioner filters. Running as much as the units are, the filters need cleaning a couple of times a month. Our units also have “Quick Cool” (or “air dump”) vents. We open them to dump a lot of cold air straight down into the RV, rather than running air through the vents where the heat from the roof warms the air a bit.
    3. Another big improvement is adding Reflectix to several windows. This is a heat reflecting insulation that is cut to fit. We have put this product on our west facing windows as well as on other seldom used windows.
    4. The next thing we have done is install curtains the width of the rig behind the driver’s/passenger’s seats, creating a sort of vestibule. This keeps the cool air from the a/c concentrated in our living room and kitchen and helps trap the warm air from opening the front door in the front of the rig. There’s around  a 5 degree difference between the driving area and the living room.
    5. We are running a couple of electric fans that keep the air moving. One of the fans is an oscillating tower that makes a nice difference.
    6. Finally, as long as the hot wind isn’t blowing too hard, in the afternoons we leave the awning extended on the curb side of the rig. This shades the west side of the motorhome and keeps the walls from heating up.

We know that the best RV summer solution is moving to a cooler spot. However, there are times when that isn’t possible and “all the above” does help us stay comfortable.

So what are your tips for weathering summer heat and humidity in a RV?

Splendide Washer/Dryer Combo again


I’ve written before about Second Wave Expenses – these are expenses that arise from equipment wearing out, etc. and needing to be replaced. While you can’t anticipate all of this kind of stuff it is wise to leave some wiggle room in your budget to update or replace items. If you aren’t ready the unexpected expenditures can put a real crimp in your traveling lifestyle.

In our case, the latest Second Wave expense is the untimely death of our Splendide 2100XC. One of the first things we bought in preparation for fulltiming was the Splendide. In fact, we bought our used 5th wheel, went straight to a tire shop and had new tires put on it and then we dropped the new-to-us rig off to have the Splendide installed.

If you haven’t used one of these machines let me describe it’s use. This is an all-in-one unit that washes and dries in the same drum. It is made for tight quarters so it is nothing like a big home style washer and dryer set. The loads are small and it washes a bit bigger load than it dries. As a rule of thumb, you wash a load a day.

Because of that, the Splendide gets used a lot. My estimate is that our Splendide did 2500 loads and served us for seven years before it died of bearing failure. This failure was telegraphed to us as the poor machine began shaking the rig even more than usual during it’s spin cycle.

Really, no complaints.

We found that a local dealer had these washer/dryers on sale and decided to just bite the bullet and get a new one. Frankly, if the new one gives us the same service we’ll be satisfied. Still, these kind of Second Wave expenses do tend to bring pain to the bank account.

Other Splendide posts are here.

2019 – Project: Our “new” 2017 Ford C-Max Energi

2017 Ford C-Max Energi

Having moved from the 5th wheel/pickup combination to a motorhome our next big move was getting a vehicle to tow behind the motorhome. We wanted something we could pull with all four wheels on the ground, not needing any kind of trailer. There are several candidates, most notably a Jeep Wrangler – a legendary “towed.” We decided that the Jeeps are too high and difficult for us to get in and out of at this stage of life. As I researched I found that Ford hybrids can be flat towed so we narrowed our focus to those vehicles. We found this very low mileage 2017 Ford C-Max Energi and decided this was the one.

The Energi is a “plug-in hybrid.” That means that you can plug it into an outlet and the batteries will deliver around 20 miles of electric only travel. After that the car acts as a regular hybrid, running the engine or using the batteries (or both) as needed. The car is very quiet to operate and drives great. It also has more technology than we’ve ever had on a vehicle. We really like the vehicle and are a bit surprised that 2018 was the last year Ford made a C-Max.

The next step was getting it ready to tow. That is a rather big deal as a front base plate has to be installed. Also, a braking system, tail lights, and tow bar is needed. We went with the popular Blue Ox baseplate and tow bar. Then we got the best braking system available for a car being towed behind a diesel motorhome; a SMI Air Force One. This system uses the power from the motorhome air brakes to operate the car brakes proportionally to the brakes being applied on the motorhome. None of this was inexpensive – but it was all part of the process of moving from a pickup pulling a big 5th wheel to a motorhome pulling a small car.

Later on I plan to do an article comparing the 5th wheel experience with the motorhome experience. I may have more to report on towing the C-Max. For now, we have just one tow under our belts. That through Houston I45 traffic to Conroe. That’s a tough drive in any kind of vehicle.

2019 – Project: Roof Vents Repair and Upgrade

One of the few things we don’t like about RV Fulltiming is dealing with severe weather and the other night we had a big thunderstorm come through. For a few minutes we had nickle sized hail. Tell you what, having hail beating down on the RV is attention-getting! Our motorhome has three roof vents/exhaust fans. One is covered. The other two, one in a hallway and the other in the bathroom, have no cover over the lid.


We were already aware that one of those lids had a small corner crack so replacing it was on the agenda. The hail storm, though, moved that project to the front burner. The hail broke through that lid, knocking holes in it. The other lid cracked but held. As the storm continued, I grabbed some gaffer tape and taped the broken lid from the inside the best I could. The next morning I got on the roof to survey the damage. Happily, the only damage was to the two lids. I taped them both up some more and ordered replacements as well as new vent covers.


The project was easy enough and in an hour or so I had the new lids plus new covers installed. The covers will not only protect the lids in rough weather and against sun damage but will keep the rain out if the vents are left open. They can also be cracked open when we are traveling to create airflow through the camper.


This is an easy upgrade and I recommend it to anyone who has a RV that doesn’t have the covers.

2019 – Projects – Moving the TV


One thing I really dislike about the floorplan of many motorhomes is the placement of the TV over the driver’s seat.  I know that newer rigs are being designed differently, but motorhomes of the era of our “new” Safari Cheetah are all laid out like this.

With that in mind, one of our first projects after getting moved in was to relocate the TV.  Since there are just two of us, picking a good spot was easier than it would be for a family.  Our rig had two couches facing one another, so we got rid of one of the couches and put our recliners in place of the removed couch.

Then, I mounted the TV over the couch on the opposite side of the rig so that our recliners face it.  My approach was pretty low tech.  First, I put two hooks in the cabinet above the couch.  Then I built a shelf that sits on the back of the couch and is attached to the wall below the window.  The front of the shelf isn’t attached to the couch – it just rests on it and is kept in place by a couple of L-shaped brackets that “saddle” the couch.

The TV, then, sits on the shelf, but is also attached by chains to the hooks.  This keeps it pretty stable.  However, it will not stay there when we are moving the motorhome.  I can just unhook the chains, disconnect the HDMI cable, and lay the TV down on the couch.  This process will take less than one minute.

Meanwhile, we had a big blank space where the TV had been mounted above the driver’s area.  We recovered it will stick on cork shelf liner and attached a much-needed clock there.

Again, this is all low tech and it is also low cost.  We’re happy with this early motorhome project.

Note: happily, the scenes on the TV aren’t our local weather!

2018 – Project: Wide Angle Lens for hitching the 5th Wheel


I know that there are nifty bed mount cameras for this, but I was looking for a low tech solution and found one that I am sharing with you.

The challenge is backing the pickup up to hitch the 5th wheel. In our setup, the only way to see out to back window down to the hitch is to prop yourself up at a strange angle in the seat, twisting around while keeping your foot on the fuel peddle, ready to switch to the brake. My neck and back don’t work very well for that kind of Jujutsu move anymore so I looked around for a cheap alternative.

My solution was a wide angle lens that sticks to the back window of the truck. The lens “bends the light” letting me look through the rear-view mirror and see the hitch. To help things out, I put some fluorescent tape on both the edge of the hitch and the front of the hitch.

Once I put the wide angle lens on the window and tried it out, I took scissors and cut it in half, using only the bottom half on the window. That kept the lens low enough that I can look through the rear view mirror when driving without the camper and not see much of the lens at all.

This setup has been surprisingly helpful. I line things up without turning around at all, just looking in the mirror as I back up to the 5th wheel. Admittedly, there’s a bit of a learning curve, but this set up works well, especially when you consider the low cost.


See individual photos with captions.

2018 – 5th Wheel Service in Chanute, KS

We’ve fulltimed in our 2007 Hitchhiker II for five years now and have been pleased with how well it has held up. Last year we decided to keep it for a few more years and upgraded to a Bigfoot hydraulic leveling system. We love it. This year we had a couple of bigger repairs to do so we made our way to Chanute, KS, where our NuWa Hitchhiker was built, for factory service. We dropped the camper off early on Monday morning and moved into a nearby motel for the duration. While this isn’t a review of the motel, I will mention that we were very pleased with the helpful service we received at the Chanute Knights Inn and recommend it.

The big ticket item on the 5th wheel was the big slide out that had some water damage and needed to be completely removed and basically rebuilt from the floor up. Another job was replacing the rider’s side lower-front panel that had an unfortunate run-in with a big boulder in North Dakota last summer. Also, it was time to replace all the slide seals on the camper; a bigger job than you might think. All that plus a few other minor projects were on the schedule.

On Thursday the service center, true to their word, reported repairs complete. Happily, no other big problems were found during the work. After deflating our bank account we were ready to move back in. All in all it was a positive experience and we are pleased with the service we received. When I thanked the service manager for their work I commented that I hoped not to see them again for a long time. He laughed and said he hears that a lot.


See individual pictures with notes here.