Community Forums

Bently · 12-25-2014, 04:02 PM

We recently purchased a 2005 Excursion- we were filled in on many things, but not the Entertainment Center located in front of the driver's seat. It has a Panasonic DVD Home Theater system, a Daevo VCR & DVD recorder, a "switch box" to control the in put to a front and rear TV, and wires from a satellite receiver on the roof (the capabilities of which are unknown).

We are replacing each TV with modern flat screens, removing the VCR/DVD recorder, and want to hook up the satellite receiver.

Have any of you faced these issues, if so, how did you accomplish the results you wanted? Any suggestions for us?

One speaker, near the refrigerator, is not working- any ideas on how to trace the wires from the front to the speaker?

RVNeophytes2 · 12-25-2014, 04:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bently

One speaker, near the refrigerator, is not working- any ideas on how to trace the wires from the front to the speaker?

Have you done a continuity check? I can't recall if the wires are routed along the edge or down the center, past the AC units.

Not only is it good to have a lightweight LCD screen up front for better viewing, but also for safety reasons: in a collision, that 80 lb OEM TV might leave a mark...

We owned the same model, year, as our first rig and loved it. It was so babied, the dealer gave us better than a wholesale-wholesale swap and offered me the position of Maintenance Manager, which I graciously declined.

Punchline: Our Excursion had 100K miles on it, drove "showroom new," according to the salesman who drove it after we'd departed in our new Patriot Thunder. We loved the Fleetwood, and my wife felt comfortable taking it out on solo trips, towing a car. I consider the RV one of the best values out there, in diesel pushers.

Clayobx · 12-25-2014, 05:17 PM

We had an 03 Excursion. That compartment, top left, is a box of many wonders! I let Complete RV in Denver NC. Replace the TV's, rewire the sat receiver, and sort out the rest. Best money I spent on the upgrades of what I considered a great coach. Hope your experience with your Excursion is as great as ours was!

LouieL · 12-26-2014, 08:28 AM

From my experience....Check to see if there is a speaker in that location in the first place. Second, Fleetwood just silicone my speakers in place. The size of the opening VS the speaker size meant that the speakers are almost completely blocked by the cabinetry. In addition on my coach those rear speakers do not work unless the right sound coding is coming out of the DVD player.

I solved that by using some small 2x4 blocks to move the speakers up into the opening. This has improved sound tremendously.

Bently · 12-26-2014, 06:00 PM

I was told by a person at Best Buy that modern TV's will not work with this home sound system because one is digital and the other analog. Any body disagree or agree with that?

stink · 12-26-2014, 09:14 PM

Haven't seen a new tv without old school coax imput, just no hd. I redid my discovery that may be similar to yours. I installed a new blueray player with built in amps for the surround speakers. I bet your speakers are screwed to the cieling on a bracket. I left my old Panasonic speakers as they still sound great. I redid the tv with HDTV led 28" that just fit into opening left by the old CRT. I use a hdmi cable from blue ray to tv and left everything else alone as I don't have HDTV on satellite and haven't found a campground that has HDTV in the park cable. As to your inop speaker I would try a known good speaker both where the inop one is mounted as well as strait out the back of DVD player. If speaker works strait out the DVD player and not at bad speakers location than the wiring is broken somewere

stink · 12-26-2014, 09:19 PM

As to your satellite antenna, it's probably a 18" winguard manual if stock. This will work with dish and direct as far as I know. I use mine with direct. They do work better than the suitcase portables but not as good as a high dollar travelere. I have gotten a good, not great signal thru a tree a few times that most portables wouldn't

Bently · 12-27-2014, 08:07 AM

Thanks to all for the good information. Will put your recommendations to work. We appreciate the folks on this site and their willingness to help and share.

EasyPace · 01-10-2015, 02:05 PM

I have an 05 Pace Arrow with the Panasonic Home theatre system. I decided to keep the panasonic home theatre receiver and speakers and I installed a Sony Blu-Ray player and connected it via HDMI directly to the new flat screen TV and used a fibre optic cable out from the TV to a digital to analogue converter that I bought on Amazon to convert the signal down to the RCA plugs for input into the Home theatre. While not really Dolby 5.1 surround sound, the Panasonic puts out pretty good sound to all of the speakers in the Motorhome, and I didn't need to run new wires and buy new speakers.

mchero · 01-10-2015, 06:49 PM

I don't think Fleetwood was very consistent with the entertainment systems. I don't think I have ever the same setup in ANY Fleetwood's.

Our new to us 07 Discovery has Samsung LCD TV's & Samsung DVD Home Theater systems BOTH up front and in the bedroom.

Outside a Samsung flat screen CRT and a waterproof DVD\Stereo system. I'll either pull the TV all together or U/G to a flat panel. We just don't watch TV outside unless a game is on. The current CRT is SO hard to see during the day due to the flat CRT screens reflection.

The distribution system is a black powered switch box, All Coax runs to rear & outside TV's as well as Cable & roof antenna switches. When I am watching DirecTV up front I select satellite & rear TV and I then can tune rear TV to channel 3 & see the same program as the forward TV. A little tricky to figure out how to operate the system.

The In-motion satellite was a real PITA to get setup with DirecTV. It was programmed to use Dish and I followed the directions to a "Tee" to get it setup for DirecTV but no go! I called support & they where happy to offer support with a Credit Card number!

Being in the computer support side for 30 years I was determined to resolve the issue. I ended up having to do two separate firmware updates. I had to makeup special update cables. Persistence paid off! After the two updates and a manual program edit she locked right in!

The forward Samsung system has the subwoofer next to the drivers seat. Front, center & rear speakers are hidden behind some grill covers built into the cabinets. I'm going to upgrade to Samsung Blu-ray systems. I'll prob. use the existing speakers.