Vanman

I replaced what I think was the original isolator relay on my 91 Dolphin a few years ago, (really rusted and looked old) with one I got on amazon was supposed to be a Tekonsha. Looked exactly like the old one, but new, draws 605 ma steady coil current, across made contacts zero ohms and under heavy charging current had a voltage drop of .06 VDC. Which has suddenly blossomed up to .2+ VDC. Tapping it whilst on can vary the drop from .2+ all the way up to .5+. I'm not happy about buying another one of these so am shopping for a better quality replacement. BTW the new relay, like the old one had absolutely no markings on it anywhere. vanman

Toyota does funny electrical things like that. Aside from the OD lite ckt that has been discussed here already I found when replacing the front turn signal bulbs with LED's the LED's would not light. Turns out the housing is plastic and they wired the base to hot and the center to ground. Bulb does't care about polarity, LED does. Been working on cars for a long time, never saw that before. Thanks a lot for that post, I'm gonna add some gages to mine one of these days. vanman

" and they are not useful in windy conditions " I was not happy about the otherwise quality large awning on ours windwise but a 50' nylon rope cut in half and some nice stakes made a huge difference. Wrap the middle around the awnings top end, stake rope ends at 90 degrees. I did find it helpful to tie some brightly coloured cloth to the ropes just for safety thou. As we were told, the wind came up real good before we got back to the RV park and all was well. Left it up like that the 2 weeks we were there no problem. When we left there were several other RV's doing the same thing. Love the Ben Franklin stores, nice rope, stake & hammer kit. vanman

I have a 91 Toyota pick-up Dolphin V-6 automatic with OD. Is it possable to engage the torque conveter lock-up in the lower gears, or does that only work in 3rd or overdrive??? vanman

When I am going up the steeper hills I have the' pedal to the floor' and it moves at about 50 mph. No matter what you're driving this is a prescription for disaster. Go down to a gear where you can maintain between 1/2 and 3/4 throttle. Your new motor will last and run cooler to boot. I live on a hill I can only take in first gear up one side and barely get up in second gear and only then with a good run at it, that's just the way it is. If you want to go fast up hill you will have to get a very much larger motor for those 6,000 PLUS pounds. vanman

Look at the antenna on the Dolphins, pulls in really well. Was at a campsite and was listening to the radio changing stations when commercials came on and the bigger RV's on each side asked me what was the frequency of my stations. They couldn't get any of them it turns out, works good on the road also. I'm sure you can find a similar antenna set up for RV's maybe at a truck store?? Good recption starts with a good antenna. vanman

Yeah on the air compressor. What I did was to let the air down to 20 #'s on the good side then pump the rt side uo to 120#. Put jack under the now high rt side and start turning. Then add other side up to 120 # to raise it and lower left side down to 20 # and presto, it now high enough to change wheel. Don't know exactly how much changing the air bag pressures helped but I think it was well worth it. vanman

This relay is labeled TAIL LAMP R. It was hot to the touch,. Not a good sign, loose/bad ground will not cause this. Try to re-check your wiring, sounds like either a short on one line or wiring more than one ckt together. Without a schematic this can be maddenly time consuming. If that fails to resolve problem leave all the grounds connected, verify with meter are are grounds not a hot included . Connect the rear lamps one wire at a time to see what actually happens. Take your time and remember what did what, keep notes as you go along and keep cool, when you find out what's right you'll feel soo good. vanman

Our 91 Dolphin came with the Toyota screw jack and I've used it to change an outer rear tire with a screw in it. Lifted the Toy OK. vanman

From what I've been told it's a REALLY bad idea to touch the MAS with anything, like a finger, rag, etc. There are some solvents that are ok to use to clean it but I don't take any chances and got a can of MAS cleaner at the autoparts store. john

Actually the sky's the limit, you can do a whole lot to one of these. Mostly it's a question of how much can be done with the money applied. Go to an RV store and just look around as you cruze the isles you'll see something and go I need that, and or I want that. Buy the RV handbook, I knew a lot about cars but was suprised at what I did not know. Mine was so damaged I had it painted, looks great now. john

I know my upper cabinets need to be better supported, and the bottom cabinets are weak in places but I was shocked by how the fridge and all the other cabinets and doors bounced up and down. Anyone else experience riding back there like this? Ours rides really rough, better after new shocks,bushings, etc, but still bumps are hard. I have found things I expected to stay tight sometimes don't and some things just require ocassional checking for tightness. john

MontanaChinook If I overload my fridge at all, the door will pop open and spill stuff out when I take a hard or prolonged left turn. Try adjusting the fridge door, ours was way off. john

I'v had good results with this, http://www.amazon.com/Rust-Oleum-7830730-8-Ounce-Rust-Reformer/dp/B000BZZ56S I just used that link because of the picture, typical amazon mark'em'up and then mark'em'down. That's about what I paid at my local ACE hardware store. john

For my Ford parked inside 303 works well, not so well on the RV and it's expensive. Tire difference or parking in the sun?? Am thinking tire covers for the RV. What do you use? john

Around here they will break into almost anything just to grab what they can. I hope the combo of the open and empty glovebox and the blinking red LED will save me the trouble and expense of repairing / replacing anything. But time will tell. Mine looks like new to someone who doesn't know what there Toys look like. Just sayin'. john

Around here they steal anything and everything, stole my '74 Datsun B-210 rust bucket from in front of the house in. Looked like hell but it was mechanically sound. Then Mary's car a few years later, then my companies truck, Ford E-150, with all my great tools, that's what flea markets are for around here. Surprisingly this is one of the better neighborhoods in the city!!! What I did was to put an alarm on the dome light, and a hidden start kill switch. Once running it cannot be stopped by any failure in this ckt, yes it's got it's own fuse. You do not want to put anything in that could cause an engine failure while driving. I believe here that's actually illegal, according to the guy who installed the security system in my Aerostar anyway. I personally would not drive anything that didn't have a, for here, reasonable level of security YMMV Remember that on old cars, like our Toys, all you need is a screwdriver to drive it away as fast as if you had a key. Insert tool in drivers lock hard twist breaks it, repeat with ignition sw and you're rolling. Newer cars much harder to get with chips in the key. john

Been there done THAT! When I bought the ford Aerostar from my company, was my company truck, it was originally registered in Sacramento calif. They have different smog as here in the bay area so I had to take it to the only guy in town who had the rollers to run it on. After killing a whole morning watching this dufus in action he informed me it would not pass as he could not see the timing marks. NOTE this truck has a sticker on the inside of the hood that states the timing is fixed and cannot be changed, as does the factory shop manual I own. Pointed this out to no avail. Took it to my regular smog guy and he laughed hard at that, marked the harmonic balancer with white paint, took it back to the dufus and by the end of the day had my smog! Last time I had it smoged there is a new kid who demanded to check the timing with a light knowing full well that it is fixed. Says the government idiots who made up the specs made a mistake and so require it to be checked. Couldn't figure out how to remove the inside engine cover, so I showed him that, couldn't find the proper plug wire, I couldn't help with that. I think he just gave up and gave me the smog, but next time going somewhere else. Killed an half a day for something that should be done in 45 min. Remember where you are, this country is full of stupid people, most of 'em employed by some company or another somehow. John

Friend was telling me about some who had just purchased a new RV based on the Sprinter/mercedes truck. He's new to RV'ing and when he set up the first time when he turned on the propane tank there was a loud bang followed by a hissing noise. He shut the valve and took it to the dealer who found the regulator had blown apart under the tank pressure, guess where it's made Supposedly replaced with a USA made regulator. john

OR more noticable with LED lamps, they turn on and off much faster than the bulb does. I like the fast flash I have now. john / mary

On ours there is another ckt breaker on the generator it's self. You have to open the access door and lift out the access panel to get to it. Might be the problem?? John and Mary

Was shopping for new shoes for the Subaru and was initally looking at the MXV4 and MXM4, but liked the new Premier A/S so I went with that and only found out incidently that the MXV4 is a discontinued model, no definate word on the MXM4 as of yet. This was a very popular tire so if you need one of these soon might want to get on it as the supply will dry up eventually, quicker in the more popular sizes. John-Mary

We live in S F and only own automatics, in the Toy it's no problem with the V6, just have to use first gear on the hills. On level ground the Toy can keep up with traffic if I want to , but I don't drive it that hard, it does not stop like my other rides, not in a hurry anyway. John & Mary

We went to the park today and saw 3, a Dolphin who lives there, a Warrior and another one that said Mini Warrior, looked shorter that a 22 footer across from the gas station. I honked at the Warrior on JFK drive, couldn't stop as park was full to the brim. John & Mary

Go to page 2 of this thread post called"4.56:1 ring and pinon gear" , here's the link. But that's an adaptor only. http://toyotamotorhome.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=7045&page=2 ... john