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Author |
Date Posted |
Forum
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RE: Dinghy charging from MH
Another option could be swapping your CRV taillights to LED. Then you wouldn't have to worry about them draining the battery.
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camperdave
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02/01/23 04:21pm |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: Towing a Honda CRV one time - NC to Maine
Sucks that they don't have surge brakes anymore. I rented dolly's from uhaul a few times over the last couple of years, and it was about 50/50 if they would have brakes or not, I assumed if you called and wanted one specifically with brakes they could do it. Guess not anymore huh?
The last one I rented (last summer) was sweet, had a nice foolproof Demco EZ latch coupler and surge brakes. It looked brand new.
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camperdave
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01/31/23 11:59am |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: Toad Battery Charger
FWIW, the RVI toad charger is nothing special, imo. You are basically paying for the ability to monitor your toad battery from the proprietary RVI hub and tablet.
It seems to actually have more of a voltage drop than a simple fuse/diode would.
I use the RVI because it came with the brake system I bought used. I certainly wouldn't pay $120 (I don't actually know how much it is, since they don't show a price until you log, which is a bit sus).
I agree with Willald, put a voltmeter on the TOAD battery with and without the motorhome running. What's it read? Any chance you just need to replace a fuse in the charge line (should be very close to the TOAD battery itself)?
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camperdave
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01/31/23 11:28am |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: Dinghy charging from MH
I have a charge line in my toad. In my case I do need a diode in the line. This is because I have my motorhome backup camera powered by the trailer charge line (it's an on with ignition source, right were I wanted it, made sense at the time).
If I simply used a charge line with a fuse, then the backup camera would be powered by the TOAD battery anytime the ignition of the motorhome was off. A diode prevents this.
Fwiw, you can buy a simple charge line with a fuse and diode for $25 on etrailer. (I instead used an RVI Toad Battery Charger, but that's another story and not something I would recommend or do again).
Most folks use a 7pin to 6pin cable to connect between the motorhome and the toad, so power is already there. In your case, since you're using only the 4 pin connector, you'll need to figure out how to get power from your motorhome over to the toad.
My motorhome already had power at the 7 pin, and I use a 7-6 pin cable to the toad with a standard 6pin round connector on the front of the toad, so power was already right there. All I had to do was wire from the new 6pin connector up to the toad battery.
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camperdave
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01/31/23 11:16am |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: I need a toad.
For the first 5 years we owned our motorhome, we did a combination of renting at our destination, uber, and u-haul dollies. All worked and had their uses. The u-haul route worked well for us on longer trips to a single destination, cause we'd do two one way trips dropping off and picking up the dolly close to our destination so we didn't have to store it at camp.
Ultimately this year we set up our Ford Fusion Energi to flat tow. It's fine, but something we already own and use as a daily driver. If I were to pick something specifically for flat towing, it would sit higher off the ground, and be a simpler/lighter vehicle. CRV or Wrangler probably.
It cost me around $1500 to set up our car to flat tow (and that was buying most stuff used). That's a lot of renting/ubering. But it's also SO convenient having the car with us and being able to hook up/disconnect in a few minutes.
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camperdave
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11/21/22 08:50am |
Class C Motorhomes
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RE: Dealers lots are filling up
I went to college. Mechanical Engineering. I worked in that field for about 10 years, then I didn't. My job now (that I've had for the last 7 years and will probably stay in till I retire in 10 years) requires no college education. You never know where life will take you. That said, I learned so much more in college than Engineering. It was my first exposure to a world outside my bubble, and literally changed my life.
Both of my girls are in college right now. Neither knows what they want to do, but that's not important imo. They will graduate mostly debt free, cause I'm paying for it lol.
I'm no fan of inflation or the impending recession. We'll be more or less fine cause we've got a lot of financial backups in place. If the housing market truly crashes, I'll try to buy another rental home or two. Real estate (buy, hold, and rent, not flip) has by FAR been our best move in the last 20 years, and the main reason I will most likely be able to retire someday.
I'm sure not counting on my 401k, social security, or my non-existent pension!
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camperdave
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11/18/22 04:03pm |
Tow Vehicles
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RE: dingy induced sway
I have a similar setup towing a 2019 Ford Fusion Energi with a Ford E450 Class C motorhome. I am amazed that you need a 10" drop hitch. The rear of your motorhome must sit rather high. My Roadmaster tow bar goes directly into the hitch receiver on the rear of my motorhome and the tow bar is within 2" of being perfectly level. Bottom line - - I have experienced none of the issues that you seem to be dealing with and I've towed my Fusion Energi over 12,000 miles with this setup. Sorry to not be of more help.
Interesting, as our motorhomes are about the same size. A 10" drop brings the tow bar almost completely level. It may be slightly apples to oranges as I have a car mounted bar that goes on a trailer hitch ball, as opposed to the more common motorhome mounted bar that goes directly into the receiver. Not sure how much of a height difference that would be, if any. Same baseplate, so I'd think the height of the tow bar itself is probably the same.
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camperdave
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11/15/22 04:25pm |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: Tire chains in Califdrnia
So even though I have 4wd I might need chains
If you are towing, yes. If you can disconnect and drive them separately, then no. But you still legally need to carry the chains with you even though you won't need to install them.
In my experience, the major roads in Ca go from R2 (2wd with chains, or 4WD with snow tires) direct to closed. I don't think I've ever seen an R3 (everything needs chains) situation.
But I'm a very occasional snow goer, I live on the coast.
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camperdave
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11/15/22 04:19pm |
Roads and Routes
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RE: Dealers lots are filling up
I've become a fan of leasing for my wife. She has a fancy pants type job, needs a reliable car, wants something nice and new, and I don't like working on new cars. So a lease works well for her. Except this time when we had to buy out at the end, cause it's too good to pass up. She'll keep driving it for a while, when things revert back, we'll grab a new lease for her. Leaves me in a bit of a pickle with this car though. Once my wife replaces it with a new lease sometime in a year or two, I don't really want to drive it as my daily. But we just set it up to be a toad so we've got to keep it for a long while. I'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
In the meantime my daily driver 2000 frontier (with 2wd, roll up windows, and an awesome hvac system!) does me great. And the 1998 van is always at the ready to pull the boat. As an extra vehicle it's only got 200k rust free miles and should last another 10 years at least.
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camperdave
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11/15/22 09:22am |
Tow Vehicles
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RE: Dealers lots are filling up
Guess we'll see huh? I'm not in the market for a truck, but if I was I'd wait.
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camperdave
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11/11/22 04:45pm |
Tow Vehicles
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RE: Dealers lots are filling up
I was at the local Ford dealer this morning (buying out our lease that we took in 2019, no way possible to turn that down right now).
I was surprised how many new trucks were on the lot. I was equally surprised to see they all still have huge dealer markups. Dealers (at least this one) have not gotten the memo.
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camperdave
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11/11/22 03:02pm |
Tow Vehicles
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RE: Can I charge the house battery with the engine alternator?
sounds like the wiring is already there, add a battery isolator at the engine side of that battery cable coming from the house and wire it up to the starter battery.
Yes a DCDC would charge quicker, but a simple isolator is like $50 vs $150+ for a DCDC. And since your RV is older, it probably won't have a smart alternator so it will charge quicker than the newer RV's do.
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camperdave
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11/11/22 08:11am |
Class C Motorhomes
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RE: Truck wants $$$
I hate intermittent electrical gremlins. Were it me, I'd probably buy a set of manual front seats from ebay and call it good.
My 1998 Ford Van is totally rust free and runs great as well (but many less miles at only ~200k). I'll keep on fixing little stuff because no way can I afford a new truck these days. The difference in registration and insurance fees alone for a new truck probably makes up the cost of repairs to keep an old truck on the road lol.
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camperdave
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11/10/22 09:25am |
Tow Vehicles
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RE: Anyone interested in 83 Pace Arrow Tear down and Rebuild?
I still check it out every once in a while, and look forward to updates on the motorhome. Timelines are for people who have bosses.
keep on keeping on!
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camperdave
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11/10/22 09:09am |
Class A Motorhomes
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RE: dingy induced sway
good pictures, you put a lot of effort into that setup! While I do have a locking anti-rattler on the drop bar, there is some looseness in the towbar I'll take a closer look at. In my case it's an old Stowmaster (car mounted, uses 2" ball on motorhome) that I bought used. It was last on a 1995 Saturn, so it's probably about that old, though it sat most of it's life in the previous owners shed after they sold the RV in the early 00's (at least that was the story I got).
It's in good shape with no rust, but there is some room for improvement on the sliding bar as well as the crossbar clips like you've done.
I see I can buy a full rebuild for the bar for under $50 on etrailer, I may do that this winter too just for kicks, although the sliding arms are not where the slop is.
Overall, in retrospect this is not the ideal car for a toad, as it's quite heavy at ~4000# and sits really low. I dragged the bottom of the tow ball a lot with the required 10" drop. But it's the car we own, it's low miles and paid for (and an awesome commuter in daily life).
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camperdave
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11/09/22 10:24am |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: dingy induced sway
Have you tried adding a "de-rattler" at each of the interfaces between hitch and receiver? There is some play at those joints and that can cause stability issues. The de-rattler will eliminate that play.
I do have one of those J-shaped anti rattle pins (it basically clamps the drop hitch to the side of the receiver) on the RV to draw hitch connection. There is a tiny slop in the baseplate arms and crossbar, but not much (and nothing I could do about it anyway).
The more I read stuff online the more I think I want to add a track bar. Seems like the correct tool for the job here seeing as I've got over 10' of overhang and am towing a car. But that will probably wait till spring. All the trips planned this winter are close to home and we probably won't even bring the car.
Hopefully I'll get the shocks installed soon, I'll do a test tow with new shocks and some extra air in the toad tires to see if there's an improvement.
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camperdave
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11/08/22 12:07pm |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: Stops Catalytic Converter thefts! (inexpensive method)
I had the CC stolen from my motorhome about 2 years ago (I was on the leading edge of the wave!). It was in a local storage lot. In town, well lit, barbed wire, but no cameras. They stole 20+ CC's that night from the yard. Police were uninterested in helping, basically said there's nothing they can do about it.
Personally I did not go through insurance for it, just bought a cat from NAPA and had a local muffler shop zap it on. Under $1000 total, and done in a week.
Anyway, my solution was to move to a different storage yard with better security, and monitored/recorded cameras throughout. He showed me the camera feed of where my motorhome is, if nothing else next time I'll be able to watch the guy do it! lol. It does cost a bit more, but also has an on site dump station which is nice.
My mom was worried about the CC being stolen from her Prius (even though she keeps it in her garage. Watches too much news I think!) so she had a local mechanic install a shield of some type. She's happy and I think it was like $100 or something.
It's definately a problem around here in suburbia. The solution needs to come at the recycler level. Make it simply not financially worth stealing/selling cc's. Till then, meth heads gonna meth.
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camperdave
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11/08/22 08:58am |
Do It Yourself Modifications and Upgrades (DIY)
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RE: dingy induced sway
I didn't do anything with the Fusion tires, they were at 35psi per daily driving normal. Is that a common thing to run higher when toading?
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camperdave
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11/07/22 02:16pm |
Dinghy Towing
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RE: brake buddy use
I know I'm a little late to the discussion, but I have done some research on the Fusion prior to setting ours (2019 Energi) up to flat tow.
First off, are you sure you have the 2.5 and not the 2.7? Because I'm pretty sure you can't flat tow the 2.5l. But if you have the option of the 'stay in neutral' mode, I guess it would be fine. I'd verify what you've got for sure though.
That said, I would suggest running a charge line. You probably don't need it. But, it's a highly electronic car, including the 'stay in neutral' mode (it's just an electronic rotary switch, no actual lever for shifting). I'm a bit concerned what will happen if the battery does die while towing. Since I was already running a 6 pin connector to the toad for lights, adding the power was super easy.
Also, if it's like my 2019 Fusion Energi, the 12v outlet is only active with the ignition, so I had to run a new always on 12v+ source from the engine bay into the drivers compartment for the brake system.
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camperdave
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11/07/22 11:56am |
Dinghy Towing
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dingy induced sway
I recently set up our 2019 Ford Fusion Energi to flat tow.
Setup is as follows:
baseplate: Roadmaster
towbar: Roadmaster Stowmaster 5000 (car mounted)
hitch on motorhome: 10" drop hitch with 2" ball
lights: magnetic lights inside on the package tray
brakes: RVI3 brake set to active, 5psi (basically not doing much)
Motorhome setup:
2004 Ford E450 chassis, 30' Fleetwood Tioga
stock suspension
Michelin Agilis tires at 65psi front, 70psi rear. rides smooooth.
4.5 degrees caster in alignment
The tow bar sits level, and there is minimal slop in the setup.
We did our first trip this weekend (around 700 miles total) with the car 4 down and I experienced some sway. Basically anytime I corrected the wheel, or changed a lane, it would induce a lateral push from the rear that took a certain level of concentration to manage.
Not terrible, but definitely noticeable.
For reference, I have dolly towed this same car over 1000 miles on various U-Haul dollies and never experienced anything like this. It was stable and solid. I also tow a boat on occasion with no issues.
I'm thinking it has to do with the ~12' of overhang from axle to ball, in so much as when I make a turn to the left (for example, lane change), the first movement of the toad is actually turning the wheels to the right because of the overhang. Then almost immediately it will correct itself and turn the wheels to the left. Seems like this could be what I'm feeling as a sway inducing thing, and would explain why I don't feel it when dolly towing since the dolly wheels don't turn.
I've got new tires on the motorhome as of this year, so I know they are not an issue. I have new shocks in the garage to install (Bilstein) and I'm hoping that helps, but I'm not sure why it would?
Really I'm thinking I could use a track bar in the rear to reduce lateral movement between the wheels and the chassis.
So my question (finally getting to the point!) is, anyone have experience with four down dinghy induced sway, and do you think a track bar would be a worthwhile investment for it?
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camperdave
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11/07/22 10:09am |
Dinghy Towing
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