Community Forums

Mudge · 01-22-2015, 07:57 AM

Hi All,

After a year of research we sold our Heartland Edge M22 and bought a 2015 Creekside 20FQ. The wife and I like to chase big trout, which means we needed the Off Road and 4 Season capabilities. Our first trip was in late Sept. 2014 to the Miracle Mile in Wyoming. We experienced all Four Seasons; 96f on arrival and 20f 3 days later. Air conditioner worked great; not so with the furnace. Long story short, while troubleshooting the furnace, I found that not only was the furnace not screwed to the frame of the trailer, the wood frame that the unit mounted on was not secured to the floor! The furnace worked fine at the Dealer; would not fire up at my home (8200'). 3 months later I have a new furnace. With the stock orifice it fires and works. Tested it at 8200' at -14f. In spite of that problem, we still really like the trailer and can't wait to get out again!

Lac · 01-22-2015, 12:06 PM

Welcome Mudge..glad you joined the ORV group. It's unfortunate about your trailer issues...glad things got fixed. There is an ORV event at the end of July at Wallowa lake in Oregon ...hope you can make it.
Again welcome
Coops

kayakcrazy · 01-22-2015, 12:26 PM

Greetings Mudge. Glad to hear of someone who also shares in two of my passions (camping in my Timber Ridge and disturbing the peace of those beautiful trout). Please stay away from my third passion as she's been married to me for 38 years. We look forward to your participation and any time you want to swap fishing stories (or lies), please feel free to drop me a PM.

Larv · 01-23-2015, 08:08 AM

On our longest trip since acquiring our new timber ridge 260rls. Currently in Quartzsite, AZ. A few minor issues fixed by Crist RV in Mesa,AZ. All is well so far. Looking forward to the Wallowa camp out!!

geocacher · 01-28-2015, 11:25 PM

Brand new owners of a 2015 Blackstone 280RKSB. We are going from a mini MH 22' w/Toyota Chassis to the Blackstone. It will be a huge difference. We are not picking ours up for a few months as the dealer is storing it for us at no charge until the snow melts. Can't wait! Even though we haven't done the ORV tour yet, it is on our to do list.

sigfire · 01-30-2015, 12:36 PM

Greetings all,
happy to have found you! Ben, Alicia, Landon and Aislinn cannot wait to get on the road with our new 2015 creekside 230 bhs towed with a 2010 GMC sierra 2500. We LOVE this trailer! heading to central Ca. coast in March, Nor Ca. coast and Oregon coast in April and Mammoth,Ca in July.

Highway 4x4 · 01-30-2015, 05:33 PM

Sounds like you've got some great trips planned. There are many great places to see in the southwest. I hope to see Canada after the rally.

Lac · 01-30-2015, 06:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sigfire

Greetings all,
happy to have found you! Ben, Alicia, Landon and Aislinn cannot wait to get on the road with our new 2015 creekside 230 bhs towed with a 2010 GMC sierra 2500. We LOVE this trailer! heading to central Ca. coast in March, Nor Ca. coast and Oregon coast in April and Mammoth,Ca in July.

You folks are busy...nice.
Travel safely.

Coops

Lac · 01-30-2015, 06:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Highway 4x4

Sounds like you've got some great trips planned. There are many great places to see in the southwest. I hope to see Canada after the rally.

British Columbia ( Canada) will never be the same....

3Fletch · 01-31-2015, 09:08 AM

Does anyone have a solar panel system on their Outdoors RV other than the small one that came with these trailers? I am installing a 150 watt system and was curious if that was sufficient or would I need to add more panels?

brulaz · 01-31-2015, 09:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 3Fletch

Does anyone have a solar panel system on their Outdoors RV other than the small one that came with these trailers? I am installing a 150 watt system and was curious if that was sufficient or would I need to add more panels?

All depends upon how much you use it and how long you are off 110VAC.

I put on 380W (2 panels) with an MPPT controller, and the dealer sold me the trailer with 2 6V golf cart batteries (220Ah).

So far that's been good enough for when we are off the grid, but we only use a tiny inverter for my 110V coffee grinder. Our main current draws while camping are the 12V awning, computers and TV/dvd.

We spent a week at Everglades N.P. in December without 110VAC and could have gone on forever it seemed.

If it gets cold, the big draw is the furnace blower, but so far we've been ok. Even getting enough sun in the Smokey Mountains N.P. last November to keep things running for a few days, but the batteries were getting down.

I wouldn't mind increasing my battery capacity so we could last a bit longer in the cold dark days of winter when the solar panels can't do much. Or maybe I should just get "the message" and head to sunnier places like Everglades N.P.

Highway 4x4 · 01-31-2015, 10:48 AM

I also have the factory solar and it doesn't keep the battery charged for even the parasitic non-use load. I think it's only 15 watt. I would like to take it up to around 100W So I won't have to run the gen quite as much. Just wondering what it will take to do that. Would it just be more or larger panels?

brulaz · 01-31-2015, 12:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Highway 4x4

I also have the factory solar and it doesn't keep the battery charged for even the parasitic non-use load. I think it's only 15 watt. I would like to take it up to around 100W So I won't have to run the gen quite as much. Just wondering what it will take to do that. Would it just be more or larger panels?

If you just have a single battery, probably the simplest would be double it. That would double the time between generator runs, but then you would have to run the generator longer to charge up the battery bank.

Don't think that 15W panel has a controller, it's probably just plugged into the batteries with an inline fuse. So for an additional 100W panel,you would need a controller as well, probably a PWM controller would do.

When we first got our trailer, we did use the 15W panel to maintain the batteries when we were not around, but it was necessary to switch off those background loads with the rotary battery switch. That panel remains connected.

Haven't really measured the background loads on this trailer, you could try doing that to see if 100watts is enough, realizing that you will only get that 100W during daylight under optimum conditions. Maybe 300-400 Wh max per day from the panel?

Some current draws from our old trailer were:
propane frig (when cooling): 0.6A
propane hot water heater (when heating): 0.7A
There's also the clock radio and propane/CO detector, maybe: 0.5A ???

So 1-2 Amps depending. And not including the water pump, LED lights and especially not including any FANS or incandescent lights, or the operation of the slide, tongue jack, stab jacks and awning.

So 1-2 Amps would be 12-24 Watts over 24 hours or 288-576 W-h
A 100W panel giving 300-400 Wh per day could cover that.

3Fletch · 01-31-2015, 05:52 PM

I would not be using anything requiring an inverter to get 110. Everything would be 12volts. I believe the stock panel is only 10 watts which would amount to a trickle charge at best. I have two 6 volts with 232 AH, so I may need to add another 150 watt panel later.