It was time to finally finish the tire rubbing issue once and for all. Mike Devaney had looked over the pinch weld under the cab and determined that I should be able to chop away to my heart’s content. 👍
And if I did cut too much- we could figure out how to fix it. I assembled my safety gear, grinder with a cutting wheel, and a piece of plywood to lay down on and got to work.
Unfortunately, the rain picked up and I decided I would pick it back up the next day. Though I cut off a chunk of metal off of the pinch weld, it appeared I would have to keep going.
The next day was perfect weather to finish the job up. Laura was working with me as well this time, so while I went under to finish up cutting, she headed inside the camper to open up the doors and windows and open up Our Ohana for the first time this season.
Meanwhile, I finished up the pinch weld and after some tire turning and testing- we haven’t had a tire rubbing issue since!
Once our turning problem was FINALLY cured 😌and the camper was freshened back up, we decided that with such beautiful weather it was too good of an opportunity to not give The Ohana her first bath of the season as well.
And with that we were officially back into project season!
So what was next? Well- this spring’s Ohana project was to go through and cab and re-finish it. As you can see, she was a little rough around the edges.
Which suited her just fine back when she was a “pirate ship” as Laura liked to call her.
But now, we wanted to give her a good and comfortable life- so with that she didn’t have to be rough and beat up to be rugged.
My first plan was to open up the dashboard, so I decided to back the RV up close to the shed by our house to be closer to my tools. While I was backing up I couldn’t help but feel like something was off, and gave a real heavy check on my passenger mirror to see that I was really close tot he eve of our house! In fact, too close to the eave of our house!!! After I pulled forward I found this. Holy Cow! I had pushed right up into our metal gable trim! 😬
I couldn’t believe how lucky I had gotten- because as I inspected the pods, I had just barely pushed up into one.
See how the lip is pushed in a little on the pod on the right in the picture?
After checking it all out, I easily popped the lip back into place and found a little bit of scrapped Gaco. Other than that, no cracks or breaks!
I straightened back up our trim on the house, and immediately took a moment to breathe a sigh of relief as it sank in just how close I had come to causing some major damage.
And after all that, it was time to take apart the dashboard.
My intention was to upgrade the dashboard lights to LED like I had done in Serenity.
So after the dash cluster was free of the cab it was time to take inside and see what I could see!
The speedometer needle had been broken off inside of the dash cluster faceplate, so I began with carefully separating the faceplate from the unit.
Once it was clear, it was time to attempt to reconnect the halves of the needle.
I used a Super Glue Gel, and it took about 3 times to get a nice solid hold. But once it set the needle was holding strong!
Then I gave the faceplate a good cleaning before popping it back into place.
Next it was time to research what bulbs I was going to need to upgrade the cluster to LED. During this time I also discovered the cluster was missing 6 of the twist mount bases for lights.
After some research I found out these were called “wedge” bases, and amazingly enough found a 6 pack that came with lights right off of Amazon.
There was one smaller bulb in the cluster I would have to order too, but it turned out that I needed a second one to replace the bulb in the heater controls- so at least I could justify having to buy 2 bulbs of a particular type instead of just one!
I went to the spare RV parts section in the shed and found out that still had bunch of just the bulbs I needed from when we updated all of the running lights- perfect! 😁 With that, I had a completed list of the bulbs we needed!
When Laura arrived home that day, we decided to tear open the dash a bit more and find out what size speakers to order to replace the old ones.
After we had them pulled and some more research, we decided on these little guys…
…They wouldn’t be thumpers or anything- but we just wanted better than the blown and rattled speakers there was before! So we placed our order for our new bulbs and speakers, and the cab was on pause for the moment being. 🎵⏸️
The next project we wanted to tackle was installing LED light strip around the inside of the camper. This would hopefully provide a different type of light source for us while hanging out that could be changed to fit whatever mood we were in. When we went inside we found this strange phenomena…
The old wallpaper that I had removed before painting, well I hadn’t fully cleaned the glue off afterwards. With the temperature changes in the cold of winter the glue seemed to seep out from behind the paint!?
The strangest part was, all it took was some cleaner and a quick scrub and it was gone. Meanwhile I stripped the wires back from the overhead light that used to be in the upper bed area.
Then we did a quick test to make sure the LEDs could run off of the 12 volt correctly.
Before we went to purchase a wall box to install the unit into, we wanted to check with how much space and depth we were dealing with in the ceiling. Out came the drywall saw to cut a little and probe about…
By the time we were finished we determined the box would go in the original light location, with the sensor and lights running out as close to the ceiling stud as we could get them.
So we purchased a box and faceplate to install the switch into.
The controls for the LED light strip were just slightly larger than the opening in the designer faceplate, so I had to take my Dremel tool and sand out the edges a bit. By the time I was done though it fit nice and snug.
Then it was time to cutting and installing.
In the end the difficult part was securing the switch so that it would sit close to opening of the box and be centered.
I had to use some tie wire and thread through portions of the box as well as the switch itself.
In the end the box was secured and (mostly) centered. Unfortunately though, the box did not sit all the way flush with the faceplate.
I am still going to do a little shimming to get the switch completely centered, but the switch is solid and does not move due to applying pressure to it. For the time being we were happy. 👌
As for the LED light strip itself, the original plan was to take double sided Gorilla tape, slice it down the middle, and lay it in place before sticking the 3M backing on the lights to that.
My original calculations must have been off though, because even with 2 rolls split in half we ran out of Gorilla tape. 🤦 We managed to make it half way around the RV before we had to put the light strip project on pause.
The final act of last fall 2020 before winterizing was Laura accidentally ripped the grab handle we had put in out of the wall. This was due to there being no stud inside the bathroom wall anywhere between the shower and the door, and I foolishly chose to mount it anyway. We decided this time we would just run bolts all the way through the wall to secure the handle.
After buying a few parts and drilling some holes, the handle was re-installed and more secure than ever!
You can see the walls in the bathroom are pretty worn, so we also decided this would be our bumper sticker collection area. We will decorate the walls of the bathroom with stickers from our travels over time and this will become a collage one day!
So that’s mostly it for today, we have lots of good stuff on order, and as we wait Our Ohana will just have to patiently sit until we can get her all put back together. So for now halfway there isn’t halfway bad! 😉 At least she’s got company…
Oh! And I finished the mural on the wall inside. (Finally!) Here is how it turned out. 🌄
We will be in touch soon with many more updates. Hope you all are soaking in some sun, and positive vibes along with it, out there! ☀️
Geoff Murphy 5-7-2021