My GMC at Home
Langley, British Columbia, Canada

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My other (original) GMC website: www.smallrvs.ca/gmc1

Link to the Conclusion (Bottom of page)

February 27:
In the process of getting ready for the jaunt to the Western States Spring Rally in Palm Desert. First on the agenda is to change the water pump. At least I think that's where a noise is coming from. Settles down after it runs for a while but I'm not going to risk it. It'll be bad enough to change in the barn. I've had one fail on the road between Coast and Bakersfield before and it wasn't fun. pretty desolate in there.

Hoping for a March 7th-ish departure. We'll see how it goes.

February 29:
No easy task but got it done... hopefully. I say hopefully because I haven't run it yet so no idea if/what got messed up. While fighting with goop and gasket and hoses I couldn't help but wonder why the water pump failed when it had only a few years on it.

Can't help but wonder if the fan contributed. The reason I say that is that the designs of the fan (serpentine belt setup) is quite different from the original. The blades are not equally spaces and some blades curve sharper at the end. Will be doing a little more research on the subject but I would imagine if the fan was bad it would vibrate a bunch.

The new pump. Straight blades so that it is truly bi-directional. The serpentine belt setup runs the pump in a reverse direction.

The removed pump. A reverse flow Mondello.

March 1, 2004:
Cranked it up today and all is well. Haven't driven it yet but it seems the noise that started all this is gone. Will need a drive to confirm though... hopefully tomorrow. Still have a few things to tend to, like heat-shield on a Flowmaster needing a little repair, height adjusting arm needs a new adjuster and I have to relocate license plate to buggy rack, just in case I run into a Trooper that's having a bad day.

Made some inquiries re the fan and all seems well. Will just have to trust GM.

March 6, 2004:
Finally got the buggy out for a run yesterday after replacing the air tank. Rust finally took it's toll as a small pinhole developed which prevented me from adjusting ride-height. replaced the tank with a new one from Jim DeMaere.

Test run went well. Even ride-height was pretty close. Upon return I was going to start the Generac to warm it up to ready it for an oil and filter change. It didn't happen. No fuel getting to the GenSet. Of course I left the easiest for last and replaced filters and fuel pump before blaming the GenSet itself. It's just not letting any fuel in. But that's for after breakfast today.

The GenSet Problem

I spent yesterday and today chasing and conquering the fuel starved GenSet.

After changing filters and checking fuel line I finally came to my senses and disconnected the line going 'to' the GenSet to see if it would draw fuel and sure enough it did.

The culprit was the GenSet not taking the fuel it was given. The reason: lack of use. Todays' crappy gas likes to gum things up and that's exactly what happened. Removed the carburetor and cleaned it and lo and behold, it worked after re-installing :-))

So, long story short... I'm going to try and run it once a month. Been meaning to, but have not been good at it in the past.

Tomorrows project: chase a non-operating license plate light. Have never been in there since I got the coach. Screws are ceased tight. Probably have to dig at it from inside :-(

Still hoping for a Monday departure for a leisurely trip to Palm Desert.

March 11, 2004:
Well, we made it to Sacramento and going strong. Hoping for an early PM departure to Stockton and then an overnight south of Stockton ready for the jump to Bakersfield on Friday.

The trip has not been totally uneventful. Here are some babblings of the sometime/somewhat excitement incurred.

March 19, 2004:
I better take a few minutes to catch up. The rest of the trip to the Palm Desert Rally was uneventful, thankfully. We did the trip up the Grapevine in early morning to catch the morning cool. Not really sure it it really makes a difference. Of course the other reason for would that traffic would be somewhat lighter, and it was.

We dropped down to 38mph in second. Not sure if that's normal or not. Perhaps you could drop an email with your own Grapevine experiences. We did breakfast in the Rest Area at the top, or almost top and then did a little shopping in Valencia before heading east on 210. We started to see a few GMC's. As we neared Pasadena traffic ground to a halt as the freeway was closed at the Pasadena Tunnel. Eventually back on track. Had lunch at the Palm Springs Rest Area so that check-in would be a little easier, or at least with tummies full. Got our spot but found that we'd have to move as it was just for the night. Dave was very helpful to re-arrange our spot so that we might have a chance at latching on to the WiFi at the Clubhouse. This turned out well as Kerry Tandy and his DataStorm weren't able to make it. By putting up a high gain WiFi antenna I as able to connect a bridge to the resorts WiFi and rebroadcast so that at least a few coaches were able to get connected.

The rebroadcast turned less efficient as planned. The high gain antenna was for rebroadcast had to be used with bridge instead so we did not cover as many coaches as I had hoped for. Oh well, maybe next time. The plan to get the wireless web cam to the demonstration and vendor sites also went down the proverbial tube as we couldn't get the range. Back to the drawing board. Maybe we'll get another chance in future and put to use what we've learned.

Last full day at the Rally today. Planning Bakersfield for Saturday and Sacramento for Sunday.

March 21, 2004
Took the 215-->395-->58 route to Bakersfield. Was a nice change and easy trip. Got up early and made for Santa Cruz to pick up a bogie assembly for delivery in Tacoma. Trip was nice and leisurely in the morning but traffic got a little hectic between Santa Cruz and SAC. Hoping for an early departure homeward.

March 24, 2004 - Back Home.
Got in late last night. The trip from Bakersfield to Santa Cruz was very nice and bogie loading went smooth. We were able to tuck it away behind the co-pilot's seat and it was reasonably out of the way. Getting from Santa Cruz to Sacramento was a little more hectic as we got into the Sunday afternoon traffic, but we made it ok.

Departed SAC reasonably early on Monday morning and stopped early at Valley of the Rogue State Park. Very nice place with full hookups at many sites. Early departure saw us deliver the bogie in Tacoma in the late afternoon and got us home at 11PM after waiting out the Seattle rush hour. Long day, but they are always a little easier on the homeward stretch.

That's it for this trip. Now for the cleanup and some regular mtce. to have it ready for the next one.

A post script regarding my flasher problems early in the trip. It is quite possible that the user contributed when installing new license plate light. Not confirmed, but possible. I don't want the coach to take all the blame when/if there were extenuating circumstances .

The conclusion to the March travels
It is now May and while I'm not ready to take ALL the blame I think I certainly did contribute to the problems encountered enroute to Palm Desert. As best as I can reconstruct: The fuel selector circuit (fuse) probably failed due to a gummed up selector valve requiring more than normal current/time to switch. Gas is getting worse and the coach sat longer than usual meaning that the fuel selector valve had not been exercised for a while. I'll be making it a practice to switch tanks when running the engine to temp when in longer non-use mode.

Then... as I activated the flashers while waiting for emergency fuel, the user screw-up came into play and blew that fuse. And fuses continued to blow until the cause was removed, which turned out rather simple at the end, i.e. temporarily undo the users doings (disconnect the extended license plate light) . Had I gone a different route to find power for that extended license plate light there probably would not have been any problem but it seemed so simple to use the toad connector. Of course there is a chance now that fuse blowing mysteriously will be a thing of the past, I.e. the destroyed (rusted) original license plate light assembly is no more.

The fixing commenced by removing bed and back panel to gain access to the license place light. What I found was plain old yuk. Rusted out lamp assembly and corrosion on the connector. I replaced the lamp assembly with a two-wire type so that there is less reliance on getting the fixture a good ground.

Here is how it turned out along with the usual additional problems and solution that always creep in causing any GMC project to expand in scope.