Views from El Malpais, New Mexico

Random overlook on the way to El Malpais

View from the Sandstone Bluffs Overlook in El Malpais

The main attraction in El Malpais National Monument, the Arch.

Ancient Lava flows

View of our campsite from one of my hikes

A little cactus man I stumbled across, about 8 inches tall

A view from above of the 10 camping site camp we stayed in for a long time, different spot than the picture above.

Another view of the Lava Flows from the Sandstone Bluffs Overlook

Sandstone Bluffs Overlook again

Sum Up

Catching up is just a bit too daunting..so I'm going to use the wisdom of Inigo Montoya:

Quick Summary of the last month:

We left Plano, TX, and started our trip to New Mexico. After a couple days of easy traveling we got to the border, stopped at the Visitor Center in NM at the border to eat, and later that day realized that one of my tires was losing air pressure. After a little testing I determined it was actually the tire rim itself that was leaking. It had a hairline fracture that a little soap water revealed. The next morning I aired up the tire and we went about 50 miles to Tucumcari to a truck repair shop and for 30 bucks I got them to swap out my spare tire.

Back onto the highway for about 5 hours and after passing thru Edgewood a different tire started vibrating wildly. After pulling over I noticed the rear passenger side tag axle wheel was smoking good and was definitely hosed. Called Progressive roadside assistance and 5 hours later(around 11:00pm) we had the Beast on a flatbed trailer pulled by a Semi.  They drove us to 'Second to None' repair shop in Moriarty, NM. This was on a Saturday night about 11:30pm when we got dropped off, a few miles outside of town inside this repair shop's yard that wasn't open until Monday morning.

All things considered, their parking lot/yard was very nice and we had a fully stocked RV, so it was actually not bad at all.  The staff was very accommodating and allowed us to stay there while we waited for parts and repairs to be done. Turns out our Axle had to be repaired, which required an Axle Surgeon. We got out of the yard Wednesday around 5:30pm after repairs were completed.

After driving a couple hours west, we were getting a little hungry and decided to try to find somewhere to eat and we saw signs for Indian Fry bread. We exited I-40 and came into a small village and the Fry Bread restaurant was definitely closed and abandoned. Drove around a bit and eventually decided to turn toward I-40, and saw a casino in the distance. This is how we ended up Dancing Eagle Casino. Turns out they had full hookups in a small RV park right next to the Casino for 10 dollars a night, which is crazy cheap. I had to find my 50 amp plug to take advantage of this. Anyhow the diner in the place had really excellent food, very tasty Chili Cheese Fries. New Mexico style, so instead of like a traditional Texas chili, it had Red Chili/Green Chili sauce on them. Delicious.

We met a few RV'ers in the park from Australia that were here for a couple months traveling with some friends in a pack, hoping we catch up with Bill and Sue on their next visit to the States in a few months. A local told me about Acoma Pueblo, which was 15 miles down the road. Who knew that the oldest inhabited village in America was located right down the road and it also had the oldest European built Church in North America in it. And it was located on top of a Mesa, Sky City!

After 4 nights at the cheap RV park in Desert Eagle Casino and trying to win a Mustang and failing, we hit the road again and ended up in El Malpais National Monument. Free Campsites! Beautiful area.

Next destination was a whirlwind journey to the North Rim Grand Canyon, got a great camp spot for one night, then back down the mountain with smoking brakes.

And back to El Malpais for another week to chill out and hang out with my new buddy John, the camp host. Did a lot of hiking and relaxing. Met another full time RV'er as well, Tiffany, who we hope to catch up with one of these days.

Decided we needed some repairs on the Beast done and we needed to be back in Plano by the end of June. 'Course we had to stop at Desert Eagle Casino for a couple nights to recharge and do laundry, and eat more Chili Cheese Fries! Afterwards we hit the road and drove all the way back to Plano.

Now just waiting to do some repairs, have some leaky oil and transmission issues that I need addressed. Also may get an exhaust brake installed so the Beast can handle mountains better without the smoking brakes. Oh yeah, also a shock decided to rip itself free and was fully extended right above my rear tire. Good times. It's fun working out the kinks.

Bamboozled

A quick sneak peak at what we've been up to with the Beast.

Ripped out the carpet and foam.

Built my own saw table

My table allowed me to slide boards in and out and remain secure,
so I could use the circular saw with good precision.

Roughed in flooring, still needs glue and trim.

Dinette area. Wire still needs managing.

Snook, Solitude, and Solar

So this last week I took the Beast down to Snook, Texas to do the Solar work at my Uncle's farm. Since he was away on vacation, it was pretty much The Beast, some donkeys, a dog named Fritz, and myself.

First things first, I needed water. I didn't feel like driving the 200 miles with the extra 800 lbs of aqua in my tank.

Filling the 100 gallon tank up water

The front yard.

Since this was taking forever, I took some pictures of where I would be doing my working and sleeping the next few days.

Pretty sure I'm the first one to ever sleep in the workshop

Nestled in among the tractors and tools

Had to unfurl this mighty satellite one more time before removing it to make room.  As well as the HD antenna behind it and the fan vent to the back right.

Over the next few days, my cousin Jason and I got to work on the solar install. We managed to get most of the panels installed before the weekend hit and he had to run off to some fairs and such showing some old tractors. But we did finish the seven hardest to place ones, leaving just a few for me to finish.

First 4 panels on front glued and screwed on

Framework for 2 of the panels in the back right

I took to the road back to Plano Texas early Saturday morning and subjected the build to a 80 mph wind test on I-45. Happy to report that none of the panels blew off! I stopped and checked at a couple rest areas along the way to make sure nothing was amiss as well.

This Sunday I completed the Solar install, building a platform for one panel in which the cords all connect and go down into the electronics cabinet below. I also hooked up five of the panels to test out the supply to the batteries. They were putting in about 5 amps at 95+ volts.  Once I connect the second set, it should be up to about 10 amps. I may have to juggle this around a bit to optimize my amps to the batteries.
The OCD among you might want to just ignore the panel in the lower left...there was just no other way.

Late today some MC4 connectors I had ordered arrived which allowed me to create the cables I needed to connect the 2nd set of five panels. Unfortunately the sun had gone down so I had no way of testing if they were working as I planned or not. I have to wait until tomorrow. Once the test is complete I'll do the wire management and secure some of the hanging wires.

In other news, the interior of the RV got a bit of an upgrade. The uncomfortable leather got replaced, though we did save the old covers. Here's the transformation:

Fancy Electronic Do-Dads

My heartfelt apologies to those of you who don't enjoy all the technical mumbo-jumbo, but I need to get this stuff documented for my own good.

Yesterday I took about 3 hours to wire in some additional features to my new power station of 8 batteries. One is a disconnect switch which can be turned off/on to allow current to and from the batteries.  Handy if I'm storing it for a while or if I just need to disconnect power going to the batteries.  This will be helpful when I have the solar wired in as it will allow me to disconnect the power from the batteries and confirm that the new Kingtec air conditioner is running purely on Solar Power.

The other thing I wired into the mix was something much, much, more useful. That thing is the amazing Trimetric battery system monitor by Bogart Engineering. This is such a useful item, as it's wired into the system via a Shunt(pictured below), which will allow you to monitor how many amps the system is draining, how many amps are going to the battery when charging, and how many amps you have left (i.e. how much juice you have left in the batteries.) A few years ago I had actually bought one and was planning on putting into my last RV, The Chinook. I just never quite got around to doing the upgrades I wanted to that rig before switching to the Beast. Anyhow, so I have an older unit, though still new: mine is the Trimetric TM-2025RV. I actually got lucky that I had bought the higher end model years ago, as this particular model allows you to monitor up to a 48 volt battery systems instead of the standard 12 volt which is prevalent in most RVs.

I just have the Disconnect switch and Trimetric roughed in for now, they simply need to be screwed in place somewhere. The Disconnect Switch I have a home for right next to the Shunt picture below you will see the hole next to it. The Trimetric I believe I'll be placing inside the rack with all of the electronic equipment(dvd player, stereo, etc.)

Here's some exciting photos of the above items!

Disconnect Switch roughed in.

Blurry Picture of where the switch will be.  This is under the bench in the dinette, because of the overhanging wood it would be impossible to accidentally switch it on or off. Also it has to be depressed and turned at the same time.

The 500 Amp shunt mounted and sending valuable information to the Trimetric.

The Trimetric in action!

This is the Trimetric showing 51.8 Volts. When the batteries were brand new, they were sitting at 52 Volts. So I've lost .2 Volts over the last month while they sat waiting for me to work on them and also they got drained a little when I ran the A/C for a good 10 minutes on just the batteries. I have yet to recharge them, that's where the Solar comes into play very soon!  Also on the to-do list is some serious wire management.

Months of Silence and a lot of Noise to come

Sorry folks for the months of Silence, but we've been crazy busy.  We renovated the house for a few months and then put it on sale Mid-December.  We had an offer within a week and we are now officially closing on the house the end of this January.  We are now 1 step closer to being mobile.  Our possessions are still being pared down and things sold off!

With all of the above going on, our money has been tight, so the upgrades on The Beast that I want to do had to go on the back-burner.   The Beast did manage to get a brand new set of 6 tires somewhere in all that craziness.  Little issue with my old tires:  the metal caps were fused to the stems so I had no way to put air in them and they were over 10 years old so nobody would work on them.  Now we have brand spanking new 35 inch off road tires with a nice Discount Tire warranty for years to come.  So hopefully in the next few weeks I'll get the Solar array and batteries ordered and start rewiring the heck out of it to support long term living better.  Any electricians want to help?

On another front, I may have a source of income for this new lifestyle lined up, more info to come once I secure it.  It's not a lot of money, but I think it will more than pay for all the expenses of living on the road for a couple years.

One other thing we did a few months ago in preparation for the new lifestyle was invest in a New Hobby. So on my 40th Birthday we decided that we would learn how to play guitar.  I bought a resonator guitar and my wife got a guitar-stringed Banjo.  So maybe in a decade we'll be able to create music.

For Christmas we got each other some Learn Guitar books, so we will be trying to teach ourselves wherever we make camp.  We apologize in advance if you happen to be within earshot of what will most likely be a lot of Noise.


Things are falling into place.