We have been "boondocking" the past few nights on our way home so have been out of touch. Tonight we are in La Grande, Oregon in a Wal Mart parking lot and I HAVE WIFI!!! It might be coming from a Radio Shack about 100 feet away. No way to tell! It is very cold here and we ran into a little falling snow a few miles back. The furnace will get tested tonight!
To catch up:
The cheque from the Insurance company arrived at the repair shop the same day we went to pick up the motorhome. Now that is good service! I put the repairs on my credit card and will pay them off with the insurance cheque when we get home.
We finally got everything transfered over to the new motorhome and left El Paso, picking up the new dolly in Las Cruces, NM. I have never had electric brakes before and have been having a hard time setting things up. Every once in a while the dolly brakes lock up, causing my heart to beat rapidly and leaving a nice smoke trail behind.
My first thoughts on the new motorhome are that it is much more comfortable to live in than the old one, thanks to the slide and extra two foot length. The handling, however, is another story. It really sways in high winds and when being passed by semi's. The Cruise Control is a lot different that the Chevy. It wants to gear down way more often, both going up and downhill. It will not let you gain speed downhill to make the next uphill easier. Instead, it does everything it can to maintain speed uphill, sometimes going down to second gear and revving up to 5000 RPM at about 45 MPH! Now that gets your attention. My son thinks the swaying can be improved with the addition of an additional leaf to the rear springs. I guess I was spoiled by the extra heavy duty frame and larger tires under the old rig.
The Ford V-10's gas consumption seems a lot worse than the Chevy 454. This is probably contributed to by the Cruise Control problem. I am told I can replace the electronic "Chip". I will investigate this when I get home. It may help the Cruise Control problem.
It is a little early to pass judgment too hard as I have only driven it a thousand miles or so. My mind is still open......
I just did my mileage calculations. The three tankfulls I have put in it so far have yielded 5.1, 7 and 7.5 MPG. The difference is explained by the mountainous terrain and perhaps that for the last tank I took it off Cruise Control whenever I saw a hill coming up.
We've been in Mazatlan almost two weeks.
3 hours ago
I know my Tioga is a lot older than yours (and no slide), but when I first got it and loaded up, the side to side sway was so bad at times that I had to slow way down to stop it. In my case it was partially caused by a suspension add-on from a former owner...one side was bad.
ReplyDeleteSince I knew I wanted rear air bags, I told them to replace all the shocks with Bilsteins. My leaf springs were "sprung" so we opted to replace them as well (could only get remanufactured ones). The combination of all the fixes & upgrades made a HUGE difference.
No sway at all..trucks can still move me from side to side, but it's not a swaying motion.
What is the Cruise Control issue you're talking about? My V-10 gets around 8 mpg currently. Not sure what will happen towing the car instead of the trailer.