the Rig

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Huzzah! Today we had some work done to the rig.

A week or so ago, our refrigerator started freezing everything. This has happened before, when we first got the motorhome and it was fixed under warranty. Now, six years later, the warranty is long expired, so we knew we'd have to spring for a fix.

From previous experience, we knew it was either the thermistor or the board, or possibly both.

In looking around, we saw that thermistors have vastly improved from the one installed in our fridge. Instead of a small wooden match-head sized unit, they now look like a thin tube of lipstick. Much better for sensing ambient temperature. Finding this, we decided no matter what, we were getting a new thermistor.

As to the board (which turned out to be the problem), we've heard for years that Dinosaur boards are much preferable to Dometic boards. For starters, Dinosaur boards come with a three year warranty as opposed to the ninety day warranty offered by Dometic. The Dinosaur board also has an external temperature setting, so that's what we went with.

While our repairman was here (aren't we lucky to have a mobile tech who comes to the rig?) we talked about our water pump.

Several years ago, our Shurflo 5.7 finally failed (years after a lot of others of that model). At the time, it was an emergency situation and fortunately (having heard of the Shurflo 5.7s high failure rate) we had a spare, a generic pump that we had purchased at Camping World. After a good friend installed the spare, I dealt with Shurflo.

While our 5.7 pump was well out of warranty, I persisted (are those who know me surprised?) and finally got Shurflo to send me a free replacement pump. They sent us the Revolution, which is what they ship in place of the faulty 5.7s.

For a few years now, we've carried the Revolution, making do with the other replacement, because we aren't all that handy when it comes to plumbing. That said, the replacement has been a huge pain in the heinie. The flow is poor, giving adequate water, but pulsing instead of providing an even flow.

Since we already had the replacement on hand and the repairman at the rig, we decided this would be a perfect time to have it installed.

Now we're happy campers!

Our water is flowing and our food is cold.

And once again,

Refrigerator Tube Caps (for the RVers Out There)

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Over on the Lazy Daze board, we've been discussing refrigerators. A few posts ago, I discussed cleaning my refrigerator (you can read about it here if you care) and it seems that many rigs don't have the little cap that we have on our drain tube. Several folks have asked about it, so I decided the easiest thing to do would be to post a picture.

It's not really clear in the picture, but there are perforated holes in the cap.

That’s All For Today!

Snow White (and the Refrigerator)

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I think I mentioned our DVD player died. In looking at a new one, we decided to get a BluRay player, even though we don't have an HDTV. I have a couple of BluRay discs and today I took my first look at this technology. I have to admit, it looks pretty darned good.

But it wasn't the technology that got me, it was the film.

Wow, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I know that most people look at it and scoff, but it gets me every time. I always think back to the time it was created and what a tremendous achievement it was.

Remember, this was the first time anyone attempted to engage an audience using characters who weren't portrayed by live actors.

And engage them it did.

I remember talking with animators who worked on the film about the first showings. According to them, when those seven little men were standing around that glass coffin, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. It's a pretty powerful piece of film making.

I look at the character of Snow White and I am enamored of how lovely she is. Over the years, as a Disney collector, I've gotten used to seeing still pictures of these characters, and this is how I seem to think of them. It slips my mind that they are meant to be seen in motion, that's why they call it animation. Duh.

While I know that many people make fun of the voice of Snow White, I always remember that it is exactly the way that Walt Disney wanted his very first heroine to sound. And when you look at pictures of a young Adriana Caselotti (only 19 at the time), it's obvious that they based the look of Snow White on her fair beauty.


I had the pleasure of knowing Adriana later in her life, and she carried the delight of this character with her to the very end. If you haven't seen this classic film in a while, I urge you to give it another look. And if you have any little ones in your life, make time to introduce them to this classic.

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Now on to a completely different subject. This is for all you RVers out there.

Today I cleaned out my refrigerator. While our refrigerator is a good size, it's no where near the size of a household appliance, so it needs to be cleaned pretty regularly. While I've done this for all the time we've had Cholula Red, today I found something I've overlooked for the last five years.

When you clean an RV refrigerator, you want to clean the set of metal fins that sit at the upper back. Below these fins is a short removable shelf, which has a tube/vent that leads to the outside. This is where the condensation runs out of the fridge. What I've missed all this time is that right where the tube attaches to the back of the fridge, there's a small catch cup. Today, when I looked in this catch cup, it was full of slimy yucky goop. How had I missed this all these years? I don't know, but I won't ever miss it again!

I also went outside and checked where the fridge actually drains below the fridge. This opening has a small perforated cap and this was also clogged with goop. After cleaning both of these openings, I blasted a bit of canned air till the tube ran clear.

If you have an RV fridge, you might want to check these the next time you clean your refrigerator. Or maybe everybody else already knew about this?

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That's it for today.