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2015/12/01 (T) Home Again

I got up at 7:45 AM, got dressed, and fed the cats. The Magnum BMK was showing the house battery pack at 24.2 VDC and 47% SOC with the refrigerator and other significant loads not drawing any power. I worked on my iPad for a while until I heard muffled voices from the compound around 8 AM and saw Pat (John’s son) working on the roof of one of the trailers. Linda got up at 8:30 and we had granola for breakfast and had a leisurely morning.

Check-in time at Williston Crossings RV Resort WCRVR) was noon. We only had 75 miles to travel to get there and did not need to be there right at noon. Around 10:45 we started getting the inside of the coach ready to travel and by 11:15 we were taking care of the outside stuff. Paul and Eugenia were already hooking up their car and obviously preparing to leave as well. We walked around the coach and checked that the bay doors were closed and locked. On the way around we got the tow bar off the ground and secured it. I then switched on the chassis batteries, opened the engine accessories air valve, and returned to the cockpit.

The chassis battery gauges read lower than normal for a fully charged condition but had plenty of energy stored in them to crank the engine quickly. With Linda spotting from outside I did a three point turn to get the bus pointed towards the exit. John came over in his Kubota utility cart and chatted with Linda while I moved the car behind the bus and we continued to chat with John as we hooked up the car. We thanked him for his hospitality and assured him that we would be back; both for a solar system and to just hang out for a longer time in the woods by the Suwannee River. I started the engine and Linda checked the lights. Everything was good and when she was back on board we started the slow roll back to the county road.

We pulled out of John Palmer’s place around 11:30 AM and slowly made our way back to CR-354. I stopped there (to check for traffic, of course) and raised the tag axle to shorten the turning radius. I did not have a sign post at the edge of the road on the left, as I did when turning in, but the ditch on the other side was deeper closer to the road so I did not to get the passenger side steer tire very far off the pavement. I completed the left turn cleanly and put the tag back down before continuing.

It was closer to 11:45 by the time we passed the east boundary of the property and saw the sign for the River Rendezvous RV Park. We took CR-354 to US-27 and headed east to US-129. Just south of Trenton we vectored off onto SE CR-339 and then picked up NE US-27 Alternate which eventually became Main Street in Williston. The trip took about an hour and 40 minutes and we arrived at the main entrance to Williston Crossings around 1:25 PM.

It’s usually nice to return to a place you have been to before and liked. We enjoyed our time here during winter 2013/14 and it felt a little bit like being home again in that the place, and some of the people, were familiar to us and pleasant to be around. One of the most familiar people was John, our next door neighbor of two years ago. He was doing site escort duty and led us to our site after Linda got us registered. We pulled up in front of site #233 and disconnected the car while John read the electric meter. John then helped me back onto the concrete pad. We were in place and level at 2 PM and visited briefly with John, giving him a quick tour of our interior remodel. After John left we hooked up the shorepower cord and put power to the coach.

I checked the chassis battery voltage on the dashboard gauges with the engine off and they were 28+ and 14. We went through our usual arrival routine with the addition of checking the reading on the electric meter. We pay for our electricity here so checking the meter on arrival is prudent. I checked the maintenance chargers and they showed the charge level on the upper and lower 12V portions of the chassis batteries as 75% each. They should have been fully charged after almost two hours of engine operation so something was still not right. The house batteries were down to 24.0 VDC and showing a 43% SOC. The battery charger section of the Magnum 4024 went into Bulk charging mode, charging the house batteries at 107 Amps.

We are parked facing approximately WSW so the front of the coach gets the afternoon sun. It was in the low 80’s, and a bit warmer in the coach, but we turned on the ceiling exhaust fans rather than run the air-conditioning, deployed the window awnings on the driver side, and lowered the day screens on the inside. We used AntennaPoint.com to locate broadcast TV towers. The two we cared about, CBS and PBS, were both north of us. I rotated the front antenna to point in that direction and did a channel scan. They both came in with solid signals so I repeated the set up with the rear antenna and bedroom TV.

Once we were set up we had vegan hot dogs for lunch and then walked to the CVS Pharmacy just outside the front entrance to the resort. We crossed paths with John again and this time he had Ali with him so we had a quick reunion. When we got back to the coach I was tired and with the warm conditions I dozed off. When I woke up I set up the printer, NAS, and Amped Wireless router.

Meanwhile Linda had started preparing red beans and rice for dinner and discovered that she did not have diced tomatoes. I drove to the Grocery Depot, which is also just outside the front entrance to the Resort, and bought a couple of cans that included green chilies. It was 6:30 PM and the Resort gates were already closed so I had to use the code to get back in. The dish was excellent and would not have been the same without the tomatoes.

After dinner I e-mailed Butch, Chuck, and Lou. We are parked close to one of the Resort’s Wi-Fi towers with a strong N signal and reasonable speed, leading me to wonder if the Resort has upgraded their system and Internet connection. Linda made a stovetop apple crisp and finished it just before our Tuesday evening TV programs began at 8 PM. The crisp was different from an oven baked one but still very tasty. We watched a few TV programs on PBS and CBS. Linda has been fighting something and took some OTC Tussin nighttime medicine for her cough, congestion, and itchy throat. She has coughed enough that it now hurts and is very tired from many nights of poor sleep.

2015/11/30 (M) Palmer Energy Systems

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I was up at 6:45 AM and wandered over to John’s trailer compound around 7:10. He was outside talking to someone on his cell phone and we finally left at 7:20 for breakfast in Mayo. We went to a small, unassuming diner and waited in the car until Dale showed up. We ordered at the counter, selected ceramic mugs from a basket, and then took a table in the back. I had a version of my usual breakfast out; dry toast with Smucker’s Strawberry Jam and coffee.

We were done by 8:15 and stopped at the NAPA store headed east out of town on US-27. They had a good supply of Group 31 commercial batteries and gave me a good price based on my AITA/NAPA discount card and waved the core charge if I returned the old batteries.

We returned to John’s and I got busy removing the old batteries, which was a bigger project than it sounds. I had to get all four of my tool boxes out plus our Little Giant ladder, nitrile gloves, and paper towels. I also had to disconnect the car from the bus.

The four batteries were lined up, sitting crosswise, in a tray above the passenger side tag axle. Being that far off the ground I found it easier to work from the Little Giant ladder configured as a short step ladder.

My first step was to make a diagram of the physical location of the batteries with the positive and negative terminals marked and lines for the main cables attached to each one. I assigned the numbers 1 through 8 to the terminals and then used green Frog Tape to label each cable with the number of the terminal it was connected to. At Linda’s suggestion I used my iPad to take a photo of the batteries with the labeled cables.

My next step was to remove all of the cables from the batteries, being careful not to allow the exposed lugs on the ends to come in contact with anything they should not touch. Some of the cables were jumpers, which I removed and set aside, while others were captive and had to hang down next to the forward side of the tray. The cables were secured with a lock washer and nut at each terminal which I set aside as I removed them.

With all of the cables removed I proceeded to remove the large nut that secured the retaining bracket that held the batteries and remove it. I started with the battery farthest to the outside as it was the easiest to lift out from atop the ladder. Paul, one of the owners of the Entegra Aspire motorhome parked behind us, had come over to see what I was doing and offered to help. I gladly accepted his assistance and he helped me lift the old batteries out of the tray and get them on the ground. Each one weighs about 80 pounds.

I emptied out part of the driver’s side rear of our Honda Element, loaded the four used batteries in there, and took off for Mayo. The associate at the NAPA store unloaded the old ones for me and loaded the four new ones, which I appreciated. He pulled eight new lock washers for the terminals and a larger one for the hold down bracket, got a 1/8″ brass pipe thread plug, and helped me select at spray lubricant for the tray slides and a grease to coat the connections after they were made to protect them against corrosion.

As best I recall I was back at camp by 9:30 AM and backed the car into position by the passenger side rear of the bus. I used the silicon spray to lubricate the slide tracks. I then moved each battery in turn from the car to the ladder, setting it up one step at a time until I could lift it into the tray and slide it into position. I was careful to use my legs and protect my back muscles.

With the batteries physically in place and oriented correctly I reinstalled the hold down clamp. I then got Linda to help me reattach the cables. I cleaned the ends to remove previous grease and wrapped several of them in electrical tape to ensure they did not short out to the tie down bracket. I put No-Ox electrical connection anti-oxidant on each terminal. We then put the cables back on using the new lock washers and the old nuts. I torqued the nuts tight and we double checked the connections against the diagram. We finished at 12:30 PM, so I felt we had accomplished the battery replacement in a very good amount of time.

I turned on the generator and then turned on the circuit breaker for the maintenance chargers. As I expected the new batteries were not fully charged but the maintenance chargers indicated at least a 75% SOC and we slid the battery tray back in to its compartment. I repacked the tool boxes and Linda loaded them back into the battery bay. We put the ladder back in the front bay and the things I had removed from the car back in there.

This old building seemed to be full of stuff but no longer actively used. Our bus was parked pointing directly at it.

At 1 PM we decided to go for a walk in the woods. I turned off the genset, put on my hiking boots, and got the Sony a99 camera. It was a lovely day for a walk with the air temperature at 80 degrees F but shaded from direct sunlight by the forest. I took a couple of dozen photos along the way. We were back by 2 PM and decided to drive into Mayo to see it and buy some groceries. When we got back we had vegan cold cut sandwiches for lunch and then sat outside for a while. Paul came over to chat followed by Euginia. Doc (the retired veterinarian who owns the property) stopped by and then John drove up to see if we were interested in a campfire. That sounded great so John said he would start one.

Linda sits in a tree swing in one of the areas that John has “improved” on the property.

We took our chairs over to the fire ring and sat for a long time having a nice conversation. Kathleen arrived in a car and joined the group. We never learned who she was but we did learn that she was there to meet up with folks driving down from Atlanta. On the short walk back to our coach we paused to marvel at the night sky. It is very dark here at night and there were no clouds this evening.

For dinner Linda made linguine with mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, and olive oil. It was very good. She used the induction cooker and we operated off of the batteries/inverter so they got quite a workout. After dinner I used www.antennapoint.com to locate the TV towers around us. I managed to tune in a CBS affiliate so we were able to watch our usual Monday evening TV programs. I worked at my computer off-loading photos from the camera and copying them to the NAS. I e-mailed Butch and texted Chuck regarding the battery replacement.

Our bus boondocked at John Palmer Energy Systems shaded from the late afternoon sun.

John suggested that we operate off of the inverter and batteries and run them down to 24.0 VDC which is approximately a 50% SOC, so I agreed to try it. We had issues with the system during the evening. The power was flickering, causing the APC UPS to switch to batteries briefly and the lights to flicker. The TV even turned off once. This has never happened before and I did not know what was causing it, but suspected that we might be using too little power and/or that the inverter had overheated (although I considered that rather unlikely). I ended up turning off the NAS and the Amped Wireless router, which were plugged in to the UPS, and then shut off and unplugged the UPS. My laptop runs on its own battery, of course, but I had already checked my e-mail, off-loaded photos from the camera, and backed up photo files to the NAS, so I turned it off as well.

I also turned off the Search Watts feature on the inverter, which was set to 5 Watts. My understanding is that this feature turns off the inverter when there is no load and turns it back on when a load of at least 5 Watts tries to draw current. Five Watts on a 120 V AC system is 5/120 = 1/24 Amp or slightly more than 40 mA; not very much. On a 24 V DC battery bank the required draw from the batteries, ignoring inverter inefficiency, would be five times that (120/24 = 5) or 200 mA = 0.2 A. The Magnum remote was showing that we were drawing at least 6 A, so that should not have been a problem, but I did not know what else to do and I certainly was not going to bother John at this late hour.

John also suggested that I equalize the batteries and told me how to activate that function on the Magnum 4024 by holding down the button on the unit for at least 25 seconds. The equalizing charge is a 4 hour cycle and he suggested I run it twice, back-to-back once the batteries were fully recharged and the charger was in float mode showing zero Amps. He told me to run the equalizing charge once every six months. I have always read that you should NOT apply an equalizing charge to AGM batteries but John said that the two guys who own Lifeline Batteries now recommend this.

We went to bed a little after 11 PM. Linda fell asleep almost immediately but I was awake until 1 AM working on this post and listening to the sounds of the coach.

2015/11/28 (S) Berea to Cartersville

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I did not take any Ibuprofen before I went to bed last night as I felt OK. I was also very tired and fell asleep without difficulty around 9:30 PM. Under the best of circumstances I was going to be awake between 4:30 and 5:30 AM and that was the case this morning. During that hour the cats prowled around the bed, got some attention from me, and looked out the windows. What they really wanted, however, was food.

The pickup truck / 5th wheel combination that pulled in on our passenger side last night well after sunset was making departure preparations this morning at 5:30. The strained muscle(s) in my lower right back were nagging at me and, unable to find a comfortable position, I finally got up at 6 AM as the neighbors were pulling out. I sat on the sofa with the heater pad on my back and worked on my iPad.

The cats still had food and water but wanted fresh kibble, as they do every morning and evening. It was in the bathroom closet, where it always is, but took me a while to find as it was hiding in plain sight behind the lower rack of hanging clothes. Linda finally got up at 6:30 AM. She rarely sleeps 10 or more hours but she was very tired when she went to bed at 8 PM last night and immediately fell asleep. She also appears to be coming down with yet another cold. For someone who rarely gets sick she has suffered with colds this fall.

We only had 300 miles to travel today, all on I-75, between Berea, Kentucky and Cartersville, Georgia. With a fuel stop somewhere along the way it should only be a six hour day. We got online and checked the weather. Rain was forecast to start in Berea around 10 AM so we targeted 8:30 to 9 AM as our departure window and decided to have coffee and breakfast. The cold front was sitting to our west running from southwest to northeast. It was moving slowly southeast but the precipitation (mostly rain but with some ice and snow) was along the front and sliding northeast. Based on how it was moving we figured we would probably have rain between Berea and Knoxville and then dry conditions from there to Cartersville where the chance of rain for today was 0%.

I had the engine running at 8:30 AM. The battery balance light came on and stayed on for quite a while but eventually turned off and did not come back on. That may just mean the Vanner equalizer was just doing its job. However, with the upper and lower banks of the chassis batteries on maintenance chargers since we got here yesterday that just begs the question why they were out of balance. We may be replacing the batteries and/or the Vanner equalizer this winter.

We pulled out of our site at 8:3 AM. I-75 through southern Kentucky and northern Tennessee was very hilly but the highway was in excellent condition and it was a scenic and pleasurable drive. Traffic started to get heavy as we approached Knoxville, Tennessee where there was apparently a college football game being played today. Traffic remained heavy from there to our destination, which made the driving a little more work and a little less fun, but it was still OK.

The bus ran strong all day and I was able to climb the grade at Jellico, Tennessee in 4th gear without dropping below 50 MPH or getting the engine temperature above 200 degrees F (as best I could tell from the gauge) and the exhaust manifold pyrometers not exceeding 800 degrees F. That was a big improvement over two years ago when I recall climbing up the mountain in the right lane behind slow trucks in a lower gear and worrying about the engine temperature.

Even though I had the cruise control on for most of the drive I did well using downhill speed to go up the other side and getting on the accelerator early to get the RPMs and turbo boost up and keep them there. I typically saw 15 PSI boost at 2000 RPM but occasionally 16 or 17 PSI. We really need a 0-20 boost gauge for this engine but I could not find one and doubt that they exist. Besides, the new 0-30 gauge is working for me and I have other things that need to be fixed/replaced, such as the twin pyrometer gauge. The left needle used to stick at the bottom of the scale but now the right needle is doing that. Tapping on the face of the gauge usually frees it up, but not always. When the needles are both working, however, they are showing the same temperature within 50 degrees F, which is comforting. I used to think the bus (and me) liked to run at 62 MPH but I have come to the conclusion that it likes to run 65 to 68 MPH, and I am comfortable with that.

We stopped at the rest area about 41 miles north of the Georgia border where I replied to a text from Kristine and then called John Palmer. He answered this time, said he was glad to have us visit, and gave me the address. He said he will have customers there but there was plenty of room and we would not have a problem getting our bus in and out. (Note: We are also customers, albeit from a few years ago, but this is primarily a social visit and a place to stop for two nights.) Rather than take time to eat while sitting still we had some pretzel and peanut snacks as we finished our drive to our destination for the day.

We arrived at exit 296 in Georgia around 1:45 PM and pulled into the Pilot Travel Center just southeast of the exit with the fuel gauge sitting at 1/4. We picked this place to refuel because it is just on the other side of I-75 from our campground for tonight and I wanted to use as much of the fuel in the tank as I could without risking sucking dirt off the bottom or running out.

I figured we would take on 150 gallons of diesel fuel so I added 2 ounces of Racor Biocide, three 16 ounce bottles of Stanadyne Performance Formula diesel fuel treatment, and three 16 ounce bottles of Stanadyne Lubricity Formula. The PF additive treats 60 gallons of fuel per bottle and I add it to the tank before each fill up in proportion to the amount of fuel I think I will add. The directions for the LF additive say to “use it 4 to 6 times per year” but that is presumably based on an engine operating in a tractor-trailer or other commercial / industrial use. Still, I only added one bottle last time when I should have added three, so I added three this time. We ended up only adding 142 gallons but the extra additive won’t hurt anything.

I reset the trip odometer before we pulled out, which I forgot to do when I filled up at home. We used to record our mileage and fuel purchases to get an idea of our fuel efficiency in miles per gallon but have never really had an accurate figure for a couple of reasons. One was that the speedometer/odometer was not working correctly, or at all, and only got replaced in fall 2014. The other is that the Aqua-Hot and auxiliary power plant both burn fuel from the same tank as the main engine. Consequently, we can get an approximate idea of fuel consumption if we fill up at the beginning of a long day’s drive and then fill up again at the end before parking for the night, or if we know for sure that we are not going to use the Aqua-Hot or Genset prior to refueling. Since we will be boondocking from tomorrow afternoon until Tuesday morning we will definitely be running the Genset and probably using the Aqua-Hot.

Our next fill up will probably be on the drive from Williston to Arcadia in late December and the only reason for topping up then is to make sure we pull into Big Tree RV Resort in Arcadia with a nearly full tank to minimize condensation while the bus sits there until early March. This is one of the reasons I wanted to get all of the additives in the tank today. We will have full hookups at Big Tree and do not expect to have to run the Aqua-Hot for space heating. Even though we will have metered electric, we will use the electric heating element in the Aqua-Hot for domestic hot water except possibly for showering. If the resort has a bath/shower house we might use it if convenient.

From the Pilot station I drove to the KOA about 3/10ths of a mile on the other side of I-75 and pulled up to the office at 2:10 PM. The KOA is near Cartersville, Georgia. It is a nice enough place with easy access but the facilities are not as extensive (read that as kid/family magnet) as some KOAs. Linda got us registered and the woman in the office used a golf cart to lead us to our site. We got a very convenient 50A FHU pull through site so getting in was easy and getting out tomorrow morning should be equally easy.

We leveled the coach and went through our arrival routine, minus the water and sewer connections. It was 71 degrees F outside with low afternoon sun was just warm enough in the coach that Linda opened several windows and I put the screen in the door window. We then went for a walk around the campground. The place was almost full and seemed to have a lot of rigs that appeared to be set up for long-term stays. The woman in the office confirmed later that they were fully booked for this evening and that 2/3rds of the campground was in use by extended stay visitors, many of whom were doing work in the area for Georgia Power. That was certainly not the case when we were here two years ago on December 22nd, so that may have just been a matter of timing.

Back at the coach it was warm enough that we opened two of the ceiling vents and turned the fans on to exhaust air from the coach. I went to put on a pair of shorts and discovered that we had failed to pack any. I did bring my two pairs of convertible hiking slacks so I unzipped the lower portion of the legs on one pair and made them into shorts. Much more comfortable. I will be doing some shopping once we get settled.

I sent a slightly more detailed text message to Kristine and a daily update text message to Chuck which drew a reply and another text from me. Linda got our WiFiRanger connected to the KOA Wi-Fi and then logged-in to RVillage. She changed our location for last night to the Oh Kentucky Campground in Berea, KY and then changed it again for today to the Cartersville KOA. We were apparently the only RVillage members at either campground.

We were a little hungry so Linda walked to the office to see if they had any hotdog buns, as we left ours behind along with a loaf of raisin bread. They did not have hotdog buns so she cooked a couple of vegan hotdogs and served them on bread. We also forgot to unplug the Insta-Hot in the kitchen so she texted the kids and asked them to unplug it and remove the bread products when they were next at the house.

We will be boondocking Sunday and Monday nights so Linda availed herself of the showers at the campground. I worked for a while on this post and then went over to get a shower. Linda warned me that it took a while to get hot water so I let the hot water run for at least five minutes but it never got warm enough to shower comfortably. The men’s bath/shower room was also quite chilly so I took a really quick shower, dried off, and got dressed. The office had free coffee available so I had some to warm up and mentioned the lack of usable hot water to the woman at the desk. She seemed surprised but then asked if I let it run a long time, so they know there is an issue. She said she would mention it to the manager.

Around 6 PM Linda heated up a couple of Amy’s brand Vegetable Korma meals. As with all Amy’s products they were vegan and tasty, as well as quick and easy, so the quality to efficiency ratio was fairly high.

The antennapoint.com website indicated that we should be able to pick up a few OTA TV stations. We managed to tune in the ION and PBS affiliates whose towers were NNE of our location and watched a few shows. Linda read for a while and I checked e-mail and played games on my iPad, which is what I do to relax and/or fill time when

I don’t feel like doing anything else. Linda was going to make an Apple crisp but did not have enough cinnamon so she added that to her grocery list and cut up an apple to eat. Around 8 PM she popped the last of the popcorn and added that to her grocery list too.

Around 9:30 PM I closed the ceiling vents in the bedroom and bathroom and took the screen out of the entry door window and closed it. Linda has had a cough for a few days and has been a bit congested so she went to bed at 10 PM. I called Butch at 10:15 PM (8:15 MST) but he did not answer. He does not have a voice mailbox and does not respond to text messages on his phone, so I went to bed.

2015/06/24 (W) Up The Tower

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Today was the day to finally climb the tower to remove an old TV antenna, reposition an amateur radio antenna, and install two new antennas, one for OTA TV and the other for a cellular booster system. But there were other things to do before I was ready to climb.

I was up at 7 AM and on my way to Lowe’s in Howell by 7:20 AM in search of a solution to the problem of how to mount the outdoor cellular booster antenna. I ended up buying two 2-1/2 inch U-bolts. Although the tower legs are 1-5/8″ in diameter the angle bracket attached to the bottom of the antenna is 2-1/4 inches wide. Thus I needed the 2-1/2 inch spacing for the threaded ends of the U-bolt to clear the bracket.

Back at the house Linda was up and had the coffee made. We had a quick breakfast of homemade granola. I removed the tire pressure sensors and GPS from my car and headed to Brighton Honda to drop it off for its 100,000 mile service appointment. Linda arrived at the dealership about 10 minutes later. We then headed to Adams Electronics in Wixom. While Adams Electronics primarily serves the public and business communications markets owner Scott Adams, AC8IL, is a long-time ham and a member of the South Lyon Area Amateur Radio Club and Novi Amateur Radio Club. Well known in the local amateur radio community, Scotty is the local go-to guy for certain kinds of equipment. I ordered two coaxial cables from him the other day and we were here to pick them up.

We left to return home at 10 AM so I called Mike (W8XH) to let him know we were running a little behind. So was he, but thought he could be at our house by 11 AM. That gave me time to drill a hole in each of the two U-bolt retaining plates and cut a short piece of 1″ square aluminum tube to use as a spacer. That was the last fabricating I needed to do and we got busy staging all of the materials we were going to need to get the tower work done efficiently.

Mike (W8XH) setting up the tools and parts outside the “drop zone” of the 40-foot tower on the east end of the house. (Photo by Linda)

Linda set out a sheet near the tower but not in the “drop zone.” We spread out materials and tools on the sheet and used it to make sure we could find things quickly and keep them from getting lost in the grass. I also brought all of my tool boxes to the tower area. With everything assembled it was time to climb. I set up our 7 foot step ladder on the east end of our rear deck to provide access to the roof near the tower. Mike helped me into his climbing harness and got it adjusted. Once on the roof I took the harness off temporarily as my first task was to remove the 2m/70cm base station antenna. After clipping the plastic cable ties I lowered it down to Mike while Linda took photographs. (She helped with many aspects of the work today but was the only photographer.)

Starting up the tower from the roof of the house. (Photo by Linda)

I put the harness back on and Mike tossed me one of the 100 foot ropes which would eventually be used to haul materials and tools up and down the tower. I secured the haul rope to one of the unused seat clip rings and Mike instructed me on how to secure the harness while climbing. I put the waist strap around the tower and clipped it in. I then put one of the two fall cables, attached to the ring at my upper back, around one of the legs above one of the cross bars above my head and clipped it into the ring at my chest. The tower is adjacent to the east end of the house and is attached to it by two pipe assemblies just below the soffit (the house has hip roofs) so it was easy to step onto it. After that things got tougher.

The horizontal trussing on the tower is two feet apart vertically. That spacing was right at the limit of how high I could lift my right foot and required me to pull myself up part way until I could push with my right leg. Once up on the next rung I attached the other fall cable, moved the first one higher, and slide the waist strap up to position myself for the next step. I repeated this pattern with the two fall cables and the waist strap as I worked my way slowly up the tower, clipping old plastic cable (zip) ties as I went. The tower definitely had some give but I was quickly acclimated to the amount of sway and found it to be acceptable so we decided not to guy the tower with the other three ropes, which would have slowed my ascent even more.

When I finally reached the top of the tower I untied the haul rope, looped it over one of the southeast facing horizontal bars and hauled it up allowing the free end to lower down to the ground. Mike then tied the rope to the standoff pulley I had fabricated and hauled it up to me. I already had cable ties, a diagonal cutter, and a pair of slip pliers with me. I set the threaded rod on the northeast and southeast cross bars, inside and against the two legs that were parallel to the side of the house, and secured it with cable ties. This was a three-handed job that I had to do with two hands but I got it done while only dropping one cable tie. With the pulley rod secured I undid the rope and then undid the knot tying the two loose ends together. I fed one end through the pulley and retied it to the other end. We now had a way to haul materials and tools (in a bucket) up to me at any needed height while keeping it 18 inches away from the tower.

Three-quarters of the way up ad working with the haul rope. (Photo by Linda)

The next task at the top of the tower was to remove the old TV antenna, mast, and rotor. When I finally had a close up view of these old components it became apparent that my best course of action was to try and unclamp the base of the mast from the rotator, lift it off of the rotator, and toss it to the ground.

The mast clamp parts were all very rusty so Linda got the WD-40 and Mike sent it up in the bucket. I sprayed the nuts on the mast mounts and also the rotator leg clamps. I tried undoing the mast clamps with a slip pliers but it was no good, so Mike sent up three open/closed end wrenches. One of them was the right size and to my surprise the rusted nuts broke loose and started backing off. One of them did not want to come off but unscrewed the entire bolt instead. Fine. The bolt had a screwdriver slot in the top and was threaded into the rotor housing and I did not care how it came out as long as it did. I got the mast clamps loose enough that I could work the bottom of the mast free from the top of the rotor. There was a lot of rust there too. After clipping some coax cables, rotor control wires, and plastic cable clamps I repositioned myself up one rung on the tower so I could get enough leverage to the lift the mast clear of the rotator collar and control it well enough to make sure the antenna fell to the ENE away from the house and my helpers down below. And that is exactly what happened.

The first antenna to get mounted was the outdoor antenna for the cellular booster system. Mike sent the antenna up in the bucket along with the various pieces I needed to secure it to the short top/center mast support tube so the entire antenna, which is omnidirectional, was above all parts of the tower. What would have been an awkward assembly on the ground took on added difficulty 40 feet in the air but I got it secured with good access to the N-female connector on the bottom.

At the top with the pulley in place and using it to haul up a bucket with tools and parts. Mike is controlling the haul rope on the ground. (Photo by Linda)

We decided to run the coax on the outside of one of the tower legs rather than down the inside of the tower. Mike tied the LMR-400 coax to the rope and hauled it up to me. In addition to the haul rope Mike tied a second control line to the bucket to keep it from swinging all over the place. I connected the coax to the antenna feed point and then wrapped the connection with coax seal tape. I then routed the coax down the east leg of the tower and zip tied it to take the weight off of the antenna connection.

Next up was the 2m/70cm amateur radio base station antenna, often referred to as a 2m/440 dual band antenna. (In this nomenclature the “2m” refers to a range of wavelengths for one of the VHF ham bands and the “440” refers to a range of frequencies for one of the UHF ham radio bands, so it is a mixed units designation.). The antenna is about five feet long with three short counterpoise (ground plane) rods near the base. It had an LMR-400 style cable connected to it but with PL-259 male connectors on each end. The antenna feed point is an N-female connector so I had an adapter installed to make everything compatible. Mike removed the coax and the adapter, zip tied the antenna to the haul cable at three points, put the 10mm wrench in the bucket, and hauled it up to me.

The ham radio antenna was also tricky to get mounted. I installed it at the top of the northwest leg so that most of the antenna was above the tower and two of the three short counterpoise were parallel to the west (N-S) and northeast (NW-SE) crossbars. The antenna by itself is light in weight but it is five feet long and mounts at the bottom nine inches, so most if it was above me with a tendency to wave around in mid-air. With the coax connected, however, it weighed quite a bit more. I temporarily zip tied the coax to take the weight. I then had to hold the antenna with its base against the northwest post at my head level, push a U-bolt through the mounting bracket and past the tower leg, slip the mating clamp over the two ends of the U-bolt, and then get a small lock washer and nut on each threaded bolt end. I then had to repeat this for the second U-bolt. Again, a three-handed job that I had to do with only two hands.

The old OTA TV antenna and mast on the ground. It came down by the gravity method. (Photo by Linda)

The bonus to this work at the top of the tower was a commanding view of the surrounding countryside, which was mostly trees in every direction. I even saw two towers far to the north and was kept company by a soaring vulture just to the NNE. I was also able to determine that the tops of the large white pine trees behind the east end of our house are about 10 feet higher than the top of our tower, putting their overall height at about 55 feet as their bases are lower than the base of the tower. We plan to put the 70 foot tower at a spot that is surrounded by these trees on three sides (W, S, and E) so the top of the tower, and any antennas mounted there, will be well above the tree tops. That is especially important as we plan to eventually put an HF beam antenna up there on a mast attached to a rotator and it will need to be able to rotate freely for 360 degrees.

The final antenna was the hardest. The Antennas Direct DB8e OTA UHF/digital TV antenna was very large and heavy by comparison to the other two. In this case ‘heavy’ meant a few pounds. It is actually two UHF antennas mounted at the end of a dual support arm structure. The support arm mounts to a vertical pole, such as a tower leg, at its midpoint and there is a combiner box located there as part of the mount. A short length of RG-59 (75 ohm) coax connects each antenna to the combiner box and the main coax connects there as well.

How tall the tower appears (and feels) depends on where you are standing. (Photo by Linda)

How tall the tower appears (and feels) depends on where you are standing. Pulley and haul rope in the upper right. Lots of coaxial cables to be dressed (secured) on the way down. (Photo by Linda)

RG-59 is a different kind of coaxial cable from the LMR-400 used for the first two antennas. LMR-400 has a 50 ohm characteristic impedance and is used for receiving and transmitting RF energy with considerable power if needed. RG-59 is much smaller in diameter, more flexible, has a 75 ohm characteristic impedance, and uses F-connectors that are the standard for OTA TV, video, and satellite cables. But I have gotten ahead of myself. I had to come down a few feet on the tower to install the TV antenna but before doing that I had to start securing the transmission lines to the tower legs with cable ties.

Mike rigged up the haul rope in a ‘Y’ to lift the antenna from its center of gravity while actually attaching the rope to its ends. That allowed the haul rope to both support the weight of the antenna and keep it oriented correctly while I positioned and clamped it to the southwest tower leg with the dual support arms pointing in an east-west direction. Because of where I had the pulley mounted, and the length of the ‘Y’ in the support rope, I had to mount the antenna a few feet lower on the tower. Fortunately the slightly lower height was not going to affect its performance.

Like the ham radio antenna, the OTA TV antenna mounted to the tower leg at two points. The upper assembly was a U-bolt with a retaining bracket on the back side. The lower assembly was a pair of straight bolts that went through the combiner box past the tower leg and had a retaining bracket on the back side. The antenna came with wing nuts instead of washers and regular nuts, which helped a little, but I really needed three hands to get the antenna into position and tighten the mounting brackets.

Mike ties off the DB8e OTA TV antenna with an inverted “Y” so it will haul up in the proper orientation. (Photo by Linda)

Once I had the antenna sufficiently attached to the tower I was able to position the support arm close to the southeast facing side of the tower. I then pointed the antenna on the east end of the arm ESE towards the Detroit area TV towers and tightened the two nuts on the mounting studs. (The horizontal dual support arms are about 3 feet long so I was able to reach through the tower to get to the mounting studs and nuts.) I left the antenna on the west end of the support beam loose and turned it out of my way so I could complete other tasks.

Mike attached the end of the main RG-59 coax to the haul rope, put the amplifier and a 2-foot length of RG-59 coax in the bucket along with lots of zip ties, and pulled them up to me. The amplifier is about 3″ wide by 2″ high and 1.5″ thick including the concave plastic backplate. The backplate accepts two zip ties for mounting to a pole. I positioned the amplifier about 8 inches below the antenna combiner box and cinched up the two zip ties. I then connected the short coax to the combiner box output and put the combiner back it its protective, weather-gasketed plastic box. I connected the other end of the short coax to the amplifier input and wrapped the connection with coax seal weatherproofing tape.

Installing the DB8e OTA TV antenna required three hands. Note that I am installing it at the highest point possible when suspended from the pulley with the haul rope in an inverted "Y" attachment. (Photo by Linda)

Installing the DB8e OTA TV antenna required three hands. Note that I am installing it at the highest point possible when it is suspended from the pulley with the haul rope in an inverted “Y” attachment. The yellow waist strap allowed me to lean back and work while the two red security straps would catch me if something broke. (Photo by Linda)

I attached the main RG-59 coax to the output of the amplifier, which is also the DC power input, and wrapped the connection in coax weather seal tape. I then dressed the cable and secured it to the tower leg. I aimed the antenna on the west end of the support arm WNW towards the East Lansing TV towers and tightened the nuts to lock it in position.

At this point I was finally done working on the antennas but had three coaxial transmission line running down the outside of the tower, one by each leg. As I descended the tower, reversing the protocol I used going up, I secured all three cables every few feet. I finally had my feet back on the roof at 2:20 PM, almost exactly 2 hours and 30 minutes from when I started climbing. Projects usually take me twice as long as I think they will but this was about half as long as I thought it would take, so we were all pleased that the work had gone smoothly and relatively quickly. My main objective was to get the old TV antenna down and the three antennas up but my secondary objective was to only climb and descend the tower once. Mission accomplished, at least for now.

By now we were all hungry and thirsty so Linda made chickpea salad sandwiches and set out fresh sweet peppers, sliced apples, baby carrots, and cold water. After a suitable lunch break we returned to the next phase of the work which was routing the coax cables into the cable entry box (CEB) and making the connections.

We started with the RG-59 coax from the OTA TV antenna. I coiled the extra cable and hung it on the tower (with zip ties, of course), routed it into the CEB and connected it to the power inserter / lightning arrestor. We purchased this cable from a Radio Shack store in Florida two winters ago to hook up our bus to the RV resort cable TV system. Besides the coax it had a separate ground wire. The amplifier and the power inserter both had connections for a separate ground wire so I connected it on both ends.

Routing coaxial cable into the cable entry box from the tower and the basement and making the connections. (Photo by Linda)

We had already routed a 75 ohm video cable from our bedroom TV to the sump pump room in the basement. I selected a suitable length of this same type of cable from our existing inventory, connected it to the other side of the power inserter, and routed it through the back of the CEB into the sump pump room where Linda guided it. Conveniently, I had a double-ended F-female barrel connector designed to connect together two cables with F-male connectors. I plugged in the AC power adapter for the power inserter, which was already in the sump pump room, and we went upstairs to see if we were receiving any TV stations.

We set the ‘Source’ on the TV to ‘Antenna’ and did an ‘Auto Scan’ for digital channels only. There are very few analog TV signals still in use and the ones that are reside in the old VHF TV spectrum which our new antenna cannot even receive. The scan found 58 signals, which obviously included the sub-channels. Besides the main Detroit stations and the East Lansing PBS station we got other Lansing area stations and even a station from Flint. The nice thing about digital TV is that if you get a picture at all it is very good.

There is a large TV tower at I-96 and US-127 on the southeast corner of Lansing so we were probably picking it up. There are several TV towers SSW of Lansing about 35 miles that serve Battle Creek and may serve Lansing and Kalamazoo. They are 50+ miles from us and I did not have the west antenna pointed in exactly that direction but it may have been close enough to pick them up. Flint is at least 35 miles away straight north off the sides of both antennas so theoretically we should not have received any stations from that direction. We will have to check the AntennaPoint.com website and confirm by station identifier what stations we are actually receiving.

Feeling good about our success so far we routed the coax for the cellular booster across one of the support arms that brace the tower to the house just under the east soffit. We dropped it down next to the wall and brought it into the bottom of the CEB, replacing the hole plug with a rubber grommet. Routing it this way kept it out of the way of future foot traffic, or lawn and garden work, in the space around/between the tower and the CEB. I connected the cable to the lightning arrestor and coaxed it unto position inside the CEB. LMR-400 is stiff and bending it sharply will damage it.

I connected one end of the 15-foot LMR-400 cable to the other side of the antenna arrestor and routed it into the sump pump room where Linda guided it into position. I secured it to the ceiling, brought it down the opposite wall, put a large 180 degree bend in it, and attached it to the connector on the bottom of the cellular booster. I turned it on and watched the lights blink for a while. All three of us then started checking signal strength throughout both floors of the house. All five of the ‘Alert’ lights went from blinking yellow, which means the unit is adjusting the gain on that band, to solid yellow, which is not described in the manual. Since we had not yet registered the device with Verizon Wireless I turned off the booster.

Back out at the CEB I removed one of the hole plugs directly below the input of the Morgan VHF lightning arrestor. We routed the coax for the 2m/440 ham antenna across the tower brace, down the wall, and around through the bottom of the box where I attached it to the lightning arrestor input. I had an old piece of 50 ohm coax with an N-male connector on one end and a PL-259 (male) connector on the other end. I attached the N-connector to the output of the VHF lightning arrestor and fed the other end through one of the 2″ conduits into the sump pump room where Linda routed it out into the ham shack.

We set our “Go Box” on the desk, plugged the PL-259 into the SO-239 socket on the back of the case, plugged it in to AC power, turned on the power supply, and turned on the radio. The radio, an Icom IC-7000, came up tuned to the South Lyon (K8VJ) repeater. I transmitted and successfully triggered the repeater, which is currently at a secondary site about 20 miles from our tower. Mike went out to his car and used his mobile radio to verify that we could transmit to and receive from the repeater. I had a lot of background static (white noise) so Mike switched modes and transmitted directly to our antenna. The signal was full scale and full quieting. I have a ground lug in the Go Box but did not have it connected. I vaguely recalled that I had to ground the box at the previous house to eliminate a noise issue. (The radio and power supply are grounded to the box.)

I switched the radio to UHF and it was set for the Novi repeater. I listened but did not hear anyone transmitting so I transmitted, giving my call sign and a brief message, and then listened. I did not get a reply even though Mike was also monitoring the Novi repeater so I switched back to the South Lyon repeater. Mike indicated that I had, indeed, triggered the repeater and that a couple of other hams acknowledged hearing me in addition to him. It thus appeared that I did not have something set up correctly on the receive side of the radio for the Novi repeater but the system (radio, cables, arrestor, antenna) was clearly working.

That was enough work for one day so we gathered up all of the tools and unused materials and put them away. We offered to take Mike to dinner as a ‘Thank You’ for his assistance. It was more than helpful to have someone on the ground who was familiar with tower operations. We considered several dining options but opted for Olga’s in Brighton. Linda and I had small salads, sans the Feta cheese, veggie Olga’s that were excellent, and curly fries without Tabasco sauce for the ketchup. Warning: As inconceivable as it may sound, Olga’s does not have any kind of hot sauce in its restaurants. Mike had a dish with chicken in that he said was very good.

Mike headed home from the restaurant as did we. We were tired but very pleased with what we had accomplished in the course of the day. We celebrated our accomplishments by watching several programs on Detroit PBS, something we have not been able to do for more than two years.

2015/05/31 (N) Age of Disco Camping

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We were up around 8 AM. Linda took a shower after which I started the last load of laundry while she made coffee. We had our usual granola breakfast. When the washer finished I trimmed up my beard and shaved and then took my shower while Linda moved the wash to the clothes dryer. Once we were both dressed we got very busy loading the bus and preparing it for travel.

I put on my work clothes and selected my clothes for the week. Linda took care of loading the bus while I attended to preparing it for travel. The preparations went something like this. First I loaded our GLCC banner, flags, T-shirts, door prizes, tools, and our new 6 gallon pancake style Porter-Cable air compressor into our Honda Element. I turned on our TireTraker TPMS monitor and plugged in the power cord for the TPMS repeater which is installed in the passenger-side rear corner cabinet in the bedroom. I then got out our long fresh-water hose, connected it to the faucet on the front of the house, ran it under the bus, and connected it to the fresh water inlet. I got a mat to put under the fresh water tank drain and emptied about 40 gallons of water that had been in the tank since we got home on Friday, April 24. I closed the drain valve and then opened the fresh water tank fill valve.

At 3.4 gallons per minute the 120 gallon fresh water tank takes about a half hour to fill. While that was happening I got our DeWalt 15 gallon upright tank air compressor out of the garage and rolled it over to the front of the bus (it has wheels). I got our long extension cord out of the front bay and ran it from the front porch outlet to the air compressor. I then got the air hose out of the bay where it was stored along with the air chuck, and digital tire pressure gauge, and retrieved a knee pad and slip pliers from two other bays. I removed the TT TPMS sensor from each wheel in turn, checking and adjusting the pressure as I went. I always do both dual drive tires on each side at the same time to make sure they are the same.

The inside duals have valve stem extensions so I use the pliers to keep them from loosening while I unscrew the sensor. The two front tires were at 111.5 and 112.0 PSI, both above the minimum required 110.0 PSI, but I brought them up to 115.0 PSI. I like to run the tires 5 PSI over the correct pressure to allow for changes in overnight low temperatures and to provide some margin against slow leaks. The two tag axle tires were around 82.5 PSI so I reset them to 85.0 PSI. The four drive tires were around 92.5 PSI so I brought them up to 95.0 PSI.

By the time I was done with the tires the fresh water tank was full so I shut off the water and stored everything back where it came from. I then pulled the Element around behind the bus. Everything was on board by this point except the cats, the cat tree, and us. We hooked up the car for towing and checked all of the lights. I switched on (connected) the chassis batteries, opened all of the air valves, switched off the Aqua-Hot engine preheat pump and diesel burner, started the main engine, and switched the suspension to drive mode. While coach was airing up I pulled the 50 A shorepower cord and stowed it away. Back in the house we put the cats in their carriers and left them in the front hallway while we took their “tree” out to the bus. We then brought them out, locking the house behind us, and put them on board. Both cats immediately went under the front passenger seat which is their “go to” spot while the coach is moving.

All of what I have just described took place with intermittent light rain. We could not recall the last time we had to load the motorcoach, or our previous motorhome, in the rain, but we agreed that having it parked with the entrance door opposite the sidewalk to the front door of the house made it much more convenient. Still, it was reminiscent of the “age of camping,” a time in our lives when we camped frequently in a tent with our pre-teen children. While not a constant companion, rain was a frequent visitor on these outings and yet it never deterred us from going and never lessened our enjoyment. Indeed, we tried to show our children the special beauty of a hike in a Michigan woodland in the rain or the power of standing near the shore of a Great Lake during a storm. Cooking was more of challenge, to be sure, but we had a screen room in addition to our tent and made preparing and eating meals part of the adventure. Our friend Chuck said to me once that we were different from most of the other Prevost owners he and Barbara know because we were “campers.” True enough, although what we do now hardly seems like camping to us. Still, we are quite comfortable with having the furniture and flooring removed from our motorcoach, sitting on lawn chairs instead, and dining at our fold up plastic side table.

We pulled out of our driveway at 12:30 PM and made our way slowly down our muddy, pot marked dirt road to N. Hacker Road. It was nice not having to worry about scratching the side of our rig as a result of our tree trimming raid late last night. Instead of taking our usual route north to M-59 we went south on Hacker which got us on pavement a short distance later. Most of the trees on the west side of S. Hacker Road were trimmed up high enough but just before getting to Grand River Avenue we got clunked. Our front OTR TV antenna is the highest thing on the bus. It is centered side-to-side near the front and probably took the branch. I should check it for damage the next time I am on the roof.

We went south on Grand River Avenue towards Brighton and less than a mile later took the entrance ramp to I-96 west. Twenty-three miles later we took exit 122 and stopped at the Mobil Truck Stop for fuel. We were at 3/8ths of a tank and rather than fill it we only put 80 gallons on board. That was enough added fuel for approximately 480 miles and our round trip to/from the RV rally would be less than that.

We will not be using the coach for a while after this week and it is not clear what the best thing is to do relative to long term storage. Filling the tank with fuel minimizes the air in the tank and thus the opportunity for moisture to condense out. Moisture is a bad thing in diesel fuel as it enables the growth of algae. I use a biocide additive to inhibit that growth, especially at a fill up just before it is going to sit for a while, and we have a fuel polishing pump to slowly circulate the fuel and remove water and other gunk while the coach is sitting. That would seem to solve the problem, except for the fact that it is not ideal to store diesel fuel any longer than necessary before using it. I suspect that we will fill the tank at the Mobil Truck Stop just before returning home, using an extra dose of biocide, and then run the fuel polishing pump all summer.

We continued west on I-96 to the southwest corner of Lansing and then exited onto southbound I-69. It continued to be overcast with a noticeable wind out of the east. We thought we were done with the rain but continued to get an occasional sprinkle. We exited I-69 at US-12 and headed west through Coldwater and the southern tier of Michigan counties. US-12 is a good 2-lane highway with some left and right and some up and down, sometimes at the same time. It is a fun drive with nice scenery and passes through three other small towns: Bronson, Sturgis, and White Pigeon. We eventually left US-12 onto Old 205 (M-205) and a couple of miles later entered Indiana where the road became SR-19 (IN-19). A few more miles and then left (east) on CR-4 and a mile later we pulled into Elkhart campground at 4:10 PM.

Linda checked us in and then we drove to site 738, leveled the coach, and shut down the engine. We went through as much of normal arrival routine as we could, setting up the cat tree, two folding lawn chairs, and our plastic folding side table. Linda got our WiFi Ranger connected to the RV Park WiFi and got online with her iPad while I used mine to write.

We snacked on pretzels while we were traveling and by 5:30 PM we were ready for dinner. Linda made a simple salad and then cooked a couple of vegan “burgers” and served them with the remainder of the potato salad she made the other day. We went for a walk around the campground after dinner and thought we spotted Nick and Terry Russell’s Winnebago Ultimate Advantage motorhome but did not see any sign of them. The rig had Florida plates but there was a new Honda SUV parked in front. The last time we saw them they had a Ford Explorer but I have not been keeping up with Nick’s blog so they could have gotten a new car without us knowing about it.

When we finished our walk we unhooked the car. I forgot to pack my toothbrush so we drove back to the intersection of CR-4 and SR-19 where there is a CVS, a Walgreen’s, and a Martin’s supermarket. The CVS was the most convenient, and we have a discount card there, so we bought my toothbrush and picked up some pistachios and almonds on sale. Back at the coach we had small glasses of Moscato and some red grapes. It’s been a very physical week for us and by 8:30 PM Linda was ready to lie down and watch a little TV.

The TV stations here serve the area surrounding South Bend and Elkhart including the area of Michigan along the Indiana border. It took me a while to figure out where to point the antennas but I eventually remembered that there a quite a few very tall towers on the south side of US-20 about half way between Elkhart and South Bend. That was roughly southwest of our location and we were parked facing southwest so it was a simple matter to point the antennas straight forward. Bingo! (I should have remembered that the AntennaPoint.com website will give you the bearing and distance to all of the broadcast TV towers with a certain radius of a specified location, but I didn’t at the time.)

The local PBS station was in the middle of a fund raiser (they probably all were nationwide). That usually means vintage (nostalgic) musical performances and tonight was no exception with a reunion concert by the BeeGees (Brothers Gibb). Although best known (to my generation) as the “sound of disco,” personified in the movie Saturday Night Fever, the BeeGees performed actively for many years and have a very deep catalog of surprisingly familiar songs. This concert was filmed in Las Vegas in 1997 and several of the brothers have since passed away.

Good music is good music but popular music tends to take on significance for individuals based on where they were and what they were doing at the time it became popular. The BeeGees, like Ernest Hemingway, we’re so popular that it became popular to put down the music of the disco era. Thankfully that time has passed (in both cases) and we can remember fondly “the age of disco” and enjoy the art and artists for what they are, enjoyable and talented.

The BeeGees concert was followed by Motown 25. I was 12 in 1964 and although I studied and played classical music I was definitely listening to popular music on the radio and that included the new Motown sound. I was enjoying this concert as well but it was late and even I get tired and sleepy so I turned it off and went to bed.

2015/05/04 (M) Moving Things Along

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I had a list of things I wanted to accomplish today but did not get most of them completed. I am trying to make purchasing decisions and get products and materials ordered so I can get some projects done and checked off my list. It wasn’t a wasted day, as I gathered additional information, but it was frustrating to not get orders placed for things that I thought we settled items.

Based on a recommendation from bus buddy Butch I had decided to order a Cyclo 5 dual head orbital polisher. I had looked at them before on Amazon but on closer inspection discovered that there is a Cyclo 5-Pro and now a Cyclo 5 Mark II and Cyclo 5-Pro Mark II. The Mark II models are the current ones but much of what is for sale on Amazon are the previous generation. Not only that, any one of them comes in three different configurations, two of which appear to duplicate one another. I finally figured out that the Pro version has a variable speed motor. The configurations have to do with the style of buffing pads and how they attach to the tool. It turns out that whatever I get I can order the other parts if needed, so which one to order comes down to which pad attachment method I think best suits my needs. That means more research before I place an order somewhere.

I have also decided to finally install a cellular booster system at the house and identified the TopSignal 5-band system as the one I probably wanted. I have always been partial to Wilson Electronics, but the company has changed ownership in the last year and rebranded everything for the consumer market as WeBoost. The redesigned “consumer” website is less informative than the old one and the company has been slower than other companies to bring products to market. The model I would want is listed as “available soon.”

I called Cellular Solutions and talked to Paul. They sell the WeBoost and TopSignal products but he steered me towards the SureCall Fusion5s, which is similarly priced to the TopSignal and more expensive than the WeBoost. It is also a 5-band/multi-mode (3G/4G/LTE, etc.) transceiver so it will cover almost all cellular carriers including Verizon, without locking us into any specific carrier. I was also going to call PowerfulSignal, who sells most of the same products, but there was no price difference based on the information I had and Cellular Solutions is a Michigan-based company.

We also need an Over-The-Air TV antenna so I started revisiting the website for AntennasDirect.com. I spent some time looking at their website while we were in Quartzsite, Arizona but never ordered one. One of the links on their website is to AntennaPoint.com. This website shows the direction and distance to OTA TV towers based on your ZIP code. It turns out that we have broadcast antennas in all directions but most of them are at ~104 degrees (Detroit) and ~270 degrees, plus or minus (East Lansing, Kalamazoo, and Battle Creek). The ground rises to the west from our house so the Detroit metro stations will still be our primary ones. Even so, the closest tower in any direction is 27 miles away and the farthest is 58, so we will need a serious antenna to pull these in. (Antenna point.com only display towers up to 60 miles away but that covers everything we would care about.)

I have been trying to catch up and dispatch these kinds of lingering projects so I can work on plans for the bus barn and get started on our bus projects. At this point I am no longer confident, however, that we will ever build a barn. No matter what approach we take it is just going to cost more than we want to spend and it looks like dealing with the permitting process may be a hassle. Added into this mix are several major projects on the bus, the need for a new roof on the house, and the need (desire) for a new car. Ugh.

One of the bus projects is the remodeling of the seating in the front half of the coach. As part of that project we want to remove the old carpet from the front and the bedroom and the black ceramic tile from the kitchen and hall, and probably the bathroom. We did some online research and liked the look and quality of Armstrong Alterna Luxury Vinyl Tiles. These tiles come in a 16″x16″ and a 12″x12″ size and a few of them come in 8″x8″. From the website I determined there was a dealer, Lynch Carpet, close to us with an excellent selection of Alterna samples.

We made an errand run, stopping at the Howell Library to return a DVD, do some car research in Consumer Reports, and check out a few children’s books for Madeline’s visit tomorrow. We stopped at the Howell branch of First Merit Bank to make a SLAARC deposit, and then drove to Lynch Carpet. Clint worked with us and we took four samples to look at in the bus. Once we saw them with our cabinetry the one we liked best was the La Plata Crème Fresh. It has a faux stone, low luster, textured surface that is mostly off-white but has distinct milk chocolate brown veining. I was thinking we would install the tile diagonally (as diamonds instead of squares) but that would probably result in more cutting of tiles, so more work, more time, more waste, and more cost. The more I thought about that the more I liked the idea of a simpler layout, but that decision is far from made.

The rest of the day was filled with the usual things; a load of laundry, working at our desks, fixing/eating dinner, reading, games, and online research, the last three typically done on our iPads while curled up on the living room couches.

The Phase Place

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Tag Archives: AntennaPoint.com

2015/12/01 (T) Home Again

2015/11/28 (S) Berea to Cartersville

2015/06/24 (W) Up The Tower

2015/05/31 (N) Age of Disco Camping

2015/05/04 (M) Moving Things Along