Richard's Pop Up Mods

Perhaps business should be done in the creek to avoid setting the straw mattress on fire? Is that what you are suggesting?

I had such high hopes, but nooo. I broke a cable at Smokey Bear. The furtherest one from the winch again. Somethings still not right with those pulleys. Actually, The cable didn't break, it pulled out of the crimp connector where it attaches to the eye-bolt, which attaches it to the main cable on the winch. That part will be pretty easy to fix. The tough part will be figuring out why it doesn't go up and down smoothly. I'll get to it in Mid June.

Richard wrote:I had such high hopes, but nooo. I broke a cable at Smokey Bear. The furtherest one from the winch again. Somethings still not right with those pulleys. Actually, The cable didn't break, it pulled out of the crimp connector where it attaches to the eye-bolt, which attaches it to the main cable on the winch. That part will be pretty easy to fix. The tough part will be figuring out why it doesn't go up and down smoothly. I'll get to it in Mid June.

I know you will get to the bottom of things before long, unless Miss Danger has other plans for you.

Here is an idea for you to find out whats wrong. Set up a video camera and shoot it going up and down. Do each one of the pulleys. Once finished, go back and review the tapes to see what is going on.

Richard you cool always buy out camper. We maybe having to sell it. Going to see how things work out in the next week or two. We have had a few things come up. Good luck on the repair. I would offer to help you with it but were a good distance apart from one another. Maybe one weekend we could come camp at warriors path (if we don't have to sell) and I could come help ya work on it

Thanks for offering to help Dave, but as you know from working on these systems before yourself, there's not much two people can do. Just no room in those cabinets. Still, camping at Warriors Path sounds like a great idea.

Well, I did several things to the lift system, and it seems to be working. First, I took two screws out of the lift arm on the corner that was causing the problem, the two that hold it tightly in place tht go through the metal rail that goes around the rim of the trailer box. Second, I found a loose screw that is the back stop for the track that guides the spring for the other corner fartherest from the winch. Third, I found a piece of plastic moulding that was up in the lift arm, but shouldn't have been, so I removed it. Fourth, I spooned in a couple of ounces of thick black axle grease into the spring track.

Oh, and I fixed the cable end that came loose at Smokey Bear. It seems to go up and down quite smoothly now. I'm thinking that the two screws that I took loose were holding the assembly at a difficult angle, but with a bit of "finding it's own center" it seems to be working. I sure hope so.

Glad you got things working again on the pup. Now for the big test, have it work when on a group camp out.

Glad it's working......now, let's give it a try-out camping trip.

We would really like to go to Warrior's sometime in the next few weeks. Give us a call and let us know if that would work for you, I know your work schedule is kinda binding you right now.

Sounds good. I'll post plans over in the "I'm camping here" area.

I worked on the electrical issue in the PUP today. What a pain to track that stuff down. Here was the problem. On the way to Smokey Bear I decided to turn the fridge over to 12-volt and let it be cooling. I've heard that this is a good idea. Things starting getting strange. When I put on the brakes, my backup light on the trailer came on. And my turn signals weren't working right. Then, the cruise control on the Suburban quit working. How odd. I figured that something must be wrong with the fridge and that I blew a fuse in the truck. I pulled over and turned off the fridge, and cut the wire to the new backup light. After a while, but not immediately, the cruise control started working again, and the turn signals did too, but they were dim.

I got my multi-tester, test light and battery charger and set out to find the answer today. I first checked that the fridge wires were plugged in right. I never used it in 12-volt mode before. According to the manual, yes, they are correct. (Also found out that the fridge draws 11 amps in 12 volt mode. An important clue.)

The wiring to the new backup light was good, with no shorts, so I hooked it back up. I tested every hole in the 7-pin plug, and all operated the correct thing on the trailer. I achecked the power converter inside, and all was as it should be.

I finally found the problem. The ground wire in the 7-pin connector was not making contact. I'd love to blame someone for this, but the problem turned out to be a crimp connector I installed earlier, that pulled loose. I put another one on, and it doesn't budge. Everything is taped back up and working as it should powering from the connector plug with my 3-amp battery charger.

It seems that the trailer was grounding a bit through the hitch, but not good. The electric was backfeeding through the other connections, which made everything all crossed up. Dave K. tells me that the cruise control goes out when the third brake light stops working, so that makes sense too, other than the fact that it didn't start working again right away. Perhaps the ground through the hitch improved as I went down the road, and that's why the cruise control started working again.

List of planned Mods (Back on Page 13 of this thread) has been updated.

I went into the top vent of the 3-way fridge mod again today. I put a few final touches on the improved baffle that forces the air from the bottom section to travel over the vents better. I also installed a 3-inch 12-volt fan behind the grill in the top section. It blows out, sucking the air from the bottom section up through the vents and out. The folks at the popupportal site swear this helps the fridge cool down much quicker and that it keeps it about 10 degrees cooler. We'll see. For now, there is a greatly improved airflow. The fan was a little $10 computer fan I picked up at Radio Shack. It's quiet, and has three blue led lights that should help me find my camper at night as they glow softly behind the vent slats.

While at it, I included a quick disconnect, just in case I want to not use the fan for some reason. While tapping into the 12-volt, I added a car-type 12-volt socket in the bottom section, so I can plug in a spotlight if I need emergency or convenience lighting back there. There is also a 110 outlet in the bottom section for plugging in the 110 option of the 3-way fridge.

An interesting note. I had wired in the 12-volt socket previously, but it doesn't work when the camper is plugged into shore power. Apparently those 12-volt wires only work when the camper is getting it's power from the tow vehicle or auxiliary battery. I found another set of 12-volt wires in the compartment that were hot. Problem solved.

Tomorrow I'm popping down and caulking around a bunch of stuff Dave K. told me I needed to caulk around.

What a great day today. I went to Harbor Freight, and they had Duct Tape on sale!

Richard wrote:What a great day today. I went to Harbor Freight, and they had Duct Tape on sale!

Speaking of duct tape, there is a show on the history channel or discovery channel on the 101 greatest gadgets. Duct tape is one of them.

coolbreeze1 wrote:

Richard wrote:What a great day today. I went to Harbor Freight, and they had Duct Tape on sale!

Speaking of duct tape, there is a show on the history channel or discovery channel on the 101 greatest gadgets. Duct tape is one of them.

It should be at the top of the list, right up there with velcro.

Yes it should be at the top of the list. It worked well for my broken window. Not another piece of glass came out nor did it start a hairline crack. Now here is a kicker for you. In the middle of May I had scheduled a appointment to bring my 5'er. I am told it shouldn't be more than 2 days before I can pick it up. One week later, I e-mail them to find out what the problem is. They are waiting for the window to come in from the factory, should be here on the 22nd of July. One would have thought the window would have been ordered the day I made the appointment. Oh, well what do I know. Maybe I'll pay them in new $1 bills.

Does this mean you'll need a bunk in Miss Danger till then?

Richard wrote:Does this mean you'll need a bunk in Miss Danger till then?

Well I never seem to know when you want to go camping again.

OK, I've been at it again. You can see photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/29891611@N03/

I added shelves above the flip-over sink. They are shelf standards screwed to tension rods, with lightweight shelves sitting on them. Whole thing comes down and folds away in about a minute. Gives me tons of space to put stuff while camping, especially the food.

I wanted more counter space as well. The kitchen is on the street side front of the PUP, with the king bed right next to it. I cut 19 inches off the mattress and sewed the end up. Then I cut the cut-off piece roughly into thirds and sewed (by hand) covers for the three cushions. I got the idea from the split fold down rear seat in my wife's mini van. This way I can use just some of the bed space to store a cooler, or whatever.

The third big mod was to the 3-way fridge. I had already done the baffle improvement mod to improve air-flow from the bottom compartment to the top compartment. This mod forces all of the air that moves to move closer to the cooling coils on the back. The new mod involved going to Radio Shack and buying a 12-volt computer case fan and mounting it (blowing out) behind the top vent. It's very quiet and pulls a considerable amount of air over the cooling coils. It's 91 degrees outside this afternoon, yet my fridge is cooling down to 34 degrees. I have an off switch on the fan to keep from turning the fridge into a freezer at night or on cooler days. The off switch is actually a 12-volt car plug in and socket. I can plug a spotlight into the socket if I need light on that side of the camper at night. Oh, one more thing about the little 3-inch computer fan, it has blue LED lights which shine through the vents at night and look pretty cool (or pretty creepy), depending on your frame of mind. It will certainly help me find my camper at night.

The Cabellas space blankets that Chuck gave me are all worn out. I use them to cover the bunk ends on my pop-up. They did a great job of reflecting heat back in in the winter, and reflecting it out in the summer. But, alas, I could read the paper through them. The silver is gone, the plastic is gone. They would make decent window screens at this point. Rather than pay the high price of the name brand "Pop-up Gizmos" I went to Harbor Freight and got two small silver tarps on sale for under $10 for the pair. The silver isn't as silvery as the space blankets Chuck gave me, but we'll see how well they work. If they don't work, I'll be watching for a sale at Cabellas, as those old ones held up pretty well, even with extended UV light exposure. Likely saved a lot of wear and tear from the sun on my vinyl canvas as well. Thanks Chuck.

OK, I did a mod on the roof ac/heat unit. The part that is inside was hanging about a half inch down from the roof, which let the air out along the roof. This means I couldn't point it where I wanted it. I had already tried putting a few more (short) screws in, but they pulled loose as well. I have found a solution. I took two drywall anchors, and cut them to about 1/2 (maybe five eighths) inch long and pushed them into two of the holes on the end that is loose. The screws went right into them, and it's holding tight to the ceiling. The improvement in airflow is amazing.

You making me want to get out camping, share a cup of swill with you, and check out your mods

Alan, it's GREAT to see you back online and with the living. Hope you are healing nicely and being nice about it!

I am like you, I'm ready to camp! Maybe around Christmas, or sometime!

thanks, I am feeling much better. I think the doctor ordered some hammock time after a grilled hamburger lunch with my camping club! Yep that would hit the spot

Short screws Al, short screws.