January 16, 2021 - Golf and Camper Repairs

On Wednesday I played in the park golf scramble in Tampa. Here is a picture of those of us lined up to tee off.

It was a gloomy day and about half way through it started sprinkling on us. I actually shot very well for me and our team came in four over par - totally out of the running for any prizes but we didn't care.

The last two days I have been working with a friend on my next door neighbor's camper. The camper sits here all year round so it is always a challenge to get everything working when they arrive to use it for the winter. Chris and Marj are from Michigan and the greatest people you ever want to meet. The first problem they encountered was a gas leak. I will get back to that because it is a long story.

The next problem we found was that the hot water heater was not working on electric. I assumed that the electric element was worn out but it seemed to check out OK with the meter. I took off the cover for the reset switches and found one had been burned through.  Here is a picture of the burned one.  I ordered a new one for $20.00. 

While the electric was off we discovered that the camper was not getting any power from the battery. If the electric was off all 12 volt was off as well. I pulled the cover off the converter and upon checking it with a meter found that it was putting out 14 volts, as it should. For some reason that power was not getting to the battery.

We traced the wires down and found the ground on the frame. The connection and the frame were both quite rusty. We could not get continuity (a circuit) between the converter ground wire and the frame.  We pierced the wire and could get continuity at a cleanly scraped spot on the frame. The connector was too corroded to make a good ground we broke it off and drilled a hole and put a new lug connector on.  Here is a picture of the new lug connector we installed. I have since painted it all black to protect it from quickly rusting.

Problem solved, the ground problem that is. We still had no current from the converter to the battery. We went back to the battery and started tracing the hot wire back and soon found a circuit breaker which was completely rusted and not allowing any current to go though. Here is a picture after we took it all apart.

The red arrow points to the circuit breaker. The green arrow points to the wires that connect at the circuit breaker. Upon touching the two wires together we had battery power to the RV. We headed to the auto parts store and to buy a new circuit breaker. The third auto parts store had what we needed. We installed it and now the converter is charging the battery. Problem solved.

Now back to the hot water heater and gas leak issue.  

Upon turning on the gas valve on the water heater it was acting a little squirrely. We checked the regulator and decided that it wasn't working correctly because the indicator was not popping up showing the gas was "on". Chris purchased a new regulator and a new crossover valve. We put them on and still no gas was getting into the system from the tanks. Upon further checking we found that both pigtails to the two LP tanks were bad. What are the chances of that?  Chris purchased two new hoses. We installed those and we finally had gas getting to the hot water heater. 

Chris did not think the water heater valve was shutting off properly because he used up a quarter of a tank of LP overnight and we could smell propane. He ordered a new gas valve. Unfortunately he ordered the wrong one and after getting it and then spending a day hunting around for fittings to make it work he gave up. I found the correct gas valve online for half the cost of the one he had ordered and ordered it. It came in two days and we put it on. It worked fine but we could still smell LP all the time. Unfortunately even with the new valve, the new regulator, and new gas tank pigtails, we still smelled gas. I sprayed soapy water on all the fittings, all hoses, and the black iron gas pipe running from the front to the back of the camper. No bubbles showing any leak. The LP gas smell continued to be bad. We knew this wasn't right. I decided to put my tank on his trailer to eliminate the possibility that his tank had a leak. We still  had a strong gas smell around the camper. He turned off the gas and we gave up for the day.

Yesterday morning we decided to do the "flame test" on the gas line with a BBQ lighter. I started at the tanks and put a flame on all the connections at the tanks and down to where the hose connected to the black gas pipe running to the connections in the rear of the camper. No leaks. I then crawled under the wheels to the spot where the black gas pipe connects to the furnace, the hot water heater, the refrigerator, and the stove. I ran the flame around all those connections and no leak. I moved forward slowly running the flame along the black gas pipe. I got two feet in front of the front wheel and "WHOOSH" a fireball two feet wide and six inches high blew up scarring the crap out of me. I yelled for Chris to get a fire extinguisher as I tried blowing out the flame. Luckily I was able to get it out before it melted anything. 

I FOUND THE LEAK.

Of course the black gas pipe leaking pipe is the worse case scenario. The entire pipe is extremely rusty and must be replaced. The guys here at the park have lots of tools but not really what is needed to replumb the entire threaded black pipe gas line of the trailer. Chris got on the phone and has two plumbers coming Monday to look at it.  It will be a costly repair but absolutely necessary.

Yesterday evening Chris's golf cart would not charge. I took apart the charger this morning and found that the reset switch was bad. I ordered a new one and we bypassed the switch so he could charge his cart until the new switch gets here. Another problem solved.