dennis.mcdonaugh

Some coaches charge the chassis batteries on shore power. My 2000 Dynasty does.

I believe anything short of installing a residential fridge is just delaying the inevitable and adds to the cost. Just do a web search and you’ll see myriad problems with all the alternatives to extend the life of the Norcold.

I attached 1” foam board to the back of that vent cover when I installed our residential fridge. It’s a Frigidaire and works from 20 to 110 degrees according to the manual.

Two years ago we were without power for 3 days during a snow storm with temps near zero. We ran the generator and heater three straight days. We have a small propane tank so we kept the thermostat set in 60 and used an electric space heater to keep it warm. I don’t think the space heater could have warmed the coach by itself. The fuel gauge barely moved, but we used a quarter of a tank of propane.

I replaced my slide topper and couldn’t find one that covered the rolled up topper when the slide is retracted.

My Dynasty has both dipstick and keypad oil check. The dipstick is way below the obviously home made mark when the keypad reads full.

Mine got taken out by a hailstorm last year. It was a double pane with an outer hard plastic cover with a softer inner liner. They were glued together. Luckily only the outer was cracked. I just ordered two skylights, one 2” lower than the other and doubled them up. I used one size larger stainless steel screws and sealed it up. It’s been good so far.

Do all four air bags deflate? There are check valves throughout the system that should stop that from happening. The answer will help focus the search. I currently have a small leak which causes the curb side rear bag to deflate. I’ve chased the leak and it’s the RR ride height valve, I just haven’t been motivated to change it out because it’s such a slow leak.

We rarely boondock, but have spent 3-4 days without hookups occasionally. The Frigidaire draws very little on the batteries if you don’t continuously open and close it. We replaced the original modified sine wave inverter with a Magnum pure sine wave unit which helps.

There’s a 7” wide broom closet on the right too.

Its a little shorter so I made a vent for the top to aid efficiency. We just use a piece of velcro to hold the door closed when moving.

This is what I did. The fridge is only 10 CF, but it actually has the same storage space as the 12 CF Norcold. It’s very efficient and will work down to below freezing and we’ll over 100 degrees.

Our 2000 Dynasty charges both battery banks when plugged into shore power. Some models do and some don’t.

I did the roof on our Dynasty three years ago and it looks still looks great. I lightly sanded the roof, removed and replaced any deteriorating Dicor, and cleaned the roof before painting.

That’s great to know

My 2000 dynasty has metal coolant lines through the basement. There are short hoses at either end that connect to the engine and heater core. hydraulic hoses could be levelers or power steering. I’ve seen a few drops on mine for 7 years and have just wiped it off. I’ve heard that it’s probably a leak where the fitting is attached to the hose which then migrated down the hose. im going to start addressing mine soon. It’s going to be expensive.

There was some pressure in my system, but not much. We were camping when I noticed hydraulic fluid on top of a plastic bin in the storage compartment under the rear ram. I figured something was amiss and sure enough, when we retracted the slide, the front ram and rear ram did not move at the same rate and the slide started to come in cockeyed. I managed to get it in straight by pushing on the outside rear while retracting. By the time I got to work on it, the system had lost a lot of fluid so there was very little pressure left. Here's a link to the iRV2 thread. Lots of good info relating to the hydraulic slide here. https://www.irv2.com/forums/f115/2000-monaco-dynasty-slide-room-cylinder-rebuild-and-hose-replacement-547651.html

I rebuilt all three slide cylinders and replaced all the hoses in my 2000 dynasty. I documented the process in detail in a thread in the Monaco section of iRV2.

I've replaced a damaged air bags seven years ago -- I bought two then and they were $150 each. Now, I'm thinking of replacing the others, but the price seems to have gone up to $250 each for the firestones. Has anyone used one of the purported replacements? https://vigorairride.com/products/copy-of-air-suspension-spring-bag-w01-358-9781-for-goodyear-1r12-603 https://www.anythingtruck.com/product/280-9978.html https://truckairspringsonline.com/W013589978/ https://www.amazon.com/Torque-Replaces-Firestone-W01-358-9978-Hendrickson/dp/B07GNT2WYY And then there's this from Canada https://ontariosurplus.ca/products/genuine-firestone-w01-358-9978-air-spring

Mine has done that twice in eight years. I took that connector apart, but it looked pristine inside. I hadn’t driven recently either time and it hadn’t rained. The first time I still had the original trace inverter, the second time was after replacing the trace with a magnum so the AGS systems were different.

I removed what I thought was a perfectly fine Norcold about 5 years ago. It had all the recalls done so we thought it was safe, but Katherine got spooked by all the fires that had/were happening. I was surprised by the burnt spot on the back of the fridge. It was only a matter of time before it went up in flames like many others.

I don't know, my coach had one documented wheel bearing service at about 70,00 miles and 8 years. I bought it with 130K at 16 years and had them serviced and have been doing it every three years since.

Unfortunately, I've got that covered too. The first time I changed the differential fluid, a large tooth fell out of with the oil. I'd lost a tooth on the ring gear and had to have the differential rebuilt. I've been pretty anal about servicing that every since.

Tom, I've kept up with the service even though we haven't been driving it. The coach has had Peak Final Charge in it for at least 12 years and I changed it the second time about 3 or so years ago so the antifreeze is good. I change the oil in the Cummins and Onan every year and replace fuel filters even though it hasn't been driven much. Five of the tires are less than 7 years old, that's why I'm going to look at changing them in the not so distant future. The left front is only 3 years old because it was damaged and replaced. I replaced all the slide hydraulic hoses and had the three rams rebuilt in 2020 along with the generator slide so the fluid in that system is good. The levelers worry me because I replaced the other hoses because they began to leak and the leveler hoses are the same vintage. Seven of the eight air bags are original and worry me a little so I'll end up changing them soon too. I do need to have the wheel bearings service too, thanks for that reminder. I just did the second transmission oil change with Transynd about three years ago, so its due for a filter change again too.

We have been traveling outside the US for the last couple of years and haven't gone out in the Dynasty since November of 2021. I've driven it a couple times to get inspected so I could renew the registration, but the last time was last March. I was surprised how easily it started, once I replaced the 8-year old chassis battery. I was able to get it started using the boost function, but the battery was definitely toast. Now it turns over great. The ScangaugeD didn't come on, but disconnecting and reconnecting the plug got it up and running. The GPS took forever to connect to the satellite, but it eventually connected and started working. I was really worried that I'd have a lot of niggling problems after sitting that long, but so far so good. We're going to try to get out more this year if only to exercise the coach. I need to start contemplating some long term maintenance issues. New tires and maybe replacing the other 7 air bags -- I replaced a damaged one 6 years ago. I'm also thinking I need to replace the leveler hydraulic lines too. It might be a busy year.