RV life

Braking with your left foot

Published on August 29, 2009 by Ross in the category RV life | Leave a comment

On our first trip, from Portland to Spokane, we suffered from issues with the engine failing to idle when the vehicle came to a stop. Freeway driving was smooth and easy, apart from the engine temperature getting a little high when pushing the speed over 60mph on a hot day. City driving, however, was a pain in the ass!

To keep the vehicle from stalling I had to get used to braking with my left foot, shifting into neutral and keeping the revs around 1500 too 2000 rpm. This was made harder by the fact that the throttle / carb was not sensitive enough to allow the revs to be maintained reliably below 2000rm.

It sounds fairly simple, but I had the hardest time with managing to do this! The left side of my body is fairly non-compliant – I can’t write anything legible with my left hand, and I can’t much kick a football with my left foot. Katya, being ambidextrous, was getting more than a little irritated with me as I struggled to get my left foot to operate independently of my right. Understandable considering all her belongings were in this vehicle I was jerking to a halt by braking too hard with my left foot, then jerking forward as I pumped the gas to keep it from stalling. And all that combined with Spokane’s awful roads and the busted shocks…

The RV is stationary for the next month – Katya is learning how to live in it, where to store everything, working through repairing things like the oven and fridge, getting water and propane systems working again, and finishing some of the decor.

Before we drive it again though we’ll be fixing the idling issue, and maybe the shocks too – and the drive will be less stressful on everything in it as we head off to our next destination, us included.

Nerd on the road begins!

Published on August 23, 2009 by Katya in the category RV life | Leave a comment

So, This is the first post on the site but not the first day of the project. I have lots of postings and updates to do on all the renovations we are making to the 73 Brougham but I haven’t had the time – because im so far behind and started before I even bought this domain. Today me and my mom are making curtains for it while Ross reads wiring diagrams and troubleshoots every little bug in the system. He installed a nice stereo and speakers with aux input for my iphone music and replaced the wiper motor – now hes on to more complicated things like pinpointing shorts, missing grounds, dash lights and other such mysteries that have arisen on its first trip out of town. The engine sounds great but nearly 40 years of neglect have played a number on the electrical – especially being in rainy Oregon, rust is abound on every electrical connection. When he’s through itll run like a champ though – he is an engineer afterall. In the meantime Im still trying to arrange my things to fit and be accessible – lots of art and photography supplies. Back to work! I’ll get a post here soon of some of the interior decorating I’ve done – It’s a longer term project that expected but Its at least half done inside. Horray!