POG Member Finally Acquires NICE BUS!

[MangoMike]

Congrats to Fred Lloyd and wife Robin on their new '97 Liberty.

NICE BUS Fred.

Happy Trails.

mm

[dale farley]

Mike, I see this also means congrats are in order for the seller of that bus since you are retired from the TBC. I am happy for you.

[Ray Davis]

Most excellent! Woohoo!

[BrianE]

http://videosift.com/video/Plop-plop-fizz-fizz-oh-what-a-relief-it-is-Alka-Seltzer

Way to go Mike!

Good job Steve!

[truk4u]

Congrats Mango, now that upgrade is in your future!

[michaeldterry]

Congrats to Fred Lloyd and wife Robin on their new '97 Liberty.

NICE BUS Fred.

Happy Trails.

mm

What is Fred's POG ID/membername?

[rfoster]

A Big Congrats to all.

There will be Jerk Chicken in every pot!

[MangoMike]

The Mothership transfer to another happy owner was accomplish thru the negotiating & support skills of Steve Bennett at California Coach. Steve probably has facilitated more happy POG bus matches than anyone, and as far as I know each matchup has worked successfully. I can't say enough good things about Steve and his team.

A special thanks to BrianE and Beverly for gingerly transporting the Mothership across the country convoy style. Brian driving the Mothership and Beverly driving their bus. I'm sure at times the conversation across the CB was very interesting. They were able to make this happen while I stayed on the job helping to pay for all these toys.

Good luck to Fred and Robin as the Liberty was a great bus for our family and I hope it generates as many memories for them.




Fred is FLLOYD on the board.

[JIM CHALOUPKA]

Congratulations, Fred and Robin on your new acquisition and to you Mango on leaving the Two Bus Club.




JIM:)

[rmboies]

Congratulations Fred and Robin, you will enjoy this bus, it is a nice one! Mango, it's lonely over here in the TB club now that you have resigned.......

Debi and Bob

[garyde]

Another POG member is always a good thing! Congradulations to Fred and Robin on your Liberty . Mike also deserves high five's for being the most patient and long time member of the TBC . I guess this means he won't be at the next TBC social.

[flloyd]

http://www.qrz.com/gifs/adventure.jpg

Howdy folks, like any good adventure, this one starts out with equal parts of terror and excitement. Our 6 hour drive from Steve's place back to Phoenix only took 17 hours! It wasn't the bus's fault, however, as Interstate 10 was closed and we were forced to detour at Cochella over to I-8 and a few hours of sleep in a Yuma truck stop (no bedding, not extra clothes, and no clue). When dawn broke, we headed for Phoenix and stopped in Buckeye for some breakfast. Shortly thereafter, finally back on I-10, we got pulled over by the highway patrol. It was a construction zone with very uneven, narrow lanes. The cop said "he saw me swerve and wanted to make sure I was OK". After reviewing my license and registration (existing Montana), he told me that "Lots of folks drive coaches just like this one and are carrying lots of passengers". Translation: he was looking to see if we had a bus load of illegals. He wrote us a warning ticket and we were on our way. We arrived home a couple of hours later without incident.

The bus ran extremely well. I can't say enough positive about the OTR Air. Robin was freezing and I was smiling.

Once home, I plugged right into my shiny new 50-amp outlet and fired up the Cruise Airs. Within about an hour, the rear unit shut down due to overpressure. A while later, the front unit shut down too. The two center units (port and starboard) are running fine. For the past 2 days, we've been struggling like crazy with the heat. It has been about 112 degrees since we arrived home.

Once the sun goes down and the temps drop below 100, the front unit will start working again and the rear as well, but not for long. Something is wrong here. We're parked on a residential street here next to my house on asphalt. Yes, it's damned hot but, why do 2 units work and 2 not? I can't figure it out. I also can't seem to figure out where they are located. I can tell that two units are up front, behind the bumper but which two these are seem a mystery. I tried running a large shop fan today pointed into the front grille and the forward unit managed to run most of the morning, then shutting down when we hit 105 outside. The rear unit gave up much sooner. All 4 units work, but only, it seems, when the temps are under 100.

So, while this is going on, Robin and I are preparing for our first trip. Like almost everything I buy, my first task is to start making modifications. My first project is to add a flat panel TV, and a new dash stereo with Bluetooth, Satellite radio, and aux input (Ipod). This is taking some time, mostly because it's SO DARNED HOT IN THERE.

http://www.qrz.com/gifs/Modifications2.jpg

Anyhow, if anyone can help me figure out what's going on with these Air units, I would be all ears. Hope to meet you all in Kerrville, and hope it's cool there :-)

Oh yes, I'll post some "after" pictures when the job is done. Trust me, I know what I'm doing. :-)

-fred

[dmatz]

Fred

Are you sure its over pressure and not low pressure. Low pressure would indicate a refrigerant leak or clogged air filter low air flow for some reason. Another low pressure cause could be a clogged expansion valve. High pressure is an indication of clogged condenser coil, bad condenser fan motor, a bad fan capacitor could also be the issue. Hope this helps.

[flloyd]

Fred

Are you sure its over pressure and not low pressure. Low pressure would indicate a refrigerant leak or clogged air filter low air flow for some reason. Another low pressure cause could be a clogged expansion valve. High pressure is an indication of clogged condenser coil, bad condenser fan motor, a bad fan capacitor could also be the issue. Hope this helps.

The controller indicates HP, so I'm thinking it's High Pressure.

Correction: It said HI/PS

[rmboies]

From Bob:

Congrats on your new coach, it is a nice one, we used to own it.

There are two cruise-air units behind the front bumper of your new bus. The other two are located in the bays. In the first bay, on the rear wall there is a cover with four screws, take the cover off and you will see one cruise-air there. The other is behind the TV in the second bay on the passenger side which you can also see from the first bay after you remove that cover. From there, you should be able to tell which ones are running correctly. Turn one on at a time and you should be able to narrow down your problem. I think the one that cools the bedroom is the one in the first bay but 5 years ago is a long time for me to remember and am getting old and senile, suffering from that CRS disease :-)

I bought an H3-45 in Phoenix one year with cruise-air, it was over 100 degrees and they would not cool the bus. Once I got east of the MS, and the temps were below 100, they worked great.

Hope this helps

Bob (with Debi typing :-)

[truk4u]

Fred,

Glad to see you found the right bus, especially a Liberty. The Mothership is a good one and you will enjoy the ride. You've got good advice here and the Cruisairs are using R-22, so any HVAC guy with the Cruisair specs should be able to help you out and determine what the problem may be. High head pressure is a sign of clogged or dirty coils, but Doug already pointed that out.

Oh by the way, have you checked your "Jerk Chicken Limited Warranty"?:p

[jack14r]

I have found that most cruise airs have been overcharged,if you do not know how to charge them get an HVAC tech to get the suction line as cold as possible(I can usually get them to 45-50 degrees)use a infrared thermometer to measure the temperature.This will get the unit to the correct freon level as well as the coolest temperature.I also believe that the condensing and evaporating coils should be cleaned as well,welcome and good luck.

[MangoMike]

Fred,

Here are some shots that show the location of two of the cruise airs, behind the entertainment center. One is for the bedroom.
6774

6775

6776

6777

6778

6779

6780

[grantracy]

FWIW just had my a/c's serviced ,was getting a HI PS on forward unit going down the road...turned out it was overcharged.

[MangoMike]

Granvil's been known to be overcharged on numerous occasions.

[flloyd]

Fred,

Here are some shots that show the location of two of the cruise airs, behind the entertainment center. One is for the bedroom.


Great photos, thanks.

Last night I stayed up late and after 11PM local time, I actually had all four units running and the coach cooled down. At 1:am the thermometer on the back porch said 93 degrees and all was well. They were all still working this morning at 9:am with the temperature now around 97 and climbing quickly. 100 degrees seems to be the cutoff point from practical experience.

This morning I opened up the front bumper and had a look at the two forward units. They are showing their age but they don't look particularly clogged with derbis. It seems to me that if a pair of electric radiator fans were installed in the front grill that that compartment could be pressurized to gain some cooling. That's a project, however, and it's too hot to entertain any project (working outdoors) right now. After reviewing all of my cooling options, the complexity and cost, I think I've found the answer. I need to get the coach out of Arizona right away. Just about anywhere north of here will be less than 100 degrees and all of these problems will go away. I didn't buy the coach to use in the desert heat, I bought it to escape it. It's just ironic that the heat has us trapped here at home as we prepare it for the (cooler) road.

In the process of looking behind the front bumper, I think I found what was left of the front temperature sensor for the on-dash indoor-outdoor thermometer. I'd love to replace that if I only knew which part to use. The good news is that the indoor temperature display works well.

Last night, I completed the installation of the new dash radio (a Kenwood) and got everything put back in its place. It was quite a task getting the wiring down the left front pillar and into the dash. In the end, it worked out well, however. For only a few hundred bucks, it's nice now to have in-dash satellite radio, hands-free bluethooth phone, an iPod connector and an aux input from the television audio which sounds darned good coming out of the overhead salon speakers.

Also on the list today is the repair of the drivers main window shade. It had slipped on the roller and was binding to one side (which can be seen in my earlier photo, above), and so I had to remove the thing. It appears that the double sided tape used to hold the canvas on the roll had decomposed and the whole assembly is coated now with a clear, greasy/sticky residue. Hopefully, I can clean up the messy gunk, re-tape the canvas to the tube, and affix it squarely to the roll so that the shade comes straight down.

On another front, I'm trying to figure out which relay controls the Tivoli lights because it appears that they're out now as well. It's about time that I became friends with the Liberty tech support hotline.

Also, I'm hoping to install a Wilson cell booster. The hardest part about that is getting the inside antenna 20 feet away from the outside antenna. When I removed the rear TV last night, I discovered two labeled, unused pieces of 75-ohm TV coax. I may try and use this for the indoor (low power) part of the Wilson system. It's an impedance mismatch (1.5:1) but it might just work. It's worth a try. Fortunately, the coach came with a cell antenna already on the roof, which should work OK for the high power side of the Wilson. Wish me luck on that one :-) The Wilson amp is actually lower priority than the other items and I may not get it done before we hit the road (maybe next week).

The last major hurdle is the horrific jumble of TV antenna cables, splitters, filters, and IR repeaters in the overhead cabinets. This coach has gone through three different satellite systems, a number of accessory upgrades, who knows what. There is a lot of dead wiring up there from previous equipment that was just cutoff and abandoned. Some of the wiring was done extremely well and some, well, can be colorfully described as "bailing wire and duct tape". The good thing is that nothing is insurmountable and/or out of the ordinary for a coach that has had some good use and seen a lot of change over time.

I would be very pleased to learn just which one of these is connected to the outside over-the-air antenna. In some places, the Liberty factory cables are labeled and those are a godsend. Other, aftermarket cables however, are a crap shoot. Sorting them all out isn't really that much of a problem, except that the cabinet where all of it is mounted has no access panel. It's all a "reach in and feel" experience where you pull out something and stare at it in amazement. Thank goodness I have almost 40 years of radio/TV/electronics experience to draw upon. Otherwise, well, you know the drill.

Overall I"m still very excited and am enjoying putting my own personal mark on it. I'm sure it will serve me well. I hear that the coach was previously referred to as "The Mother Ship". Right now, we're going to be calling it "The Zed", which is the popular nickname for my online business.

The adventure continues....

[JIM CHALOUPKA]

All sounds good Fred, you've gotten a real good start on things.

Wondering about Ham Radio, where and when will you install a rig?

I don't remember, do you have a rear carousel closet?

JIM:)

[flloyd]

All sounds good Fred, you've gotten a real good start on things.

Wondering about Ham Radio, where and when will you install a rig?

I don't remember, do you have a rear carousel closet?

JIM:)
Yep, we have the rear carousel. "it's hot back there" :-)

No decision yet on the ham radio, but I was actually thinking of installing one in the outside entertainment center.

-fred

[JIM CHALOUPKA]

Good deal, I am in the midst of my installation, using an Tar Heel antenna on their power lift and lay mounted over the rear area above the carousel.

In the stbd corner in the closet there is an access panel to the A/C for cleaning. In there you have access to the roof framing and skin through which enters the coax.

Below that area is a chamber behind my bedroom radio and a couple light switches into which I am mounting an Icom 7000 with the remote front panel, next to the repositioned radio and a couple light dimmers. The antenna controls will also be there.

Haven't exactly figured where the power will be coming from, but there are two extra 12v #12 wires in that radio space. I believe they are fused in port bay 2 and I feel that is a little far away? That space is also near both my battery sets, just haven't finalizes what to do.

I also have a coax switch to mount, I think in the closet, to send a signal down to the entertainment area for outdoor use of the radio.

I modified the 1/4" SS lift and lay base plate with additional SS to span roof ribs and will bond that base plate to the roof with Sikaflex-292. There will be no through the roof penetrations except for the coax and two multiwire cables to lift and tune the antenna. All of the wires will enter through one hole off to the side through a marine fitting named; Thru-Dex, DX-3 by Newmar.

If any of this is of interest to you I will post pictures.




JIM:)

[dale farley]

Fred,

If you don't already have one, you may want to get a cable tracker for locating wires in the bus. The kit contains a small signal generator and a tracer. Several of us have the cheap one from Harbor Freight ($23), and although it isn't a professional unit, it is well worth the money. I used mine a couple times last week chasing wires for my satellite system. This is a link to it: http://www.harborfreight.com/catalogsearch/result/?category=&q=cable+tracker

[MangoMike]

Fred,

You also want to make sure the rocker switch on the dash for "Shutters" is in the open position to make sure there is proper cooling at the front bumper for the Cruise Airs.

Also - colorfully described as "bailing wire and duct tape". - Is B-O-B' xx work.

Mike

[rmboies]

Mango, everyone who has a farm knows that bailing wire and duct tape are two essential items :-)

Bob via Debi

[merle&louise]

Congratulations to Fred and Mango.

Fred,

You are going to love the Wilson Cell Dual antenna amplifier. I installed one and we had cell coverage as far north a Summit Lake in the Yukon Territory! That is the best money I have ever spent on a piece of electronics. It is worth its weight in gold!

Enjoy that Liberty; it is a beauty!

[GDeen]

Fred,

Since this is an area of your personal expertise, some of us with the more "vinatage" A/V components would look forward to a an article about some of your system upgrades. While lower on my to-do list, I still have VHS tape player and non satellite radio or Ipod ready receivers. Some of that is easy enough to figure out, but you guys who can do it with your eyes closed and know the short cuts are a true asset to a group like this.

Enjoy your new Liberty! I bet if that coach could talk, the stories it could tell.....

[flloyd]

Well, I'm very pleased to report that for the past two days all four CruiseAir's have been running non-stop, with no high pressure overloads. Two things seem to be responsible for this. First, the temperatures have been below 105 for the past couple of days. Second, it seems that once the coach gets cooled off, it's a lot easier to keep it that way. Never let it heat soak.

Yesterday, I started the generator and switched the AC's over to it for about an hour. There were some times when the load made the generator groan quite a bit and the line voltage took quite a hit, down below 110v. I'm thinking that 4 of these things really take more than 20kw should they all start at or near the same time. Shutting two of them down seemed to make the Kohler a lot happier.

The front end A/V redo took most of the week. I have completed the new stereo and the flat panel TV, and installed the Wilson Amp. I removed about 50 feet of add-on wiring (mostly in shorter lengths) from the overhead area and it cleaned up very nicely. I'm glad that Liberty pre-wired the rear bedroom with dual antenna cables because I did use one of them for the Wilson. Since I'm in the metro area here it won't be possible to test the thing until I get way out of town, but at least there are no red lights - all three green, on the unit. The bus came with an old 900mhz cell phone antenna on the top and I tapped into that for the Wilson input. Can't wait to see if it works.

My new TV is a Samsung 22" flat panel. It covers the hole vacated by the old unit very nicely. I bought a low-profile hanging mount at Wal-Mart and put a piece of 3/4" birch plywood across the front of the TV hole to hang it. It looks great after a little flat black paint to hide the fresh wood that was barely visible around the edges.

The last thing I want to get installed is a Silverleaf engine monitor. I bought the -120 model on eBay for $250 and although it has a small display, it seems to work well. It was new. The problem is where to put the thing. There seems to be no place on the dash and few choices around the cockpit in general. I might place it on the left side wall but I hesitate as doing so would mean puncturing the upholstery there. Also, it's not a great place for viewing when you're trying to keep your eyes on the road.

One of the final things I want to look into is a small bit of leaking oil on the engine. It is a tiny amount for sure, but it does make quite a mess and I'm not sure just how important it might be. I'm going to post a picture of it in the Busted Knuckles section to try and elicit some expert POG advice.

-fred

[Jon Wehrenberg]

Fred, Just a comment on the Cruise Air loads. Each of mine draws approximately 13 amps. Start up the current draw may spike at as much as 35 amps or thereabouts, but it is momentary. These values are at 120 volts, at lower voltage such as on some poor shore power outlets you will see higher amps.

Shore power is 50 amps at 120 per leg or 100 amps at 120. Our 20 KW generators actually make more power available (167 amps) so running four cruise airs at one time will not even be a challenge. If your generator bogged down under that load it is likely it has only seen light usage. If you run it often under reasonably heavy loads it will clean up the carbon from running lightly loaded and it will perform much better. Don't be surprised to hear and feel it stumble as you load it up, but expect its performance to be smooth and powerful as it gets more and more exercise, especially heavy loads. Avoid running a generator for long periods lightly loaded.

Even when hooked to 50 amp shore power running all four Cruise Airs will be a challenge. If you have the HW heater it will draw about 9 amps. Just the refrigerator and the typical small loads we never think about will add up to about 5 amps, and if throw on a bunch of lights your inverters will ramp up the charge to your batteries and can easily add 15 or 20 amps to your current draw. With four Cruise airs running on shore power you can see how easy it will be to trip a shorepower breaker.

I limit my current draw by managing my power to a maximum of 40 amps, aiming for less if practical. 50 amp breakers (all size breakers actually) are good for continuous loads up to 80% of their rating, and over that the risk of tripping a breaker goes up significantly. So whenever I am in doubt about the shore power I do not hesitate to use the generator because it will give you about 83 amps per leg.

[flloyd]

Fred, Just a comment on the Cruise Air loads. Each of mine draws approximately 13 amps. Start up the current draw may spike at as much as 35 amps or thereabouts, but it is momentary. These values are at 120 volts, at lower voltage such as on some poor shore power outlets you will see higher amps.

Shore power is 50 amps at 120 per leg or 100 amps at 120. Our 20 KW generators actually make more power available (167 amps) so running four cruise airs at one time will not even be a challenge. If your generator bogged down under that load it is likely it has only seen light usage. If you run it often under reasonably heavy loads it will clean up the carbon from running lightly loaded and it will perform much better. Don't be surprised to hear and feel it stumble as you load it up, but expect its performance to be smooth and powerful as it gets more and more exercise, especially heavy loads. Avoid running a generator for long periods lightly loaded.

Even when hooked to 50 amp shore power running all four Cruise Airs will be a challenge. If you have the HW heater it will draw about 9 amps. Just the refrigerator and the typical small loads we never think about will add up to about 5 amps, and if throw on a bunch of lights your inverters will ramp up the charge to your batteries and can easily add 15 or 20 amps to your current draw. With four Cruise airs running on shore power you can see how easy it will be to trip a shorepower breaker.

I limit my current draw by managing my power to a maximum of 40 amps, aiming for less if practical. 50 amp breakers (all size breakers actually) are good for continuous loads up to 80% of their rating, and over that the risk of tripping a breaker goes up significantly. So whenever I am in doubt about the shore power I do not hesitate to use the generator because it will give you about 83 amps per leg.

Thanks for that very informative advice. I hadn't thought about the Kohler engine until now. I have to admit that I gulped hard when I heard the Kohler strain the way it did.

I have another problem which I confirmed with Liberty on Friday and that is my Line 1 ammeter is bad. At times, it registers as much as 60-80 amps which shouldn't be possible. At most times it reads 2x what the Line 2 reads, even when they have substantially similar loads (e.g. 2 cruise airs on each side). Liberty suggested that I unload both lines and see if both meters went to zero. They did (nearly) and so that looked good. It looks like fixing the panel meter would be very difficult since it would require some very heavy lifting (refrigerator) in order to get to the back side of the panel.

Another thing that surprised me was that when I turned off both inverters, the voltage display went to zero. I would have expected them to indicate the AC output voltage at all times since we were still connected to shore power when I did the test. It didn't make any sense to me. I would think that the two volt and amp meters would be on the output side, right ahead of breaker busses. Perhaps they're using a signal from the inverter to measure voltage and current, however, the Liberty guy did tell me that the ammeter had a typical toroid core pickup on each AC line. I need to know more about this.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

You should be able to easily access the ammeters by removing the breaker panel. I think it has about six screws.

As to the inverters, Liberty provides a breaker for each and the actual wiring from the breaker is two cables, with one going to the inverter transfer switch and the second going to the charger circuit. The small switch on the annunciator panel shuts off the charger/inverter function, but still enables shore power bypass. When your shore power went to zero it is likely when you turned off the breakers which opened the circuit so no power went to the inverters or the bypass relays.