Happy Easter! We spent our Good Friday and Easter weekend on the roof of the rig putting on the new Dicor rubber roof coating.
First things first. I have been calling this Dicor coating “liquid rubber” or “the new rubber coating” and it wasn’t until we finally opened the cans that I realized it was NOT “liquid rubber” or “rubber coating”! It is acrylic rubber roof coating, essentially an acrylic paint. Guess I should read my labels better. Anyway, it’s on and it looks great!
We spent the afternoon on Friday removing the vent covers and the cover to the AC unit and then cleaning and applying new lap sealant around the seams of the old sealant. The stuff that was on there was not bad at all so we just went along the seams with caulking just to be safe.
On Saturday, we spent a few hours putting up plastic to cover the whole outside of the motorhome. It was time consuming and quite a pain. It was sunny out buy it was WINDY and that made it a little tough to keep the plastic in place. You can see in some of the videos and photos that we used logs from the wood pile, a ladder and a giant pallet to help keep the plastic from billowing and coming off. It must have taken us at least three hours to get it up there, only to take it down a half hour later.
Step one in the Dicor coating process is to apply a sort of primer liquid. It cleans and prepares the rubber to accept the acrylic. We read online about the liquid potentially causing damage to other surfaces so it was recommended to wrap the rig in plastic for that step.
After we completed the first step, we took off all of the plastic and sprayed down the whole outside of the motorhome to rinse away any of the chemical that may have made it’s way under the plastic.
Painting on the new coating was easier than we thought it would be. We were able to use brushes and a roller to apply four coats over two days on the roof and it worked out great and looks brand new.
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J&J
We have been very busy getting the rig ready for her big trip. Here is what’s on our “to do” list:
Upgrade! We purchased a new in-dash stereo and door speakers for the cab. Since this is a 1994, we only had a tape deck and wanted the ability to play CD’s and other media. We selected a Pioneer receiver and speakers from Best Buy and we’re having them install it. The model we picked includes a CD player, Bluetooth, AUX in jack, and a USB port. Instead of using the FM tuner to listen to satellite radio we can now use the auxiliary port and have a clearer signal. The Bluetooth allows us to use the phone hands-free through the stereo speakers which is cool and we can stream music from Pandora our phones.
As I was installing new wipers, I noticed that one of them was held on by electrical tape. Not sure what happened to it but it has held up pretty well and we never noticed it until now.
New tires were a little cheaper than we were expecting for the six of them. We went with a lower mid-grade LT tire as that fit our budget. They are good solid tires with a 50,000-mile warranty. We didn’t bother with the road hazard option since we most likely will not be capable driving to the nearest Firestone for repairs once we’re on the road (that’s what Coachnet is for!).
Completing the oil change on the generator was simple and took about 10 minutes. There is no filter to replace so it was just drain and fill. It took just about 1.5 quarts to refill. The air filter and everything else looked fine so it should be good to go for the season.
While looking for quotes on a tune up, pricing was all over the place and nobody could give me a definite estimate. Since it has a Ford E350 chassis, I called Ford and they said it would be $600 … WHOA! The other places were $400 + so when I was getting a quote for the tires at Firestone they said they would be able to do the tune up for $330. I dropped off the motorhome at Firestone one morning and picked it up with new tires, tuned up and oil changed. Not a bad deal and a time saver!
Last year when we bought the rig, the dealer put in a new coach battery because the one in there was pretty old. As we used it last year I kept thinking that it was not lasting as long as it should. Over the winter, while I was trying to keep it charged via the shore power, it wouldn’t charge past a certain point. When it warmed up a little I tested the battery and found that a few of the cells were bad, so it wasn’t charging past 9.5 volts. We purchased a new one at Sears and it’s top notch now. Everything is charging properly.
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8 More days…see you on the road!
J&J
Success! We have rescued the RV from its winter storage spot in my parent’s backyard (thanks, Mom!) It took about 6.5 hours over two days to prepare for the escape.
As you can see, the road was still covered with a few inches of snow and ice. I used the snow blower to get rid of as much snow as possible to expose the ice beneath it. I had to chop a lot of ice closer to the road exit, which was about 3 inches thick. I then laid down 100 lbs of sand and 100 lbs of stones to maintain traction on the way out. There was no wheel spinning or slipping so I was very happy!
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