TomV48

Thank you for the points on what sounds to listen for. And oh, I'm not afraid of using the accelerator, I just baby all of my mechanical toys. Nearly 285000 miles on a 2004 Ford explorer chassis by not pushing it too hard.

My ear is not so good. What should I be hearing with a bad manifold? On oil change the tech recently said that he heard a small manifold leak. I hear nothing new. I stand by the engine as ground guide when DW moves us on and off a site but of course do not hear much from up front driving. I try to stay out of my foot in the CARB, so to speak, and seldom hit max boost but noticed that I did hit 32 on the boost momentary one time last week, when I called for it. (is it psi? I thought it was column inches of manifold pressure? What do I know)

Our wet bay has a plunger switch too but it seems to have been disabled. The wet bay is the one bay light that I have not been able to fix. It and the cargo passthrough have some like old school cheap single bulb ceiling or wall lights with a slide switch on the light. So passenger's switch on and slide switch has to be on. But a couple spots have hi intensity four or five led strips an inch or two long with a firm press button switch. With a 2005 Ambassador, I am guessing the LEDs were. Not original.

Our two steps have some surprisingly NOT inexpensive shoulder bolts in the scissor like linkage. They are a little loose, but I bet with a bunch of heavy use they would get sloppy. Ours operated badly. Drive motor was stripping it's internal gear reduction. Stair runs off a large crescent shaped gear driven by what is surprisingly identical to a 90s vintage Ford pickup truck window motor. $35 Auto Part store. The gear was worn and rather than risk stripping it out, a new one came from E trailer quickly. With the geometry of ours when the gears disengage it could or would slide the step back and forth, bite your ankle, and toss you on your butt.

Me too. Mine make me crazy and half don't seem to work any which way.

Oh I have them and use a ton, but I needed to feel the edge of that gasket. Hey many years back I changed a lot of diapers without gloves and lived

I had a search over here, but found an Allison service center because at 65000 mi I found no record of it being serviced. Lots of shops said "sure we can do a fluid service on it". But I had a higher degree of confidence with an Allison service center. They seem to have had computer/machine that tested all of the functions. Also watch the way some shops quote you. A local shop that I will never go to again except in desperation quoted me the same price for a fluid service that I pay at my regular shop but they had an earlier available appointment. Well they're quote apparently didn't include oil or the oil filter the water separator and the fuel filter. So they were happy to tag me for over $200 more for the oil and the filters. Really p'd me that they would quote full fluid service and not mention that it was only a labor quote.

I just had that problem yesterday. Turned off the water, opened the valve and stuck my hand in with tp. Ran my fingers around the gasket and not sure if I rubbed a little Guber off or straightened a turned edge. After, it held water so I did something right. Lots of soap and hand sanitizer on the hand after.

Wonder if that might be available in any good auto parts store? On one outing I had to strap a cable across the salesman solenoid until I could replace it. Wonder if that would be an option for your bad relay.

I was pleased with my improvement. Although not as much as I hoped, the bigger reason I wanted it is for stability in an emergency, primarily a blown front tire. But yes. In proportion, the watts was probably a more notable change. I would do both if starting over. I got rear Cross stabilizer and front watts. Thinking one more watts on rear and cross bars on the front. Gotta get the Sheppard M100 replaced first.

Right where my RV was designed for four golf cart batteries I was able to build three 200 amp lithium batteries and squeeze them into three group 24 size battery boxes and put those in the place of the golf cart batteries. Gives me handles but the lids wouldn't fit so. Never figured out a proper lid for the boxes nor did I ever figure out how to make the spaghetti wiring look any better but it's a work in progress and most importantly it works well

I put mine in the battery compartment but handled the explosive gas issue by using agms for the engine batteries. Was able to put three Red Top Optimas in place of the two gr 31s that were there.

First time I changed oil in ours, the seal/gasket/Oring on the new onan brand filter heald long enough to pass a five minute test, but dumped oil a week later tem minutes in to use. I had another filter which had the same failure, gasket would not hold it's position in place on the filter while being held horizontal up to installed. I hope your problem is that easy. But hope you don't have to clean up oil on the Elks parking lot.

Hi again Tom Cherry, If I can't get Mike Hughes to swap my steering box in his shop, do we have any good recommendations on here for a reliable shop to do it for me. I'm in SoCal. Haven't spoken to anyone near here who makes me feel good about it and that I can cost justify. I have been looking at a couple options around Coberg, OR. Your wealth of knowledge is invaluable. Thanks. Tom Pratt

Take a look at MonacoWatts.com. I had a terrifying first trip like the white knuckle drive you spoke of. Not sure I had even put my "big blue" SafeTPlus on yet. It was just our first step. A watts link on the front all but eliminated the roll feeling. And the rear cross braces between the back trailing arms and no more tail wag. If you are lucky you will have a trw steering gear and you can adjust some of the slop out of that. Sadly we have a Shepard M-100 with a ton of slop and no adjusting screw. But hey. If this is your first DP like ours was for me, you've got world's to learn. BTW although we have spent some money but 22,000 miles so far we are in love with ours. After the exhaust manifold leak, if we have any money left, I am ogling those big fat Gold Koni shocks and dreaming about swopping out the M100 steering gear for a TRW. $$$$

I took mine apart and RE-FORMED IT USING a two part epoxy. Mine was broken internally.

Thanks. That was what I am contemplating. Worried that if the penetrant burns I could be making a fire hazard or a big mess. Have to take it about 20 highway miles to the shop.

Been reading more. Looks like it was a $1500-$2000 job five or eight years ago and as we all know cost of everything has been skyrocketing 30 to 50% At current shop rates (nah, at 75 I'm not going to begin a career as a diesel mechanic) between cost to "mill" plus the safety/risk of going new, it seems legit that they quote a new manifold. It's a big well equipped shop with typically half dozen engines opened up and out on blocks so I'm guessing if a replacement can't be gotten, they can mill or at least "dress" the surface. They leave open that a new gasket may be all needed , but said they don't want me to count on it. But new parts are probably a safer bet for their warranty for their work. Read good suggestions re: removing the bed stuff and maybe application of penetrant on bolts. Got to think how that would work and still get it to the shop. Plus now im gonna be opening it up from the top to re-access degree of leak. Thanks for the feedback

I will take that to mean maybe we call BS on cant be milled

We have developed an exhaust gasket leak in our 82000 mile, 2005 8.3 Cummins. I use a pretty large well respected independent shop. They informed me that there is a very slim chance that a gasket alone will solve the problem. They also say that milling the header is pretty much not possible. Anybody got a thought as to the likely credibility of those two remarks?

Well I use a jumper that I put on there every week or so for a couple days. Because my system is set up to charge LiFePo batteries, I made a jumper wire with a circuit breaker and a big high amperage diode, which see to knock voltage down a half volt or so for the SLA chassis batteries. Others install a "Bird" which allows bidirectional charging. He shows how.

WOW. First I have to say this is one problem we do not have in SO CALIF. But "14.5 volts on the chassis batteries and 11.9-12.4 volts on the house batteries" That scares me. 14.5 on the Chassis battery seems awful high. for me House stay up from Shore power or my solar, but the Chassis batteries often need my help if the engine has not been run for a while so I have various ways to charge them if they are below 12.2 or 12.4 when I come out, before I start the coach. If you can get on shore power then warm that block with the engine heater, my 2005 and my buddy's 2003 both have that plug hanging in the engine next to an outlet as described above. Mine is only powered from shore or generator. Good luck. I will look forward to hearing how this comes out

OK Tom Cherry You have me back to reading and studying the situation when day light comes Saturday morning Thank you Sir for your continuous attention to my education. God knows I need all the help I can get

Let me clear the air one more try. The 6ga wire is from Chassis bank to 40 amp DC to DC charger. then from the 40 am DC-Dc over to the house battery. Not a jumper cable. it is just a feed to the limited draw (maxes out at 50 amps) of the DC to DC charger. A 6ga jumper to charge my house bank off the Chassis bank would be smoking in minutes and a deadly fire risk. It is just the wiring to install the "Renogy Appliance"---which happens to be a 40 amp charger using max 50 amps from the alternator. In other words that wire pulls about 650 watts at peak. A short run of 6 GA wire can handle well over 1200 watts of 12vdc continuously. And TOM CHERRY with your comment about the charging relay, you have me going back to the book and my rig,(and the schematic to relearn what by your statement may be my very bad understanding) but pretty sure in the day of all batteries being similar lead acid chemistry my 4 house golf cart battery system was designed to charge full time through a TROMBETTA 200 amp continuous duty relay. (see already I was wrong, the BIG BOY which intellitec rates for 200 amps continuous is a latching relay that requires reversing polarity to open and close it. The Trombetta which I have is non latching) My Trombetta is clearly fed by the Boost Button, but that just overrides the Ignition Relay Delay and pushes the relay closed using the same 12 ignition on, wire that is fed by the IRD. By design the IRD feeds full time power to that relay which is the only charging link I find in the original coach wiring to begin charging the house batteries after the Chassis battery has 15 minutes to catch up from starting. I think the golf Tee situation sets up a different situation, where starting and running 100% through the Charging Relay when the chassis batteries are dead rather than just an added boost for ordinary starting when the Engine battery is low. My coach calls for two chassis batteries with minimum combined 1500 cold cranking amps. The 200 amp continuous rating surely cannot take too much of that full starter amperage. But the ordinary charging of two golf cart batteries is not likely to pull that massive a draw from my 160 amp alternator and surely is within the 200 amp continuous duty cycle rating of the Trombetta 200 amp relay (or the Big Boy which some coaches evidently have but mine evidently does not). Both are rated for 200 amps with a 100% duty cycle.

Funny you say that. When I had one leaking I went to my Tire shop BIG EXCLUSIVE TRUCK PLACE and they say they do not carry them. After failing at a dozen local stores I found them only one place. Camping World ON LINE. Had them in about three days