I'm assuming that you've been wondering about my whereabouts. Suffice it to say, work went to hell in a handbasket...I lost my cool at work after being antagonized by one of my subordinates for weeks. She is one of the passive-aggressive types and only works enough to LOOK busy. I challenged her on a work assignment and she turned on her hystronics and started yelling, crying, and accusing me of all sorts of crap. I just lost it and started yelling too. I shouldn't have, but I did. That being said, I "fired" myself--my boss and I are switching jobs. She's way tougher than I am, so the subordinate is in for a surprise. We'll do the switch on the 24th of April.
But I had a great day today, and I got Foo Foo ready for the shake down run. My neighbor, Sterling, said I should go ahead and bring her home and get rid of the antifreeze. I hooked up the "city" water and added water into the tank and figured out how to dump that quickly by flipping the lever in the water service area. I ran out all the antifreeze from all the faucets. Then I filled it up again, and tried to use the water pump. I went over and over the directions, making sure I'd already opened the valve for the hot water heater. But with no city water, I had no water. I could hear the pump running, but nothing was happening. So I turned it all off, and went through all the directions again. Still no water, but the pump is running. What am I missing? I looked at all the pictures in the book again, and one of them showed yet another valve by the pump. Now the pump is under the bed, so Sterling helped me move the mattress, and then I unscrewed two screws on the bed platform. Sterling and I are staring at the pump, when he sees the valve. Not in the same place as the picture, but there it is. He flips the valve. So I go back to the panel, and hit the pump and it works! Yea!!! So we put the platform back into place, screws back in, and put the mattress back down. So now there's tank water working. So next is the hot water heater. I had already flipped the bypass valve such that the water flows into the tank. I also went outside and flipped the TP lever and water was coming out so that's all good. I turned on the electric water heater and now to wait. I also turned on the fridge to electric and waited. But nothing was happening. Hummmmmm...then it hit me. Well, DUH...I'm not hooked to shore power! And the generator is not on either! Double DUH! So I then went around and turned on the propane. That was a bit of an issue too, as it started to blow out frozen gas from the valve. So i turned it off, went back to the book. There is some semi convoluted sentence about venting. So I go back to the tank, and turn the valve on again...the "venting" stops. I try turning it off and on again, and this time there's no venting. I then checked the line for leaks by painting soap water on the lines. All is well. So I go back inside, and I first check the stove...all three burners light. Then I go to the panel and turn on the gas power to the hot water heater. And finally, I turn on the fridge. I went outside and checked the hot water heater and there's a nice blue flame burning. Yea again! So then I start to put away a bunch of things I brought out to the RV, working for about a half hour. I checked the hot water at the faucets..and voila! There's hot water. And the fridge is getting cool. So I have water, I have fridge, hot water, and a working water pump! All is well, and she's ready for the trip.
So lastly, I wanted to be sure I could do all the steps for emptying the tanks. So I get my hose out, hook it up and pull the valve of the grey tank. Aint nothing but water in there so I let it go down the gutter. I empty out the grey tank, then thought I should just pull the black lever and make sure it worked. There was nothing in the black tank except the water I put in there after the additive. So I pulled the lever and out comes minty fresh blue water. So I close everything back up. I drain the hose, and put it back away. So I then lock everything up outside, turn off the propane, ensure there's nothing left to fall over on the inside, and finally I drove her back to the lot. I am ready to go get her on Wednesday after work, park her outside the house, cool down the fridge, and load her up for Thursday. I am oh so ready to go...Just gotta get to the store on Tuesday night for vittles.
I know how to turn everything on, plug everything in, and spend the night Thursday night. I always knew the best way to learn is by doing...and this RV is certainly proving that theory! So combine that OJT with my having written down everything I could think of, it should be a piece of cake come Wednesday.
Hope you are all doing well. I will catch up on the many postings I have missed in the last two weeks once I am settled into the campsite this weekend! (Oh it is so cool t be able to say that....)