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whyverne14

Toyota Advanced Member
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Everything posted by whyverne14

  1. We've been full-timing for a month now in the newer motorhome and the good old 1986 Toyota Dolphin is just sitting at my sister's place. It has a new engine and is PA inspected til May. Everything that is there works. No house AC. We used it on Memorial Day weekend. I give it a run about once a week. It's in the boonies of Northern PA though Bradford Airport is just a few minutes away. We had good times with it but have moved on and I don't have the inclination to muck around with it any more. Next month we're heading down for the eclipse then to Florida and on to the Southwest. I tried to list it in this site's classifieds but my password manager flipped out because the classifieds want you to open another login. Like I said, I'm too lazy/busy to fool around with that kind of stuff. I remember when all we wanted was a Toyota Motorhome. If you're in that same position, we should talk. I'm not much interested in talking to any flippers who just want to make money on it. I can find them on my own. My sister is not interested in Looky Lous on her property. You can fly into Bradford from Pittsburgh for about 60 bucks. I can pick you up there in the motorhome, show you how everything works and send you on your way. If that sounds too sketchy for you, sorry. I flew to New Jersey and did that same thing to pick up my 2014 Forester. If you want it, you go get it. Does not include the tent or solar panel. Does include my home made awning that stood up to some bad storms over Memorial Day weekend when other store bought canopies went down. LOL.
  2. Well I've only had it four years. Give me time. Heehee.
  3. Went to pick up my Dolphin at the shop, all excited. Couldn't wait to try out my brand spankin' new 22re engine. ($2600 total installed BTW) I went to pull away from the curb and heard a big clunk. Then I was in the middle of the street with no steering. The mechanic came out and got a pry bar to force the center link back into the pitman so that I could repark it. Sigh. Well it was the best place for it to happen. The parts probably won't get here til Monday or Tuesday so there is still hope for the Memorial Day weekend trip but I am making alternative plans. How many parts are there to replace? I gotta be up there close to 50%.
  4. Winegard just came out with a new RV system. Connect. It's interesting because it combines wifi and cell. Crazy expensive though.
  5. I'm trying to keep up. Sounds interesting. So could one connect a router to this setup for multiple devices? I'm researching it. A laptop with a virtual router sounds possible. I have to figure out if it would work with my cheap Chromebook. I do need a better laptop for the road.
  6. I've been experimenting with the canned meat line that has recently turned up at Walmart. I don't think it's half bad at all. If you're thinking dog food, no, they have a good texture. The brand is Keystone, 28 oz. Ground beef, beef, pork, turkey and chicken. Of course the more stuff you add the better it gets. I've heated the beef up with canned carrots and potatoes and it's instant pot roast. I mixed the pork with BBQ sauce, pretty good. Even tried Hawaiian Kalua pork with rice. I'm going to try making chili with the ground beef today. I really don't like messing with raw meat while camping and I'm quite pleased with this alternative.
  7. I tell people we got this new thing called the internet, you can look at Craigslist in Florida and see that RVs are NOT cheaper there. Another one I hear is, don't buy a MH from the Rust Belt. I live in the Rust Belt, we know about rust; and most of us are smart enough not to drive our motorhomes around in the salty snow.
  8. Well even the used ones. I don't see anything under $35K that probably won't need work soon. Unless you find that one old guy everybody is always talking about. You know the guy who's going to sell it to you for half price cause you're there and you have the cash. Yeah get me a unicorn while you're there. People tell me "Go to Florida, RVs are cheap there". Right, I go on Florida Craigslist and guess what? They ain't cheap down there. Yeah, I'm sure there's a super deal somewhere and if I find it, I'll jump on it. But that's not a plan. My plan is to continue working on the old Toy.
  9. "Can I change my mind?" I may be slipping back. Holey Moley, motorhomes are expensive! Not that I think that $50000 for a brand new E450 with a tiny house on it is unreasonable, that seems fair to me. It's just that someone is putting a brandy new engine in my Toyota Dolphin for $2500. Cripes I could do that every year for 20 years for that kind of money. I think what I need to do is to find someone to do the wood and tin work. I don't want to do it myself, I'm supposed to be retired. Now I'm leaning towards full timing this summer in the old beast, heading down south for the eclipse and then deciding what I'm going to do when I grow up. "I would like to start all over again."
  10. How badly? Mine did that last year. Cruisin' along, come to a hill; 10 mph. It was the TPS. Throttle position sensor. It's in the throttle body. I replaced it, not hard but fiddly. Look it up.
  11. Thanks everybody. If nobody wants it, I might just keep it on my sister's large property just for fits and giggles.
  12. Well I miss you guys but I think it's time to move on. I love my little Toy but I think It's time to get something that needs less work. I love it so much that I'm having someone put a new engine in it before I put it up for sale. I don't want it to go to the boneyard. So if anybody is interested; 1986 Dolphin, rear dinette, less than 80000 miles. (I guess that 22re isn't really bulletproof, someone before me really messed it up.) Not rusted out, coach A/C long gone. Fridge long gone but I bought a new Dometic 12v portable real compressor fridge for it. Works fine. Generator long gone, I was happy using a portable solar panel. New TPS, exhaust, fuel pump, alternator, shocks, lay down propane tank, LED rear brake lights and many other new parts. Tires are good. Fairly new Yoko Ds on the rear. Air bags long gone. Ladder long gone, I have a telescoping one that's cool but kind of heavy. Stove, oven, furnace, water heater, pump, lights, sinks, shower all work. My next projects were going to be; new escape hatch cover, new rear vent (there's a Maxx air cover on it, I just leave it open), bathroom vent is newer with fan. The main project is the wood is rotten around the bottom especially around the rear wheel wells. Rear side window is loose and needs taken out and reattached. Not hard but probably tedious. Ah I'm just getting too old. Any other rot I don't know about. I've spread a lot of sealer on the roof. Unit is inside for the winter. My son goes about 250 and he sleeps in the overhead and it hasn't collapsed yet. Can't be too bad. So I plan on having it running, inspected and ready to use. Work on it when your not using it, like I did. Don't gut it. Do a little piece at a time, so you can keep using it. Hopefully someone will get it done someday. The next generation.
  13. Yeah, I live in PA and I shift that automatic almost as much as I would a stick. You get good at it after a while. As soon as it drops to 45 mph I'm already into second, at about 28 I'm into first. I don't wait for automatic. Tranny fluid is still pink, engine temp does not rise.
  14. The stack jacks often wouldn't fit under the front frame of my Dolphin when I wasn't on tarmac. I use two tire jacks in the front. The one from Toyota and one I filched from my junk Chevy van. I think they are easier then the stack jacks. And it doesn't hurt to have two tire jacks.
  15. Not to be a wise guy, well maybe; but are you sure you have a problem? You smell gas after filling up. No other time?. The hose appears to have a fold in it. Does the gas go in? Eh, I'm just bitter cause mine isn't even running right now. Still working on that TPS thing.
  16. "RVs aren't for using, they're for fixing". That's a quote from this series. http://rvdailyreport.com/opinion/opinion-the-rv-industry-death-spiral-part-1/ So at least we didn't spend a 100,000 bucks and still have to keep fixing things. Many of the new ones are junk right out of the factories. We knew what we were getting.
  17. We took a trip up to Geneva on the Lake, Ohio last weekend. About 300 miles round. Very nice. I kept wanting to say, "Man, this Dolphin is running good" but I bit my tongue, thinking "We're not home yet". A half an hour or so out, it started acting up. Did not want to go up hills at all. I'm on the shoulder, 10 mph, with the blinkers on, trying to think which way home has the least hills. And we finally made it. I really thought the tranny was going, but in the bright light of the next morning I thought about it and read about it and decided that it had to be the TPS (Throttle Position Sensor). I pulled off the throttle body and following the instructions on the internet, I did the ohm test procedure. Now I'm not much of a mechanic. The TPS passed three out of the four ohm tests, but I didn't have faith that I was doing it correctly. So I packed up the throttle body and took it to work and when I passed the Toyota dealer I stopped in and asked if they could test the TPS for me. They called me later and said "Well it passed three out of the four tests, we think it's shot". Oh me of little faith. So I could have got it a little cheaper at work but I told him to go ahead and order it, hey they did the test. I asked if they could put it on and do the ohm meter adjustments and he said no, they want the whole truck there. In other words "We could but we won't", but at least now I have the confidence that I can do it myself. And so it goes.
  18. No, home-made. Just a good silverized tarp with three 2 1/2" wood screw hooks and some poles that I had from the bad old tent camping days. May I never see those days again.
  19. Just 3 hooks driven in the top corresponding to the tarp grommets. Leave some slack, the sun will shrink the tarp a bit. The poles are from one of those 10 buck canopies that I had laying around. I stand on my bag of leveling blocks to hook it on, if you're short that could be a problem. I'm tall. Had the first field test last weekend. The wind does tend to kick it off a hook once in a while. I'm going to try those zip ties that you can release next time if it's windy.
  20. Jacks, spare tire, first aid kit, tools; all that stuff I never use. I think I'm getting more fanatical, last trip two of the three drawers by the sink were empty. Caffeine pills, 10 cents apiece and I split them in half.
  21. Finally made my "Mountain William" awning. It's not "Hill Billy" cause I didn't use a blue tarp. I bought a nice one. I won't use it all the time. I usually just follow the shade around the Dolphin. Should be nice when it's really hot or if there's a bit of rain about.
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