New changes for us

 Well we sold the popup Coleman camp trailer, so we are down to just our fifth wheel. Up coming posts will be more mods to our pickup I will post that this week also up coming will be a Clear Source Ultra water filter install, a 40 am DC to DC charger install and more. I am also going to start putting campground videos up on our youtube channel and I will link to them here.

Upgrades to the tow vehicle

 We have made some upgrades to our 1999 Dodge Ram 2500 pickup for this towing season.

The first and most important was having a Pacbrake PXRB exhaust brake installed and even though I have not towed with it yet I love it already, I should have done it sooner.

This brake works awesome at slowing you down with out touching your brakes, this year I am not worried about smoking the brakes coming down off the mountain. And as a added benefit you gain a on board air compressor for airing up tires.

Next I added a boost elbow which is supposed to allow us to go past the stock 20 lbs of turbo boost to 30 lbs of boost, which means more towing power.

Next I replaced the stock air intake with a S&B cold air intake that provides 33% more air flow.

This was a pretty easy install but was a tight fit with the Pacbrake air compressor and I know there will be times in the future like oil change time when I am cussing it for being so big. But if it helps with fuel mileage, lower EGT's and better performance it is a good trade off.

And the last mod for now was also for the air intake system to help it breath better I replaced the stock air intake elbow or air horn with one from Sinister Diesel which is supposed to allow a smoother flow of air into the intake manifold over stock.

And it is prettier than the stock air horn so it must be better right ? HaHa.

More modes in the very near future will be a big line kit to improve fuel flow from the stock fuel filter to the injection pump and new boost and egt gauges to replace our old ones.

Spring time battery maintenance day

 Well it was battery maintenance day after a winter with our Boondocker charger keeping them charged and from freezing. So what is battery maintenance for me ? First I take a reading of each batteries voltage then I take a reading of each cell to see if that battery alone needs a charge.

 

As you can see this cell was between 13.00 and 12.75 a good reading but on this battery the three cells were 13.00, 12.75 & 12.75 so I gave it a little charging at 30 amps to help even it out after topping off the cells with distilled water.

             I then gave the whole bank a little charge time at 30 amps with the charger but since this charger wont bring the batteries back above the 14 volt mark I finished the charge with two portable 100 watt solar panels.

In the end we started at 13.2 volts and am ending with 14.6 volts.

Added a inside on/off switch for our inverter.

 I added a switch inside the trailer to turn our inverter on and off with out opening the laundry chute hatch to get access to the inverter.

Two new projects combined into one and done.

 Today I installed the Mopeka LP tank gauge sensors to check the level of my propane tanks and combined that with trying to stop access to the area around my tanks for wasps that have shown interest.

I used metal window screening and hardware cloth both that would have been thrown away otherwise.

Then I used a top from a old dell computer to make a base to help keep mud off the Mopeka sensors.

Next I installed labeled the tank and installed the feet and sensors.

And finally I installed the app on my phone for the sensors this will be for when I add extra tanks and one for the BBQ at home. I also installed the monitor inside so I could check them without my phone.

Electric skillet running off batteries in camper

 We have our new 1500 watt inverter installed and have tried running our 1500 watt skillet off it.

Our power voltage before the test 13.1 volts

How full was the battery bank before the test 100%

How much power did it pull A LOT up to 124 amps

The Xantrex Xpower 1500 inverter  is now working correctly we had to bypass or breaker that was to small we will need to upgrade it to 120 - 150 amps. The power drain with a 1500 watt appliance is huge so we will only be able to use them on sunny days for know with at least 4 100 watt panels putting out full charge. We will most likely wait till we have 5 panel on the roof and 4 portables that would be easier on the batteries, this is just a project out of the way before we go fulltime.

New power inverter installed a Xantrex XPower 1500 watt

 Here is my battery system with a new inverter installed.

And a video of the install.

Camper inverter replacement