There’s a reason Devil’s Churn starts out with Kade on the hunt for a fuel filter. And why in Death Bed, he’s busy patching up Hindy’s exterior with a fiberglass kit. Because I’ve done both of those things on the road.
Now, I wasn’t trying to patch a hole left by a death-defying car chase. Let’s call my offending collision operator error and move on. The fuel filter? Another mea culpa.
Our first mechanic was an amazing guy down in Florida. He and the service manager heard we were recent full-time RVers and they gave us a thorough inspection. Fixed a problem I didn’t know I had (and showed me how to keep it from happening again) and generally went all out with their service.
The next two mechanics did the basics. And by that I mean just changed the oil. I’d expected one of them to swap out the fuel filter and they hadn’t. They were typical spin on filters (there’s two – a main filter and a water separator) so I took the job on myself as soon as I realized it about two and a half years down the road.
Wouldn’t you know, you *can* get better than 8 mpg in our 39 foot rig.
Over the years, we’ve been pretty lucky. We’ve had very few showstoppers. The kind of breakdown where you end up dead in the water, relying on YouTube and the kindness of others.
One was right after I swapped out those fuel filters. We’d been boondocking on the Oregon coast for five months. I’d run the engine a couple times but not really taken it out to circulate the stagnating fuel.
When diesel sits, especially in humid conditions, it tends to get condensation in it which promotes algae growth. Of course, not knowing this, I assumed I’d botched my filter replacement job when the engine completely cut out less than twenty miles down the road.
We spent the night in Newport at a campground overflow – basically a parking lot. Being a Sunday, I couldn’t find any mechanics (this will become a common theme…) and would’ve resolved to call a mobile mechanic several hours away at crazy after hours rates if not for a fellow full-time RVing friend of ours.
He told me to buy some Lucas fuel additive, pour it in the tank, and rev the engine up. Worked like a charm. The dreaded expensive repair completed for under thirty bucks.
Of course, get this, the next time I took my motorhome in for an oil change? They CHANGED THE FUEL FILTERS. The brand new ones. The ones I’d put on only three months prior. Even after I asked them to JUST change the oil.
I change my own oil and fuel filters now…
Before the great fuel filter debacle, we’d once been stuck when one of our leveling jacks refused to retract. That’s a real showstopper right there. Unless you’re plowing a field, having a steel landing gear dragging along the ground while in motion isn’t advisable.
To solve that problem, I had to manually retract the leveler then at our next stop, crawl underneath, unbolt the landing gear from the frame, and order a new electric motor.
That was not before the delay had me driving over-tired and I clipped a stump with the front end causing the previously mentioned operator error. My bush-fix bodywork skills are not passable. Fortunately, I’m a decent artist. Match the color good enough and the repair isn’t that visible…
This last weekend, we got a Thanksgiving Twofer.
We were all set to hit the road last Sunday when the tanks for the air brakes refused to fill. During my previous check valve fix, I’d noticed another valve with a small leak. It was easily within safety specs so I figured I’d wait until we got to our winter destination to patch it when I had more time and was closer to a major city.
Murphy’s Law is real when nomading. So it came as no surprise when less than 200 miles from our winter port, that valve completely gave out.
Being a Sunday, none of the heavy duty truck parts stores were open. And the four auto parts stores along main street didn’t have anything close. NAPA was the only one who even showed they could order the part on their website. They were of course closed and didn’t have any in stock anyway.
Me, being a resourceful and impatient type, figured out a way to bypass the valve. I wasn’t about to do any highway driving, but I figured we could at least move the motorhome if the campground needed.
This is of course when one of the electric leveling jacks refused to retract. Again.
I threw in the towel. Set an alarm for 6:30 am the next morning, got up, and drove the next town over to the closest HD truck parts store. My plan was to buy 3, because there are at least 2 more of those valves on the brake system all the same age. Instead, I got the last and only one they had in stock.
By 9:00 AM, I had the new valve on. I then messed around with the leveling jack only to find out it was so stuck, I couldn’t even use the emergency manual method to retract it.
I had no choice but to wrestle that hunk of steel off the frame. I finished by 12:30 PM, thirty minutes before we were going to be charged for day two of our overstay.
We’ve since arrived at our winter destination and I’ve got a motor on the way. It isn’t a difficult install. Mount the new motor to the jack, bolt the jack to the frame, and plug in the existing wiring harnesses. Done.
Couldn’t I just pay some mechanic $200+ an hour to fix things? No. Not gonna happen. Leave it at a shop and not only am I out for the labor cost, I’m out the price of a hotel for however many days until they get around to fixing it. Rarely do motorhomes take priority over commercial trucks at those garages and RV repair specialty shops can be backed up for weeks.
Oh yeah, there was the time our full-slide slide wouldn’t retract too… Life on the road is, well, life. So why the heck am I telling you all this?
I lost several precious days of writing time. I’ll lose another afternoon when the part I’m waiting on arrives. The resulting delays shifted our travel schedule a touch too. My plans for an end-of-December release for book four might just be delayed.
Might.
I’m still aiming to release Death Toll before the end of 2023.
This may put undue pressure on my readers / editor and I don’t expect anybody to take up their Christmas with Kade’s latest shenanigans. We’ll see. I also have no plans to rush the book for an arbitrary date. You’ll get a solid entry in the series, guaranteed. It just might take a tad longer.
Thanks again for reading,
Russ
RUSS LINTON 
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