repairs

Broken Service door

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On one of our hops across the country while hooking up our fresh water, the door fell off in my hand. The problem turned out to be a broken retracting plastic pin on one side of the door hinge. The door attaches to the utility cabinet with one fixed pin and one spring retracting pin. Both pins are plastic, the retractable one is the one that broke. When it broke, the spring and remaining bits of pin disappeared into the gravel, never to be seen again. I made a few inquiries as to how to get a new one but …

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Sanitizing Our Fresh Water System

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How long has it been since you sanitized your fresh water system in your RV? Did you know your fresh water system needs to be sanitized on a regular basis? Even with a good filter, algae, debris, and bacteria can build up in the fresh water tank and plumbing.

The sanitation process can take several hours, and will require access to a fresh water supply.

We have a Keystone Laredo travel trailer with a 43 gallon fresh water tank, and our water cabinet includes the fresh water fill inlet, fresh water tank vent to prevent overfilling, valve for switching between onboard water and city water, black water flush inlet, outside shower port, and the cable TV connections.

View of the fresh water fill cabinet on our Keystone Laredo travel trailer

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Making Gray Tank Valves Easier to Reach

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Waste water tanks are not high on the list of fun things to do while RVing. We have two gray tanks, and the way the manufacturer installed our kitchen gray tank’s dump valve does not make the process any more fun. Basically, they were installed “backwards.” In order to open the gate valve you have to climb under the edge of the slide floor and electrical cables, and the valve must pulled away from you in order to open it.

View of the kitchen waste water tank dump valve with the handle facing away from the viewer
This is the easiest angle to approach the gray tank. Why is the handle on the opposite side?

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Our Furnace Wouldn’t Light!

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I know it’s August and we haven’t had to think about our furnace in months, but winter is just around the corner. It was time to do some maintenance. Much like moving into a sticks-and-bricks home, there is always something to work on. Last winter we were having periodic issues with our furnace not lighting, especially on the coldest nights. I checked the air intake and exhaust ports to make sure there were no blockages, since bees and wasps like to make their homes there from time to time. The other appliances that use propane fuel (stove, hot water heater, …

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We finally hit the road! Does That Mean Major Truck Repairs or Just a New Battery?

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Those of you who’ve followed our Instagram might’ve seen that we’ve officially left Arizona (for now) and are on the road. We have a schedule to keep to get to our Florida destination on time (more about that in a future post!), but not such a tight schedule that we can’t stay 2-3 nights in each spot, and we’ve limited our travel to 200 miles per day. So here is what happened when we landed in El Paso: The truck wouldn’t start! At least it waited until we were settled into an RV park, rather than the middle of nowhere. …

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Our Grey Water Mystery Leak

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Shortly after we moved in, we started noticing water on the ground under the dump valve for the black tank and one of the gray tanks. Thankfully, the water appeared to be either fresh water or gray water! But it was a concern and needed fixing. Our unit has an all-weather sealed underbelly, so the water leaking could have been coming from any number of places and traveling along the underbelly to the drain valve area. We were really concerned, because water can do a lot of damage when the leaks are not addressed quickly. During the course of troubleshooting, …

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