Category Archives: General

What’s The Question I Get Asked a Lot?

05 Wednesday Jun 2024

Posted by in Accessories, Caravan Chronicles Shopping, Electrical, Maintenance, Reviews, Tool Bag

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“What’s in your toolbox when travelling?”

Tricky one… I don’t have a tool box anymore. I recently started mooching around the internet for a smaller tool box… or rather a tool bag. I used to use up until a few months ago a Stanley Tool Bag. It was lighter than a tool box, I could get more in it… and I could loose more in it too. I had tools at the bottom of that bag I thought I’d lost years ago.

The price of some of the ABS tool boxes, even the small ones took me back a bit. Which prompted the search for alternatives.

As most of my tinkering when out and about seems to be based on electrical, I ditched some of the other stuff…. well really returned a lot back to my workshop. That left me with a selection of tools that I wanted to take. In the workshop most of my tools are Wera, Snap-On, Klein, Knipex, Wiha and Channellock. Not the cheapest brands, but as a lot of my time was spent tinkering with aircraft back in the day, then you soon realise why some tools command a premium price. I still wince at the cost of a set of stainless steel wire wrapping tools for securing aircraft fixings.

So sorting out my ‘portable’ tools I tend to use semi-named brands. Mac do a half decent range of screwdrivers and a small plier and cutter selection. Cheap enough from B & Q (Home Depot) not to have nightmares when finishing something making sure you have picked up all your tools.

The next thing I needed was a bag to store them in. I had a specific size in mind to allow them to fit in one of the lockers of the 5th Wheel… this was to become my “mini- workshop” locker that also housed a box of specific spares for the 5th Wheel.

I do have a separate little bag containing tools for the e-bikes that is small enough to drop into one of the bike bags, but that is a bit specific to the MiRider bikes.

Buckets, Bags, Boxes…

I started looking at tool bags, One company bought my eye in the USA… they made tool bags and tool rolls out of old canvas fire hoses. I soon stopped looking when I saw the price… for what they were asking I wanted the fire engine the hose came from as well.

I spotted at the bottom of the Amazon page a company called Ryker. They seemed to offer a bag that was just at the right size and they also had tool rolls and tool pouches. I procrastinated for a few days trawling the web for something that might be better… In the end I didn’t find anything for the same price. Not the cheapest I found but had lots of good reviews.

So my portable tool collection is now housed in a small tool bag, small tool roll and two tool zip bags. It all fits in the storage locker on the 5th Wheel or in the tool compartment of the Amarok. It’s all light enough for me to carry it in one hand as well.

Take a Closer Look….

Yep crimp tools are the main thing in my bag… and a couple of types of wire strippers for different cable structures. For automotive use everything should be crimped, never soldered and heat shrunk. I’m still looking for a small portable heat gun (not a gas powered flame type) that can run on rechargeable or 12 volts. I know they are out there somewhere!

A selection of common screwdrivers along with a torque screwdriver so that terminal screws can be tightened to the required torque and not overdone. (If you have any dealings with Victron equipment, you will know they spec a torque for every connector!)

Above: A neat carabina clip containing 7 holders that allow you to easily store the most used hex bits. You can pop them out single hand and return the bit easily after using it. Saves routing round for the correct bit.

I carry two multimeters, now in their own cases inside the bag. One is a standard fairly cheap all round meter (left) and the other an AC /DC clamp meter that also can double as a general multimeter. Sometime having just one won’t cut it when fault finding. I’m undecided if I should switch out my general multimeter for one of my oscilloscope meters… so I can see CANBUS signals when fault finding. Same size so no storage issues.

If you think I missed out on hex bits…. well there is a full set in one of the tool bag pockets.

Let’s Roll With It…

OK this is still a work in progress… The Tool Roll.

Handy little roll actually. You can hang it up on the wall, it has a couple of removable pouches held in by velcro and a few clips to allow additional tool pouches to be added.

I used them to store 1/4 inch drive sockets and bits. The handles are stored in the first and second main pouches. Along with a 1/4 inch drive torque wrench that allows me to correctly tighten up larger terminals, including lithium battery terminals. My torque screwdriver is only rated up to 12Nm. I also have three 1/4 inch thumb wheels for hex bits for those hard to reach little places.

Next compartment is the long reach sockets. These allow you to slip on a socket and ratchet onto a long thread terminal or threaded rod. If you recognise the two sets…. the one above with blue handles and the long reach sockets……. they are Aldi / Lidl specials… each set was cheap as chips and if you look closely they are made by the same company that makes specialist tools for one of the major German tool companies. I recon buying these saved me about £120 over the named brand.

Finally some instrument screwdrivers… and a spirit level (Why?)

Last compartment… still working on it…. I did find my other pair of plumbers pliers though!

Finally…

Last two tool bags…

Odd collection of crimps and a full set of cable ferrules…. The spares box in the 5th Wheel has a full set of crimps… spare 13 pin plug, MelTruck EBS 24v 7 pin plug for the brake system, Fuses, Heat shrink, stainless fittings for the sun canopy, sets of stainless screws, cap head bolts, nuts, washers etc. If there is enough interest I’ll go through my spares box in a future article.

The business card style box (photo below) was a bit of a find. I was looking for removable draw organisers fr the workshop and after a lot of searching came up empty. However changing my search to ‘business card boxes’ found these… a box of 100 only cost me about £20 delivered. removing the lids and using them as trays as well gave me 200 storage compartments. I’m now on my second box of 100.

…. and you can never ever have enough tip ties…..

So that is a quick roundup of “What’s in my tool bag” thingy posts on you-tube. Not very interesting for 99% of people out there, but everyone seems to do it now and again.

So, I’ll bet the next question is…. “OMG love the bags where can I get them from?”

All available from Amazon…. I’m not affiliated with Ryker or sponsored by them, but I will get a few pennies if you absolutely can’t live without these and buy them through the links below. In the couple of months I have been using them I find that they are good quality, stitching and zips are up to mustard and the material seems to be hard wearing.

There are other similar products available if you follow the links on to Amazon, some cheaper too. You might find something that is more suited to your needs and price range, but have a look at tool bags instead of tool boxes. For me it was a bit of a game changer and space saver…. no to mention the weight and the fact I don’t need to get a big tool bucket or box out that contains everything.

#Tourfest North West

30 Thursday May 2024

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Donkey Creek Farm, Fifth Wheel Company, Weekend Break

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Tourfest North west was our first time attending anything like a gathering of bloggers, vloggers and the generally like minded. It was organised by The Caravan Addys with a little help from others I’m sure as it must be a time consuming task and hard work to bring everything together.

We opted to arrive at the wonderful Donkey Creek Farm a day early. We had planned to set off from our compound at around 12pm…. and part way round the M60 on the other side of Manchester Sue realised we had forgotten my Chemotherapy Tablets…. so we turned round and diverted back home.

Some where along the M61 we realised we had forgotten all the contents of the bread bin…. bagels, wraps, hoagies and sliced bread for the morning toast. Not that we would have had any jam… or honey as we had forgotten that too!

The next little disaster, notice I didn’t title this post as “Disaster at Tourfest”…. as some people do like a bit of click bate goings on. Turning onto Naze Lane less the half a mile from Donkey Creek Farm we picked up a chunk… well more of a small piece of steel in one of the rear tyres of the 5th wheel. Sue noticed it as soon as we stopped at Donkey Creek reception and it was defiantly flatter when we came out of reception than when we went in!

It doesn’t stop there…

On setting up we discovered we had also left my trousers at home too….

The first order of business was to sort out the puncture. I carry a 12 volt compressor and tried re inflating the tyre. I got it up to 50psi but I could hear a hiss, so I’d not just popped it off the rim. I didn’t really think I had but you have to try. I managed to find the offending bit of steel and wheedle it out of the tyre with my leatherman.

Looking at where it had entered the tyre I didn’t really fancy a repair as it was right between two tread blocks. So a replacement was needed. In the past I’d have jacked the caravan up, removed the wheel and set off to find a tyre shop. However I’m a bit hampered nowadays so we needed someone to come out to us. I asked at Reception and they recommended a local garage… J Townsend & Sons (01772632238). I recognised the name as sometime back in 1998/99 they had done a full service and brake replacement on my old Land Rover Discovery 1 when I worked at Warton. Small world.

I gave them a ring and they said they would be out to me in about 20 minutes, and they were spot on time. They jacked the 5th wheel up in the correct place and removed the wheel. We were asked if we were staying in the 5th wheel overnight and as we were, he left the jack and stand in place to ensure there was support for that axle. Not a lot of people would have left a 5T workshop trolly jack overnight!

I had a wander down a few pitches for a quick chat with Martin – The Caravan Nut and Mrs TCN… which was really useful as Martin is the fountain of knowledge when it comes to cleaning products. He confirmed the “The Pink Stuff” would be a great product to use to clean up and re-whiten all the locker handles on the 5th Wheel. That was really helpful as I’d been reading about all sorts of self made concoctions on the internet for cleaning yellowed plastic and non of them sat comfortably with me because of what they contained. I left Martin and Mrs TCN putting the final touches to the show room shine on their caravan.

The following morning Townsends gave me a ring, new tyre all done at a total cost of £108, which for two visits didn’t seem out of order for me. Graham – Caravan Vlogger will be pleased to note I did manage to torque my own nuts before setting off for home.

So the current situation is…

I have my chemo tablets, no bread, no trousers and a new tyre on the rig. What else could go wrong?

It was now Friday and the day of the great arrival . Even though it was slightly inclement weather wise we set up shop ready to mark the arrivals out of ten based on reversing skill, use or not of a motor mover, amount of gesticulating of the reversing assistant and repositioning as the significant other was not quite happy with the exact location on the pitch and finally speed of erection…. of the awning!

No we didn’t….. HONESTLY ! We didn’t.

While we were sat out Hey Ho Let’s Tow stopped by for a chat and I can honestly say they are a great genuine family, it was a pleasure chatting to them and generally talking about all sorts. Sorry no pics but I feel at some of these events the stop and chat should be just that and not seen as a photo opportunity… if someone asks then that’s OK.

Friday night we were all due to go to a local social club organised by Tony & Deb…. I suspect more by Deb from the The Caravan Addys. However overnight I had started bleeding from my stoma. By late afternoon it was rather bad….. in fact blue light to the nearest hospital bad…. we hung on a bit and it subsided somewhat but it nixed on me going out to the Big Meet Up, buffet, disco and dancing that evening. Overnight it stopped and I started to feel a bit better. We narrowed it down to my trousers of all things…. yep bloody trousers featuring in the blog again!. The belt line on my trousers had been rubbing on my stoma and actually started a small bleed that actually seemed a LOT worse than it was. Phew….. I have never seen Sue actually worried before about a medical issue despite her 35+ years in medicine.

Saturday the weather was finally playing along.

Sun and blue skies. Himself decided that maybe a bit of fresh sea air up the nostrils was required… before his next scheduled nap.

You can never have enough Siamese on the internet….. well that is what Henry says.

Graham – Caravan Vlogger and Mrs CV stopped by for a chat and a quick nosy round the 5th wheel. It was really nice chatting to Graham after a couple of years of ‘chatting’ on line. Again Graham is genuinely as he appears on his channel…. a really nice chap.

Saturday evening was a bit of an informal do with various caravaners gathering, I was still cautious as I didn’t want to restart the previous days medical event so we ducked out of that but plenty of people stopped by for a natter including a chap that had hot rods and currently had a hot rod truck…. I never got his name but was great to talk to about everything from tyres to engine oil.

Sunday there were. couple of departures the main core however departing on the Bank Holiday Monday. We had booked through to Tuesday as we thought it might be quite on the roads… which it was.

So that was our Tourfest North West 2024.

Would we go again… heck yes hopefully with Tablets, Bread and Trousers!

Are you sure you remembered to pack my nom noms… this is serious dude!

In a few days we are off again this time to Glastonbury for a week staying in at The Old Oaks…. Gives us chance to call in to Clark’s Shopping Village and get a new pair of casual shoes! Then on the way home we are stopping in North Wales at the 5th Wheel Company while they do a couple of jobs and extending the stay for a few days…. and just maybe I’ll be back on the bike for short little trips for morning coffee.

Isn’t technology wonderful. I’m sat here at the Christie Hospital undergoing 5 hours of chemo via a drip and infusion pump and editing this post on my iPad which I originally started writing on my iMac back at home after drafting it on my Mac while at Donkey Creek.

See you on the road!

A Few More Jobs Ticked Off The List…

01 Wednesday May 2024

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Blog updates, Donkey Creek Farm, Events, General, Mini Break, Projects, The Old Oaks

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Like any project, ticking the small stuff off a list is the way to move forward even if it seems like sometimes you have ground to a halt. A bit lacking on photos…. I’m temporarily unsure of their location… pilot speak for I’ve lost them! I’ll correct that in due course.

I built a new aluminium frame for the water pump and moved the pump from the original mounting position which caused a lot of noise when running, especially in the bathroom…. as we have a direct tank flush not a holding tank, this was particularly annoying if the loo was flushed at night. So now the water pump is mounted on its isolation feet on an isolated aluminium frame bolted directly to the sub-floor in one of the lockers. I also changed the piping from the pump from solid to flexible connections further reducing noise transmission through the pipes. My next step… some time this week is to install a larger one litre accumulator tank between the pump and plumbing to reduce the cycle times of the pump. Thankfully the plumbing system installed in the 5th wheel is rated for a greater pressure than most caravans and motorhomes… that’s what gives us a great shower!! so I’ll be able to match the accumulator pressure with the pump pressure to get the best out of them.

The other little upgrade was to move the grey water and fresh water dump outlets closer to the side of the caravan. They used to be set back about eight inches and required a kneeling mat and one arm dexterity to plug in the flexible waste pipes when on a fully serviced pitch. Now it’s a simple matter of bending over and I can easily access both outlets for connecting pipes…. saving the knees a bit of hard labour at my age is key. Also if dumping at a motorhome service point I can easily see if I’m in the correct position for a clean dump and not going to splash all over the place. As the Hanks say… “Let ‘er rip”

Thanks to my local nut and bolt supplier… Francis Kirk and Sons I’ve been going there for bits and pieces since 1976… I have now got a full set of stainless steel fittings… an odd collection of UNF and UNC sizes…. ready to replace all the nuts and bolts on the pull out sun canopy, replacing the original components that were showing signs of rust and starting to bind up. I also managed to get a set of tap and dies to run through all the threads before changing everything over.

We managed to get some of the picture frames mounted inside the caravan and that makes a huge difference…. along with upgrading the occasional side lights to LED dimmable units…. feels more like home with each little improvement.

Not long to wait now….

Looking forward to Tourfest North West in a three weeks time, 24th May – 27th May at Donkey Creek Farm and meeting up with some of the bloggers and vloggers I’ve followed over the years. Thankfully no one will recognise Sue and I so we can sneak off if it gets too rowdy . I believe it is now fully booked so if you wanted to go you will just have to wait until the next one.

A few days after that we are off to The Old Oaks at Glastonbury…. it’s been a few years since we were there so it will be nice to go back and see all the changes and improvements they have made. Hopefully we can get back out on our bikes again as well.

Happy New Year…

01 Monday Jan 2024

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Blog updates, Donkey Creek Farm, Gadgets, General, Projects

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Happy New Year to everyone, I hope you have a great touring year ahead.

I’d like to take this opportunity to give you a bit of an update on my personal circumstances and a look forward to a couple of projects I’m planning to kick off our year.

First…

… A HUGE thank-you yo everyone that messaged, email and posted about my cancer diagnosis. Things started off OK and I had a stent installed in my colon to stop it blocking and started chemotherapy. Before I got two cycles of chemo completed my body decided it didn’t like the stent and for what ever reason decided to try and pass the stent to the nearest exit. This resulted me being blue lighted in to Manchester Royal Infirmary on a Saturday afternoon. 24 hours later I underwent an emergency Laparotomy to remove the stent now firmly stuck where it shouldn’t be and part of my transverse colon was removed at the same time. Basically the section where the tumour was. A further five days on the High Dependancy Unit followed and another 13 days on a surgical ward. I remember very little of any of this…. basically I was on another planet drug wise. Apparently it was touch and go a couple of times as my colon was leaking into my body.

Part of the surgery included a colostomy, so now I’m learning to live with that. I was released home late on Christmas Eve so got to spend Christmas with Sue at home.

So far I’m recovering as planned. My body strength is slowly returning… I lost a lot of muscle mass bing in bed for nearly a month. My weight has dropped by around 31kg… so if you see someone dressed in 1980’s gear… it could well be me wearing some of my old stuff. I decided against the platform shoes and petrol blue patch pocket pants though!

I go back on the 10th Jan to The Christie Hospital for checkups and to see when I can resume my chemo treatment.

ONWARDS!

So we are still planning to attend Tourfest North West in May at Donkey Creek Farm and I’m looking towards our first trip away sometime towards the end of this month hopefully. It will only be local and for a couple of days initially.

Future Projects…

The first big one is a bit unusual. I want to add electronic side view mirrors to the Amarok. These are two screens that mount vertically on each of the A posts and link to cameras where your rear view mirrors are. However I’m adding a twist. I want to mount the rear view cameras on each side of the 5th wheel. This would mean that when looking to the rear view mirror on the passenger door of the amaro I not only see the rear view from the Amarok door mirror but also the rear view from the camera mounted on the side of the trailer. Not a big gain driving down the road you might say, but there are two huge advantages. The first is I will not need to fit extension mirrors to the Amarok when towing as the installed cameras and internal A post mounted screen combo will give me the required view coverage required by law. This has already been accepted and approved for commercial vehicles and coaches and is in use on the road already. To comply with regs though these will have to be connected via a Suzi between the trailer and truck. You cannot have wireless devices.

The second is when reversing I will always have a view down each side of the trailer no matter what angle the Amarok is the the trailer. This has huge advantages when reversing into pitches as effectively there will be no blind side reversing as the combination of rear and side view cameras will always allow me to see the three sides of the trailer.

The next project really is one I came up with while in hospital. My last ‘job’ was ground op’s supervisor at Manchester Airport, a job which occasionally meant I had to oversee the ground start of engines, push backs etc. To do this we used a head set plugged into the aircraft so we could talk to the flight deck. This got me thinking…. I have several Dave Clark headsets from my flying days and thought about adapting these for ground comms between someone directing reversing and the driver.

We have tried mobile phones, cheap hand held radios working on DMR Chanels and a couple of HAM handhelds programmed to an obscure frequency that hopefully won’t get me into trouble with the authorities , as my radio licence is for aviation operation, I gave up my ham licence in the late 70’s.

It’s just an idea that may or may not work out… I have the kit and all it will take is a bit of soldering and making up a small circuit board to get everything working. As I am on restricted duties ( can’t lift anything heavier than a cup of coffee or a ham sammich) for at least ten weeks, sitting at my bench in the workshop is not an issue and it gives me something to tinker about with for a while.

The third project is to get a 12 volt 50 Amp service from the Amarok into the 5th wheel. This is in preparation for installing a dc to dc charger if we decide to move over to lithium. If not we can still install a DC to DC charger for the current AGM battery bank we have. The move to lithium is not yet a proven case for us as we currently don’t do much off grid.

Lastly is installing a couple of big solar panels. Initially this will be to keep our current AGM batteries charged, so thinking about 800 watts should do it and this could be increased in the future. One thing we do have on the 5th wheel is plenty of flat open roof space. At this stage I’m thinking of flexible panels bonded to the roof rather than ridged panels as they weigh a lot less.

Unusually for me… and the blog, I might have to partner up with companies to get a couple of these projects completed as at the moment I’m not in any shape to go crawling round the truck or the 5th wheel. We will see how that progresses though.

Thanks again..

So again a HUGE thank you for all the emails, messages and comments. I apologise if you emailed or posted comments with technical questions and I haven’t replied, but I have been out of it for a while. A huge than-you too to the people that have bought me a cup of coffee via the link. I’m well on the way to covering the cost of paying for the hosting of the blog and domain name for another year.

Both Sue and I hope you all have a fantastic New Year and have a fantastic touring season. Stay safe and hopefully we will see you soon on a site somewhere.

Rack’em Up…

14 Thursday Sep 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Accessories, Bike Rack, Bikes, e-bikes, MiRider, Modifications, Projects, Sutton-on-Sea

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One of the huge advantages of having a 5th wheel caravan over a bumper pull caravan is the payload and space. It’s as good as a large motorhome… we have around 960Kg of payload available to use. One thing we wanted to do was move our two MiRider e-bikes into the ‘garage’ locker of the 5th wheel. Although I built a great rack for the VW Amarok towing a 5th wheel means I had to take that off. When I designed it I aways wanted it easily removable just in case I ever needed the full capacity of the pickup.

The garage space in the Dream Seeker is big enough to fit the two bikes without having to remove any wheels. On the pickup we already removed the seats and dropped the folding handlebars so this is the same with the garage space. I needed something that would allow me to ‘wheel’ the bikes in keeping the front wheels straight and at the same time retaining either one of the bikes in an up right position while the second bike is loaded.

I wanted something that could be installed and removed easily and could also be used in my workshop to store the bikes if required.

After a bit of mooching around the workshop I initially thought of using an old bike rack we had for the rear of our Land Rover Freelander…. a day spent disassembling and reassembling resulted in a heavy and awkward contraption that didn’t really do anything I wanted except hold the bikes.

Mk II

OK, time for coffee and a rethink. Day two. A flat sheet with rails seemed like a good start…. with a small end wall to stop the bikes going in to far…. extend the rails up the wall to hold the front wheels upright would work. I needed to leave a gap for part of the steel chassis of the 5th wheel…. a plan was forming… more coffee.

I’d worked out that if the bikes were 250mm apart, with the pedals folded and the handlebars folded they would pass each other with ease. I off set this slightly so the edge of the plywood would lie flat right next to the rear chassis cross member and left a gap so the short rear chassis rail would pass through the middle. The front wall was tapered either side so I could install the rack through the door vertically and then twist it 90 degrees to lie flat on the floor. To hold it in place I fabricated 4 aluminium plates that would drop onto the existing bolts in the rear chassis crossmember. These bolts were just long enough to allow me to drop a plate on and a second nut. This way I didn’t have to touch the original bolts… they were still to the factory torque.

I thought about clear coating the stand…. then thought about a brush on wax shaded to match the Dream Seeker’s woodwork…. In the end I use some old exterior white hard coat gloss… several coats in fact. One less old paint tin in the workshop! I think that it looks OK and installed in the garage looks bright and clean… for the moment!

I added a ratchet strap, secured at both ends and cut short enough to allow me to hold the bikes down but not get in the way when loading or unloading.

To stop the two bikes pulling together a simple length of oak with a round cut out in each end holds the bikes 250mm apart.

Fitting into the Dream Seeker was easy enough and I installed the fixing plates once I was sure everything fitted in OK.

The bikes fit in perfectly and are held securely. For security I have taken measures that secure the bikes directly to the chassis in two locations and with the bikes in the garage make it damn difficult to even get access to try and defeat them. Obviously I’m to going to show this.

Bikes installed…. and still a bit of space to fit locate the two seats and bike helmets. So off to Sutton-on-Sea soon to test them out!

P.S. While I was at it I also installed two 240 volt sockets in the garage so we can plug the chargers in if needed. Although my preference for safety is to charge the bikes outside the Dream Seeker. I installed the sockets near the opposite door so they will reach the bikes while they are under our awning…. or allow us to power an electric griddle plate under the awning. Always thinking.

A Great Upgrade…

29 Tuesday Aug 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Accessories, Gadgets, Modifications, Product Review, Vehicle Wiring Projects

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One of the upgrades I wanted to do to the Dream Seeker was to install a good rear view camera. Looking round for options it seemed that you could easily spend a lot of money and end up with something that didn’t achieve what you wanted in terms of reliability and quality.

I did a little research and found that there were options from several manufacturers on Amazon that would fit the bill that seemed to match my basic requirements of being reliable, good vision day and night and durable with the option to upgrade or add to the system in the future.

I chose a wireless AMTIFO kit, 1080P 7 inch LCD display with a range quoted as up to 320 feet with a 150 degree rear camera. I’m not doing unboxing or installation, although installation was really easy and all the hardware you needed comes in the box. The system also records onto an SD card (not included) and the screen can accept up to 4 cameras.

Quick note: I bought this from Amazon, I paid just under £110 for the screen and one camera. This is not a sponsored post and the link to it is here https://amzn.to/44pOB0x if you want to see it and you can also see my review on Amazon… I’m SP

Fitting on the Dream Seeker was quite easy… except I realised just how tall it was!… and it was wired to come on when the vehicle supplied power to the trailer. This means as long as the engine is running the camera is active. I may opt to change this in the future if I add more cameras and a screen in the caravan.

I set the angle of the camera slightly different to convention. Most people set them so they can see the rear bumper, I set it so the bottom of the screen is about two feet from the bumper. My thoughts are if an object is at the bottom of the screen I’m still two feet away and that is close enough! The secondary advantage this gives me is that the top of the screen is effectively seeing further behind… about a cars length in fact. Due to the height of the camera and the angle of view on the motorway for example I can actually see both lanes either side of me and this helps when judging when to pull in after an overtake as I know if I can’t see the vehicle I have overtaken I must be at least one cars length in front of it. Mind you I don’t do much overtaking!

Mounting The Screen…

In the box comes a couple of options for mounting the screen… fixed dash mount or sucker on the windscreen mount. I sat in the truck for ages moving the screen about… then thinking of moving the Sat Nav somewhere else so I could locate the rear view screen in its place. Then I had one of those “Doh” moments…. why not put it where the rear view mirror is as the mirror is really just full of caravan nose cap when towing. I know they do make mirrors with screens in them but I looked at a couple of these at the caravan show and they seemed really small… a honking seven inch screen on you mirror is much better IMHO. I’ve also discovered that located there its still natural to glance at it as you would normally look at your mirror and its also unaffected by sunlight reflections.

I came up with a simple solution that used a tiny elasticated cord and a pad…. it kept the screen off the mirror and gave enough room to angle the two small aerials downwards behind the screen. I installed a power feed via the roof lining and can simply unplug the screen and remove to stow safely when not towing.

Mounting it on the mirror also has a secondary advantage… I can angle the mirror so that Sue in the passenger seat can also see the screen… just incase!

I had never towed with a rear view camera before and after fitting I really can’t understand why caravan manufacturers aren’t fitting these as standard.

How’s It Working Out?

Picture is clear and bright, no drop out or freezing, there are options to change screen layout, number of cameras displayed etc. etc. Even my unconventional screen mounting with the two aerials pointing down doesn’t seem to affect things. The screen recording works great…. I can see this being a great help especially if you have side cameras to compliment your dash cam system in your vehicle.

Adding To The System…

I said that you can add to the system… up to 4 cameras. Well after using it for a few weeks now I will be adding a left and right side rear facing camera so I can see down the full length of the trailer, but first I think I will be adding a rear view camera on the pickup bed to make hitching up a lot easier.

Would I recommend a rear view camera?…. most definitely. Would I recommend this rear view camera?… well based on my experiences so far, yes. For the money… £110 is not a lot to invest in something like this.

Getting A Slide On…

04 Friday Aug 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Accessories, Amarok, Maintenance, Modifications, Projects, Tow Vehicle, VW Amarok

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After our trip out to Donkey Creek Farm I started procrastinating about the slide out bed we used to have in the Amarok. Did I need it… was it worth it….. should I put it back in? Well my body kind of made the decision for me after loading and unloading some heavy boxes from the bed reaching over the opened tailgate it kind of said “We ain’t doin’ that again big boy“.

I had to set about working out how to install the base of the slider in and around the Reese 5th wheel hitch and where it could be mounted. It also needed to be raised up 35mm so it would pass over the 5th wheel hitch cross rails and still allow me to pull the pins so the hitch could be lifted out if required.

I got lucky…. with only having to cut out the rear cross bar the slide bed would fit and the original mounting holes lined up with the holes I drilled in the truck bed when I first installed it. Next step was to fabricate some spacers to raise it to the correct height.

I just happened to have a couple of blocks of high density poly in black so cut 4 100mm long by 35mm wide slats to fit under the frame and drilled 10mm holes through them for the mounting bolts. A quick trip to Francis Kirk – my local engineering fastening company. (I’ve been going there since 1976 for all my fastenings) got me four M10 grade 8 bolts of the correct length… I even splashed out on coated ones and nylock nuts.

A test fit of the sliding frame allowed me to see where I needed to cut so it would clear the hitch. A bit of quick work with a four inch grinder and cutting wheel and it slid in without any problems. I needed to remove the original locking pin system and a couple of coats of black rust preventative paint on cut areas that I’d smoothed off with a fine grinding disc soon had the sliding tray ready to be fitted again.

I did a couple of other mods that allowed the ray to slide out further. Previously it only came out about an inch past the tail gate, now it comes out about 10 inches which will have a great advantage… more on that later.

It was now time to refit the decking and do some trimming as required so it would fit around the hitch.

I cut the sheet so that the section in the truck would remain in one piece and if I needed to the hitch could be lifted out and the cut section replaced giving me a full size sliding bed once again. I do like having options!

The trimming was actually quite easy. The board is Phenol faced marine ply and quite easy to trim. I gave all the edges, especially the new cut edges several coats of clear brush on wax and let it soak into the ply. I’ve found that this is usually better than any polyurathane edge sealant when it is in an area that is prone to dinks and abrasion. The wax penetrates quite a lot and soaks into the layers protecting them from water.

Everything was given a spray and rubdown with Boeshield as a protective against the elements and looks as good as the day I installed it.

Next little job is to find two waterproof boxes to mount on the sliding bed either side of the hitch for my recovery kit and straps. This is why I wanted to make the slide tray come out further than it originally dis so I would have better / easier access to the two “fingers” either side of the hitch.

I need some low profile narrow boxes 200mm wide, 200mm high and about 600mm long with a hinge lid. I did start looking around at what is out there but I suspect that they might need to be fabricated out of aluminium diamond tread plate.

A couple of bonus things…. there is enough space under the 5th wheel hitch to allow me to store two of the “Really Useful Box” company’s boxes under the hitch which will be fairly secure when the slide tray is stowed.

The second is there is now enough room under the sliding bed to be able to store some kit and it pulls out far enough for me to sit the Cadac on for a bit of tail gate BBQ’ing.

You Asked…

14 Friday Jul 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, Blog updates, Donkey Creek Farm, General, Towing, Uncategorized, VW Amarok

≈ 2 Comments

Well, I never expected so many questions as to the weight, size and towing our 5th wheel Dream Seeker. So here are the stats…. now these are for OUR Dream Seeker, and as each one is virtually custom made to the buyers specification, then there will be differences.

As our DreamSeeker is currently configured with an Avtex 4G/5G antenna on the roof it stands 2950mm tall (for bridge clearance my check is 3.2m minimum I would ever attempt and then only with a spotter).

From the rear bumper to the very front of the hitch, uncoupled, it is 7638mm long and 2292mm wide. Now that is not the whole story. The pin box (the bit that sticks out the front and connects to the 5th wheel hitch in the truck) can swing out of the way when on a pitch, so the actual length when pitched is 7517mm, so exactly the same as a 7.5m motorhome.

Now when we are hitched up to the truck, the effective length behind the vehicle becomes 6630mm, which is actually shorter than some twin axle bumper pull caravans.

The Weighty Stuff…

Our Dream Seeker runs on two 1500Kg rated axles and we have a MTPLM of 3750kg. So at max weight we would have 3000kg on the axles and 750kg on the hitch pushing down into the bed of the truck. The hitch in the truck is positioned directly over the rear axle so this mass bares directly onto the rear axle. Our Amarok is rated for 1000kg in the rear pickup bed so we are easily within limits.

Our Dream Seeker as bought was weighed and had 2210kg on the axles and 570kg on the pin hitch totalling 2780kg. If you subtract that from the MTPLM of 3750kg it gives us a user payload of 970kg.

The hitch is installed directly over the rear axle and has plates underneath connecting it directly to the chassis rails and suspension mounts. This Reese hitch is rated up to 800kg pin weight and 4300kg towing capacity.

Now here’s what confuses a lot of people… our Amarok is rated to tow 3200kg and we are hitching up a potential max of 3750kg…. 550kg more than we are rated to pull. Ahh pull… that’s the key word. The rating is based on the vehicle manufacturers tow bar pull capacity. With a 5th wheel hitch you are also carrying some of the weight so for every 1kg of weight that the truck carries on the pin hitch that is effectively deducted from what you are pulling. So at MTPLM of 3750kg I am carrying 750kg and pulling 3000kg (OK I know that we are moving a mass of 3750Kg but that is how the figures are assessed for 5th wheel towing… not a clue as how this calculation was decided on!)

GTW…. Gross Train Weight

On the face of it we are ok… however there is one last thing to take into consideration. GTW or Gross Train Weight. This is the absolute maximum weight the vehicle and trailer can weigh together in any combination of the mass being shared between the vehicle and trailer. Because we were approaching the GTM max for the Amarok if we had the trailer at MTPLM I wanted some extra safety margin and we opted to have the Amarok uprated to a GTM of 6400kg and the rear axle load rating increased to 2180kg. This was a fairly simple process that involved removing the hard rubber bump stops and inserting air bags, which are currently inflated to 7psi. They have increased the hight of the truck at the back be about 20mm but hitched up the truck and caravan are dead level. The only other thing is a new weight plate stuck to the door pillar of the Amarok. All the weight upgrade installation and paperwork were done by the wonderful guys at the 5th Wheel Company for us.

So there you are….

That’s it, on a pitch we are no longer than some motorhomes at 7.5 metres and when hitched up it is only 6.6 metres in additional length…. which is less than some single axle caravans!

As for drivability, well doing 60mph on the motorway and having big vans steam past at 70+ it doesn’t move or even impart any sideways forces I can feel when driving. Road bumps you can just about feel but no where as much as I could towing our single axle caravan.

On corners you just have to be mindful the the rear wheels of the trailer will scribe a smaller arc than the rear axle of the tow vehicle so for example a 90 degree left turn into a street means you need to move more to the right hand side of the lane before the left turn…. but all you class one HGV drivers know this and can definitely teach me a thing or two about 5th wheel driving.

And as for driving round tight spaces…. can you get your caravan 90 degrees to your car?

I’m still new to this and a blind side reverse does have your head swivelling a bit and I can now see why a lot of American 5th wheels have side mounted rear view cameras. I’m just getting used to the novelty of a rear view camera…. so all in good time.

Brakes…

The brakes are something else. They are Electric-Hydraulic units working on 4 massive drums. Once you get the feel of them and learn to keep an eye on the red LED in the truck that lets you know when the brakes are operating, then within a few miles it becomes instinctive. I can now judge how much pressure to apply to get the brakes to just let me bleed off a little speed or apply with some gusto then ease off so the LED goes out and we coast to a gentle stop without giving Sue whiplash at the moment we do stop. I have not tried an emergency stop and intend trying to drive so that I never have to.

While we are still on the subject of brakes…. yes it does have a handbrake that works on all four wheels and like on you over run break away cable we have something similar…. it’s a cable that is attached to a switch… pull it out and a separate 12 volt lead acid battery powers the hydraulic pump and applies pressure to all four drum brakes and maintains that pressure. The other end of this safety cable is clipped exactly as you do a normal break away cable to a secure part of the vehicle. In my case the floor mounting rails of the 5th wheel hitch.

PS…

I’m currently writing this sat in our Dream Seeker at the wonderful Donkey Creek Farm near Freckleton. It’s one of those sites that I don’t want to tell you about so I can just keep it to ourselves. (and no, before The Caravan Vlogger ask’s…. this isn’t a sponsored link!)

EOE (Errors and Omissions Excepted) As I said earlier these figures are based on OUR Dream Seeker and OUR Amarok do not take any of these figures to be a basis of working out any load capacity for any potential vehicle or caravan purchases. Speak to your vehicle dealer and caravan dealer.

The Big Reveal…

28 Wednesday Jun 2023

Posted by in 5th Wheel, e-bikes, General, Motor Home, Rhuallt

≈ 7 Comments

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I think one or two of you might have already guessed… we have bought ourselves a 5th wheel caravan. (Was it the pickup that gave it away?) So here it is…

Why a 5th wheel?

We decided that as we have now both fully retired that we would like to change the style of caravanning from a few days in one place then returning home to more of a few days somewhere…. then a wander somewhere else for a while then maybe move on again over a period of a couple of weeks before returning home. We can (and have) done this with our old caravan but packing up and then pitching again was becoming a chore for multiple stops. So we started looking at motorhomes as these had the advantage of more payload and a bit more elbow room. Something else we wanted to do was store our e-bikes inside rather than secure them outside when on site.

However when the cost of a suitable motorhome started to creep well above £100K…. we dismissed all the UK built motorhomes as most are just a caravan dropped on a chassis with an engine. So A-class it was. We looked at Carthago and really liked the c-line but my wallet went into cardiac arrest. We could cut costs a little if we cut some of our requirements and on top of that adding a vehicle that we could tow. It meant we were looking at the thick end of £150K. On top of this would be the cost of a towed vehicle and the decision to either flat tow or trailer. I believe that flat tow can be a bit of an issue in some European countries, but that might be hearsay. The yearly cost of two services, MOT’s, Insurance was also a big factor.

We started looking again at caravans with a new vision. The problem was for me, writing this blog for over 12 years now, I was a little nervous of investing in the mainstream UK offerings. It also left us with the original reason for changing over to a motorhome – the convenience of it all, that was still in our minds.

We had known about the 5th Wheel Company in North Wales for a long time, in fact a few years ago we sat in both a Celtic Rambler and a Dream Seeker at the Yorkshire Caravan Show and I had a bit of an affair moment with them. However back then we were still towing with our Land Rover Freelander (which we still own and is still going strong!) and the cost of a pickup and a 5th wheel was just not within our budget. But my brief dalliance with the 5th wheel remained in the back of my mind.

Just before we went to Sutton-on-Sea we had talked about maybe a 5th wheel instead of a motorhome. It has the load capacity (with this one we have about 950Kg available) plenty of elbow room, storage and it only requires servicing… no MOT or vehicle insurance only caravan insurance, this time we already have a pickup so no need to change vehicles. It is fitted with a 250 litre fresh water tank, grey tank, still uses a Thetford Cassette for the loo (so no issues trying to dump a black tank) so is exactly the same as a motorhome in a lot of ways. Plus it has a slide out for that all important elbow room (I’ll refrain from saying ‘enough room to swing a cat’ as Henry might be lurking around)… I’m getting ahead of myself.

I dropped an email to 5th Wheel Company asking if they could put us on a list just in case they had any pre loved units come in for resale. A few days later George from 5th Wheel emailed me back that they just happened to have both a Celtic Rambler and a Dream Seeker coming in and sent me the details they day we departed for Sutton-on-Sea.

Long story short… we received an email while we were in Sutton-on-Sea from George at the 5th Wheel Company letting us know they were having two opening days and asking if we would like to come along. The first one was Friday the day after we were due to return home from Hanworth Country Park.

5th Wheel Company Open Day

Friday was warm and clear blue skies and the run out from Manchester to Rhuallt was rather pleasant with light traffic. We were a bit early so stopped for a coffee at a service statin that overlooks the North Wales Expressway and parked looking at all the caravans and motorhomes passing by in both directions. I’ve aways wondered why so many caravans and motorhomes only seem to have one bike… there seemed to be a lot more with one bike that two and of course there were camper vans that looked like support vehicles for the Tour de France with six or seven on the roof or hung off the back.

When we arrived we were met by George and shown into the main showroom and offered coffee’s. We chatted to the couple manning the coffee table and discovered they had just sold their 5th wheel and bought an Inos caravan. Sorry I can’t recall their names. We had a look round the Dream Seeker and then the Celtic Rambler. For us, the Dream Seeker seemed the right ‘fit’. Although the Celtic Rambler has a larger bedroom we actually preferred the layout of the main living space.

The previous owners had opted for a few extras, a twin 11 kg Gaslow system with external filling point, twin 110Ah batteries and a 15 foot Carefree awning as well as a leather upgrade, Nature Pure water tap and a few other bits were included. Simon came over and introduced himself and we started chatting, answering my growing list of questions. He asked if we would like a test drive of a unit that had outside. It was a customers unit that they had permission to use. We hopped in and Simon took us out for a short run and then we swopped over and I had chance to get the feel of pulling just over 4 tonnes of Celtic Rambler. The unit was fully loaded with the customers belongings so it was a good test of reality. My honest opinion was to be a bit underwhelmed… I don’t know what I expected but it was such a non event towing it round small welsh backroads, through a couple of small villages and honestly the roundabouts, I didn’t even feel I was towing. OK the performance reflected that there was 4 tones back there but handling was no problem and even accelerating onto the Expressway, put your foot down it still went. Probably a bit better than some of the large motorhomes.

We got back and went and sat in the Dream Seeker again…. with another coffee. We spoke to Simon about figures, weight’s, costs etc and had another wander round.

The Drive Home…

The drive home was a little busier and full of conversations about what to do. Late afternoon and I think the whole of the North West was descending on North Wales. The queue round Shotton and back to the M56… and on the M56 was horrendous. Thankfully we were heading in the opposite direction.

That evening I emailed Simon to ask if he could just check the door opening size of the garage, Sue wasn’t convinced we could get out bikes in, I kind of thought we could but best to make sure.

Saturday morning Simon emailed me back a photo of the door with all the sizes on it.

I emailed him back simply saying…. “Put a Sold sign on it”.