Vanman

Derek up North Which "better numbers" are you looking at? Got a PDF off their web site. Viscosity@40 C ,cSt......ATSM D-445,,,,36.6 Viscosity@100 C,cSt......ATSM D-445,,,,8 ViscosityIndex...........ATSM D-2270,,,200 Color, Typical...........ATSM D-1500,,,7 Appearence.............................Red Brookfield Viscosity at -40 C. cP.............ATSM D-2983,,,12,000 Pour Point C (F).........ATSM D-97,,,,,-48(-54) Flash Point C (F.........ATSM D-92,,,,,180 (356) Specific Gravity, 60 F...ATSM D-1298,,,0.862 Pounds Per Gallon........ATSM D-287,,,,7.18 These #'s beat anything I've found. BTW there are several different sets of spec numbers for the Maxx Life, similar but slightly different. john

Well, the first time I used the painters tape I waited till the paint dried, boy does that not work But pulling at an angle sounds like a great idea. I was hoping for some kinda liquid that would dry flexible, yeah I'm a little lazy john

Was looking at the specs of various ATF's and the Castrol Transmax High Mileage has better numbers than anything, including their own synthetic. Anyone using this ? john.

I saw one made in wisconsin at the felton run years ago and was talking to the owner who said it was a 22' and I said it looked like a short one based on eyeballing the length of the coach beyond the rear wheels. He said he had measured it at over 22' so I got my tape measure and suprise, suprise it was that long and it looked like that because they had increased the wheelbase. I forget the exact amount but it was around a foot, to my knowledge Toyota never made 'em like that. Looked like a really well built unit. john

These , http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007VLFENE/ref=pe_175190_21431760_M3T1_ST1_dp_1 , work great, and the price is real good. This link was originally posted by someone else here a while ago. I was so happy with the first 10 I ordered 10 more and converted the turn and back-up lites also. Now I have the top clearence lites LED's also, I think I'm done. I got this one , http://www.bestconverter.com/4600-series-Upgrade-Kits_c_133.html , the "charge wizard" isn't , in my opinion. But this one has a LED that tells you what voltage it's outputing AND a small push button so you can set it to which of the 3 voltage levels you want. Handy for using it to charge both batteries at once, which I do in winter sometimes. I was initally unhappy with the way the "wizard" worked but found out all the manufacturers of these type converters all work the same, all buying the same control chips methinks. Anyway since you can manually control the output this way it's a moot point.

Had my 91 Toy restored and they had to paint the vinyl side skirts. One thing is the skirts are actually 3 parts, the center part being the rear wheel extension, so where the parts meet they flex even when just driving and the paint doesn't like that, cracking. I will have to caulk over that and I am not good at that. Is there a kind of liquid calk so I could just start it at the top and let gravity do the work? I don't think I need much coverage, just enough to hold the paint from cracking more. TIA john

Got the TOY back from down south and it looks new, really. Had one of my neighbors walking his dog and he said, " so you finally broke down and got a new RV" had to show him the inside with the birdcage (also improved). The Maxx Air works great and everything on the roof is new. They fabricated new corners from the vinyl rear side skirts to the rear bumper cover out of fiberglass. They repaired the broken fiberglass areas so well I couldn't even tell where the repairs are. All the tape is gone and it's painted almost the same color as the Toyota cab. Looks GREAT They had to paint the vinyl and did it in almost the old color as before. One thing is the skirts are actually 3 parts, the center part being the rear wheel skirts, so where the parts meet they flex even when just driving and the paint don't like that. I will have to caulk over that and I am not good at that. Some other issues most of which I've already fixed. The Onan repair didn't happen so that will have to be done here. He also replaced the front and rear top marker lites with LED's, there are 2 LEDs inside each cover both really bright. The bad wood panel outside of the refrigerator also replaced. Thank goodness for having Les Schwab replace all the suspension and steering bushings, shocks, dampener, etc. I had terrible wind conditions on the last day of the drive home and it's a joy to drive in wind gusts, but a head wind just kills both performance and mileage. After the first 52 miles on Friday I stopped for coffee and gas, 6.8 gallons and the best I could do without flogging it was 48-50 MPH !! Doesn't leak at all anywhere, as I got in a rain storm Thursday in the mountains as heavy as I have ever seen outside of Monsoon's in the Philippines. The wipers couldn't begin to keep up at full speed, like driving in a firehose. There is always something but for now I'm gonna just enjoy it and change the oil and trans fluid after our day trip tomorrow. john

That is next for me, but I don't want just a back-up camera, I want a hi res long view one so I can use it as a great quality rear view mirror while driving. I also want it to auto-dim at night. Like the one on the Subaru. Also I drove it all night back from down south and the headlights are terrible, not even useful at freeway speeds. That's actually gonna be done real soon. I had never driven the rig after dark before and will not again till that is fixed.

ipo A quick question. What type of batteries are used as the truck battery and the coach battery? I'm seeing mentions of #27 deep cell in the coach. Is the truck battery just a regular car battery? Yes, mine is a group 24 Truck and 27 deep in the coach. Check to see if you can fit a larger in coach, I think mine will fit a group 29. I guess it would be nice to see if you have room for a larger battery in the truck too. Back in the day I had a 1971 Dodge B-200 Tradesman and I put the largest batt I could fit in there it was huge, do not remember the size, but worked great. Larger will cost more but no too much. john

Waiter. Are there brakes on the tow dolly?? john

Test lites are just that, a lite bulb with wires and / or alligator clips on one or both ends. When you put it across the 12V it lights up. As you go up the food chain of test equipment cost and complexity go up also. The auto parts shop should be able to explain how their testers work. It's up to you how complex you want to go with the tester, maybe start simple.

We feel the same way, I am putting a lot more $ into mine than I could ever sell it for, but think we will have the use of it for many years. Can't wait to see it when it's coach is done being restored, next week probably.

I measured the size of my propane tank cabinet and it would be a tight fit. But by my calculations I would not be able to get that big a tank in or out of the door, which on mine is somewhat smaller than the inside dimentions. If someone made one fatter but no longer I'd go for it. Haven't seen that online yet in a horizontal tank.

Pete1122 Good point, my house battery is only a 55 amp hour AMG. Time to upgrade? Thats smaller than a group 24, most Toy Rv's use group 27 or 29. When I replace my 27 I'm getting a group 29, it will just fit the battery box. So how big is your battery box?? maybe thats as big as you can fit?? I assume you meant a 1000 watt inverter? john

Derek up North No sweat, that'l buff right out.

This comes up regularly on the Subaru Outback forums. Look at what overseas owners are towing then look at the owners manual in the american made Outbacks. In fairness, the real Outbacks are made in Japan and have a better rear suspension than the ones made here by S.O.A., in a plant jointly owned by Toyota so they make Camrys part of the time.

"corbin k" You can get cut to length mini blinds made while you wait at Home Depot and Lowes. If you can afford the extra bucks cordless is the way to go in a motorhome. Lowes had a nice, cordless, cut to length while you wait, pleated fabric shade too. What I liked about it was that the back side was a metalized, heat reflective material which will give an extra boost of insulation to the window area. Plus that metalized lining made the shade room darkening. Just remember you want something washable as you might drive down gravel roads or camp in areas with a lot of surface dirt that can blow in an open window. So check the label on fabric pleated shades to be sure they are water immersible, most are but some might not be. That sounds great I'm gonna check out Loews next week. john

Mary's dog is very well behaved , so no problem there. But the bird will eat/chew up anything in sight if she's in the mood so keep an eye out or put her inside the cage. :) john

ipo #1: So with the truck running and charging the battery, by the time it reads 13.3-13.6, if I shut the truck off the battery should read 12.5-12.6 volts. Did I get that right? Sorry for my denseness..my ol' brain is scrambled by all of this. lol Except I forgot one important thing to mention: after charging any battery it will hold for several hours what's called a "surface charge" and any reading will be false, ie too high. So after charging let it sit for a few hours before checking the voltage. #2: when you say to make sure everything is turned off on the toy you're talking like headlights, radio, engine yes? yes #3:By flash do you mean quickly touch and remove the hot battery cable connector to and from the hot post? And a spark would indicate a problem? Yes BUT Maineah's post is probably a better method of tracing. I actually made a test light from my motorcycle days and use a 6 Volt lite bulb speedo lamp from an old Suzuki. The 6 V bulb makes it easier to see when Back in the day we had these things called "points" and used this test lamp to set the timing. john

Found out tonite the RV has been fully painted and 3 coats of clearcoat. All roof and most inside work done, Onan repaired, rust, undercoating, rest of list are up next. Get it back in 1-2 weeks. john PS was told the Onan doesn't draw gas properly with tank slightly below 1/4 full. Woulda hoped they made the tank pick-up tube a bit shorter than that. Something to keep in mind and maybe gonna keep that 5 Gal metal gas can I've been carrying in the shower close to full.

Derek up North http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2548209 Great read, I haven't seen that one before. I am using the 'Mobil 1 High Vechile Mileage' in my Toy for the antiwear additive package. This was originally brought to my attention by JD in an older post on this subject, and was backed up by a post similar to this one also from Bob The Oil Guy's site. I do notice that the oil gets darker faster on the Toy than on the Ford. john

Buy a multimeter to check electrical things. Could be as simple as a bad battery, won't take a full charge and or is self discharging. A fully charged batt should read 12.5 to 12.6 volts. When charging from the motor running you should get 14.4 initally and as the truck batt gets charged up it will slowly drop down to 13.3 to 13.6 volts as a maintain voltage. Before checking the batt by disconnection, you should make sure it's fully charged or at least see what state of charge it's at to start with. Short a meter you could make sure everything is turned off on the Toyota disconnect the hot side batt connection and flash it on and off to see if you get a spark. If the batt is good and going down that fast I would expect to see a small spark from a load that large. Check it out,any more questions and we're here. john

I got a pack these, http://www.amazon.com/Amico-BA15S-68-SMD-Brake-Backup/dp/B007VLFENE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1366145356&sr=8-1&keywords=Amico+10+Pcs+Car+1156+BA15S+1206+68-SMD+LED , from someones post here and was soo happy I got another 10 and put 'em in the whole RV and the turn and back-up lites. john

Are parts for the original mechanism still avaliable?? I cannot now say what the manufacturer is as the RV is now many counties away being restored. TIA john

Dolphins usually have a sticker behind the drivers seat that has vin# and tire size and pressure reccomendations.