Work Camp, May, 2024

May 26, 2024

Our good friends Amanda and Douglas asked if they could come and visit us in Hastings and help them install a new residential refrigerator in their Foretravel. Of course, we said. We did the residential refrigerator in our coach in 2014 so we knew (we thought we knew) what we were signing up for.

A Camp Hastings Work Camp

They arrived in the afternoon on Monday, May 6th. They parked, plugged in and we went to the American Legion in Hastings for burgers.

The Legion has a nice patio overlooking the Mississippi River and the Hastings Bridge.

It was a rainy day when their refrigerator arrived a few days earlier.

My first thought was that it was upside down, but that box was not theirs. Lots of nice cardboard, a big plastic bag, and there it was. I plugged it in to make sure it worked and let it run until the day before we moved it into the coach.

Remove and Replace

The contents, doors, and all of the interior parts were removed from the old refrigerator. It was detached from the cabinet and slid out onto a roller platform with some riser blocks to match the bottom of the shelf where the refrigerator was installed. We took the riser blocks out to lower it down, removed the kitchen table and the cabinet in front of the living room window, and rolled it up next to a window in the side of the coach.

The old refrigerator sat on a shelf that was removed. Douglas spent a few hours rearranging cables and pipes at the back of the cabinet. I made and installed a new side vent cover and a platform for the new refrigerator to sit on. We added a hole in the floor for the existing solar panel wiring to go into the basement.

The new base has recesses where the refrigerator feet go as well as holes to replace the feet with a bolted, leveling option which was used in the final installation.

We rented a material lift, sort of a manual-powered fork lift to help remove the old refrigerator and get the new refrigerator into the coach. I also needed it to hoist a new AC to the roof of my coach.

The AC went up in its box. Susan did a good job of cranking. The old and new ACs were swapped and the box was lowered.

Amanda and Douglas’s coach window was removed, the lift was raised to the appropriate height, and the old refrigerator tipped into the window opening, lifted, and moved out onto the lift. Out it went, lowered down, off the lift, and dollied out of the way leaving plenty of room for the new refrigerator. I hauled the old refrigerator to the recycler’s place. $15 fee. Not bad.

Quite a bit of time went into removing the shelves, drawers, and doors of the new refrigerator and a couple of rolls of blue tape were applied just in case. We moved it into place, onto the lift, and up it went, and right into the coach.

It was a close fit but just big enough. It landed on the rolling platform, we rolled it over to the opening, and “Bob’s your Uncle” it was in place.

Douglas was intently looking for something and Maggie was happy to see me sit down for a minute. She likes to lick my nose.

The window was replaced using a foam gasket, a bit harder to compress than the original caulking tape.

At the end of the third day, the refrigerator was in place, the doors could have gone back on so that the trim could get made but they weren’t. The refrigerator was in and out of the hole many times while details were tweaked. Eventually, Douglas hooked up the water supply and did the front anchor bolts. After another 10 days, it was finally in place with the doors on and the trim was finalized. We used the front panels from the old refrigerator to make the trim.

It seems like the trim would be easy but the cabinet opening was wider at the top than at the bottom and neither side was parallel to the refrigerator. I did my best to make it fit and look right. The top panel has vent slots. The trim edges matched the kitchen drawers. Finally, the important stuff went into the refrigerator freezer section, DQ treats.

A Side Trip

While we were working on all of this, a good friend of Amanda and Douglas passed away in Michigan. They rented a car and took a three-day trip to attend his services.

Project Creep

Every project starts with a goal. Almost always something new comes up and gets added into the mix. In this case, the idea of connecting the two existing solar panels on the D&As coach morphed into removing the existing panels, buying 4 new higher-wattage panels, putting them on their coach, connecting all the wiring, running it down through the roof behind the new refrigerator and hooking all of those up. 1680 watts in 4 new JA Solar 420-watt panels that Amanda found less than 20 miles away for $150 each. We scheduled those to be picked up when they got back. Douglas ordered more solar cables and another solar charge controller, fuse block, and disconnect switch.

While they were gone I removed the two 300-watt panels that were on their roof and with Susan’s help lowered them to the ground. I washed them and tested them and they were good as new.

I got our coach out of the barn, finished the AC install, and put a soft-start module in each one. These reduce the power required to start the AC compressor and make it possible to run both ACs on a 30 amp connection.

Susan helped me hoist the panels up onto the roof of our coach. I carefully marked the locations of the mounting brackets, sanded each spot down to the gel coat layer, cleaned the area well, and wiped the area and the mounting brackets with a 3M prep and adhesion promoter. Then I applied a 3M VHB tape to the target area on the roof where the mounting brackets would sit. The hard part is getting the plastic tape off the back side of the VHB tape. Once that was done I positioned the panels over the targets and lowered the panel mounting brackets down onto the VHB tape. I pressed the brackets down onto the VHB tape. And then caulked around each bracket. That is all you have to do.

VHB tape is a very high-strength double-sided tape. The brackets are 12” long and 1.5” wide. With that much VHB tape in each corner, it would take more than 5,000 lbs to pull the panel from the roof. The roof itself or the panel will fail before the tape lets loose.

I ran the panel cables down behind my refrigerator to a new solar charger and then to the batteries. We now have 1800 watts of solar on the roof of our coach.

Before A&D returned I got started on the wood trim for their refrigerator. Some final trimming would be needed for a perfect fit in an imperfect world.

Solar Panels

Once Amanda and Douglas returned we went to pick up the solar panels. They were loaded into my pickup truck, pallet and all.

We got back to Camp Hastings, unloaded the panels, and while Douglas finished removing the last of the remaining roof-top items, Amanda and I installed the panel brackets to each panel.

The panels went up one at a time and were positioned about where they would end up.

Target areas were marked, sanded, cleaned, and prepped. VHB tape was applied and the red backing was removed. Each panel was set onto the VHB tape, pressed down, and caulked. The panels were arranged to provide good access to the roof-top equipment.

The panels were secure. The cables were carefully strung so they would be secure and as hidden as possible. They run under a new cover plate that replaced the old refrigerator roof-top vent, down behind the refrigerator, and through a hole in the floor to the basement bay just below.

Not All Work and No Play

One evening we had lasagna and freshly baked buttermilk biscuits.

Amanda and Douglas have heard us talk about a local breakfast place near here, the North Pole Restaurant. We like the blueberry pancakes. We order one pancake or the smaller senior version

Our cautions went unheeded, we recommended a single pancake. They ordered two, the waitress also asked if they were sure, they were. Douglas ordered blueberry cakes, Amanda, had chocolate chip cakes. And they both had eggs and sausage too.

I ordered one blueberry pancake, and Susan ordered the smaller senior blueberry version with a single egg, and one piece of sausage.

Of course, they were surprised at the dinner plate-sized pancakes but were up for the challenge. They finally gave up and brought home a second breakfast’s worth of pancake remains.

Douglas started in the middle and ate towards the edges as we suggested to get most of the berries. Amanda plowed through the huge quantity of chocolate chips from the bottom up. Both did an admirable job.

It should be noted here that a single giant blueberry pancake, two eggs, and two pieces of sausage or bacon is just $10.99. Adding a second blueberry pancake is only $2.00 more. The senior version with egg and sausage or bacon is just $7.85. My kind of place.

And while Amanda and Douglas were in Michigan I stopped at Costco for a few of our normal things and a couple of fresh hot $4.99 rotisserie chickens. We saved one for their return dinner.

Reheated and delicious.

We went to the Dairy Queen twice for treats and the local Bierstube for dinner.

It’s a German restaurant with great Reuben sandwiches.

And we managed to get in a Quiddler game.

Maggie wants to play too, or maybe just wanted a treat.

We gave her a new stuffed toy to keep her busy.

These stuffed, soft toys have a very short life expectancy. We always wish them well.

The stuffing was flying. The squeaker and most of the white fuzzy stuff was out in under 15 minutes.

Amanda got some Maggie love too.

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And then we were done, as far as we were going to get anyway. A couple of things did not get finished. I loaned Douglas some tools to help finish his solar panel connections. He has new Lithium batteries to hook up as well. He should get it done this summer.

Amanda and Douglas are special friends. We are always willing to lend a hand when we can. It was a treat for them to be here for almost two weeks and for us to help them with projects that make life in their coach better in the way they use it.

We met them in Nacogdoches, TX one winter more than 10 years ago over cookies and milk. We see them whenever we can, a couple of times a year when we can. The next time should be this coming November.

Pictures in this post are mostly from Amanda, thanks! Between the two of us, there are more than 300 photos and videos.

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What’s up next for us? A summer trip to the Oregon Coast with a stop in Glacier National Park. We will spend a couple of weeks on the coast with our friends Richard and Betty from San Diego and my sister and her husband. And then a late season two-week visit to Grand Teton National Park. This is one of our favorite places to visit. It will be a new experience with Maggie.

More Later, Much Love,

Roger and Susan and Maggie