Repairs.....

 7:58 am - Friday - September 19th - LPG&RVR - 61° F, humidity 40%, wind 1 mph out of the northeast......heavy cloud cover today with a forecast high of 80° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were driving I-90 in the Big Sky Country of Montana.....

.....heading to Missoula.

You may, or may not remember that a few months ago, just after arriving here for the summer season, I repaired one of the damaged wire ropes on the rear ramp door of the trailer.  While we were in Bishop, on our way here, it had unraveled when TLE was lowering it to attend to her plants.  It took us a couple of hours, but we rewound both wire ropes over the spring loaded spools, and were able to close the ramp door, but in the process damaged the driver side cable.  All that being said, when I was repairing the wire rope on the driver side, just after we arrived here, I unwittingly partially unwound the wire rope on the passenger side.  The repair involved shortening the driver side wire rope to remove the damaged section.  I wasn't sure at the time if it was still long enough to lower the ramp door all the way to the ground, but didn't deal with it then as I was 99% sure it was still long enough.  Fast forward to Wednesday evening, TLE and I were going to lower the ramp door to be sure that driver side wire rope was long enough to lower the door to the ground, enabling us to insert the VW next month.  That's when we discovered that I had partially unraveled the spool on the passenger side, and the wire rope completely came off the spool.....doh!

As this error had serious implications for our ability to haul anchor next month I had to first rewind the wire rope on the passenger side spool, and once that was done, lower the door to see if the wire rope on the driver side was long enough.  If not I would need to visit ACE Hardware in Alturas to buy new wire rope and completely redo the whole system....

That is way, way too much slack!!

.....in short the wire rope was long enough to lower the door to the ground, and we were able to get the passenger side rewound, then lower the door, but it had a little 'slack' in it (above), so ultimately I had to shorten the driver side wire rope to match the length of the driver side.  By the time I finished it was almost noon time, and some 3 hours had slipped into the past.  That aside, the door is now repaired, and VW insertion early next month will go on as scheduled.

My next, and very important task was to removed the old expansion tank in the water bay.  The expansion tank only comes into play when we are using the house water pump to push H₂O through our copper plumbing.  The tank prevents the water pump from surging.  We had a serious problem with the pump surging last winter, and didn't realize the bladder in the expansion tank had ruptured, thereby rendering it useless.  I thought it was the water pump, but it wasn't.  When our friends Tom and Darlene were here a couple of weeks ago I discussed the problem with Tom.  He suggested adding a little air pressure to the tank, but I told him I had tried to and water came out the Schraeder valve.  He, in turn, said then the bladder has ruptured, and I needed a new tank.  Fast forward to 10 days ago....I ordered a new 2 gallon expansion tank, and it arrived a few days ago.  I had assessed what needed to be done, and I had all the parts necessary to install the new tank.  Unlike the wire rope incident, this was a pretty straight forward installation....

The old 43 years of age, 1 gallon expansion tank

This picture gives a little perspective to where in the water bay the tank resides.  As I look at this picture I realize how much work I've done in the driver side of the water bay.....I've replaced the electric heater (upper right), the water pump (lower right), both rubber gaskets in the two dump valves (lower left), and now the expansion tank (center) since we purchased the Newell in 2008.  Not to mention that we had to remove the fresh water tank back in 2013 to make a repair to the black tank.

I've also replaced the water pressure regulator (lower right), and the city water gate valve (lower center).

.....I keep in stock numerous 'Sharkbite' fittings for just such a repair and already had the 1/2" elbow, and the 1/2" connector with a threaded male end to screw into the new expansion tank.  I just unscrewed the old compression fitting to remove the old tank, the cut off the flare, and the rest was quick and easy....

The final installation

.....once the tank was installed I had TLE turn on the water pump (after having closed the city gate valve) and run the shower......it worked!  No more surging!  You may wonder why I used such a long nipple to connect the tank to the elbow.  Simply put, the original nipple I cut was about 3" in length, but when I tried to connect the tank to the elbow the hose bib to the left in the picture was in the way, so I had to use a longer nipple to get the tank above the hose bib.

By the time I finished putting away tools, and cleaning up the area it was after 3 pm, and another day at LPG&RVR was basically in the books.  I took a shower, and then took a nap.  Later we watched the Thursday night NFL game between Miami and Buffalo.  It was a very good game, and close until the end, which is all for which we can ask, right?

Thanks for stopping by!