OUTLAW Mods and Easy Fixes

[Scarab0088]

Originally Posted by HPYCAMPER2

Can some one with knowledge of the Outlaw tell me how to find the satellite input jack on a 2015 37LS. Today I asked the service mgr at CW to point it out to me, he could not find it. Even on cheap trailers there is an input jack for cable and one for the satellite. What gives? Never had a need for one until now. While you are at it, Dish or Directv? Thank you ahead of time.

Class A Outlaws have had "SAT Prep" as standard equipment for a few years. This is a dedicated Coax in the roof for addition of a rooftop antenna -AND- a second cable jack in a bin for a portable antenna.

DO NOT use the cable TV jack in the power bin...That requires the use of DIPLEXERS (SAT capable signal splitters) on both ends of a cable TV cord.
See: http://www.satelliteinstaller.com/sa..._diplexers.htm

I have not personally seen the portable SAT input jack in a new LS, but it could be on the ceiling of the driver's side front-most bin.


For the best SAT company...if you have SAT at home, just move the receiver. If you are getting new service, Direct has bigger/better sports packs, but higher costs. Dish has lower costs for channels and equipment, and more affordable RV specific equipment (we bought v leasing) and Pay-As-You-Go accounts... so it is up to you, what's best for your desires.

Best luck

[Badlands]

Originally Posted by MonkeyClaw

Well if it's not one thing, it's another. I was fixing the light/fan/step switch in the garage (I didn't take pictures, but it's basically poorly glued in place) and now I can't get the basement latch to open! It's not locked and pulls all the way, but it's not actuating the latch inside. All my tools are in there except the ones I was using. Any ideas?

I have the same thing going on. The latch is not lock but the bolt system is engage even when pull on the latch, it flips back and forth. Anyone have any ideas how you can get into the basement door. O

[RV.Driver]

Originally Posted by Scarab0088

Class A Outlaws have had "SAT Prep" as standard equipment for a few years. This is a dedicated Coax in the roof for addition of a rooftop antenna -AND- a second cable jack in a bin for a portable antenna.

DO NOT use the cable TV jack in the power bin...That requires the use of DIPLEXERS (SAT capable signal splitters) on both ends of a cable TV cord.
See: Satellite Diplexer: Signal Combiner and Splitter

I have not personally seen the portable SAT input jack in a new LS, but it could be on the ceiling of the driver's side front-most bin.


For the best SAT company...if you have SAT at home, just move the receiver. If you are getting new service, Direct has bigger/better sports packs, but higher costs. Dish has lower costs for channels and equipment, and more affordable RV specific equipment (we bought v leasing) and Pay-As-You-Go accounts... so it is up to you, what's best for your desires.

Best luck

Not sure how the other models are wired, but the 2015 38RE has the coax input as previously mentioned in the 50A compartment. As delivered from the factory, it is wired into the power module for the roof off-air TV antenna. If power is on, the circuit sends DC to the antenna which has a built-in amplifier, and routes the antenna signal to a splitter that then fans out the coax to all the TVs in the coach. If power is off, the circuit routes the signal from the coax from the 50A compartment instead to the splitter (and on to all the TVs).

It is true that the factory claims coax are also wired in the roof from a standard location they can provide a roof map for, to the entertainment component cabinet (on 38RE this is above the kitchen).

We elected not to go with a roof mount dish yet, as the only one offering Hi-Def DirecTV last year when we fit-up the Outlaw was not a dome style. I do not want to install the big Winegard Trav'ler stationary viewing only for High-Def, nor do I want a dome that is only low-def. As long as High-Def is only available when in camp, I will set up a SWM dish on a tripod, or a roof-frame mount and aim it. I can do this as fast as a Trav'ler can aim itself, and with a long coax, have no doubt of gaining a dish location with a clear view of DirecTV's constellation of satellites.

So we do use the coax in the 50A compartment that the factory wired for cable. Since we are using a SWM DirecTV dish, we only need 1 coax. The dish is connected to the coax in the 50A compartment, and the other end is removed from the roof antenna power module. Instead, it is connected to the SWM power supply for the dish. The other side of the power supply is connected via a coax jumper to the DirecTV Gennie whole house DVR which was added to the entertainment cabinet above the sink. Four 2" holes were drilled with a hole saw on a 90 degree drill adapter, one each in the top corners of the cabinet. As long as the cabinet door is not pushed to full closure, this provides adequate airflow into the cabinet and out the top holes for cooling.

A short HDMI jumper places the output of the Ginnie DVR on one of the HDMI inputs of Thor's factory 2x4 HDMI switch. The factory DVR was tossed and replaced with a Sony BluRay also capable of Internet streaming which provides its HDMI output to the 2nd input of the HDMI switch.

We added two additional HDMI TVs, one previously documented on a swivel mount in the doorway viable by both chairs at the "dining room bar-height table" (where the big factory dinette was), the second is a small portable monitor sized TV on the dash that provides TV viewing when sitting in the passenger chair at the main coach computer center.

To support the total of six TVs currently wired, a 1x4 HDMI splitter was added after the 2x4 HDMI switch so three TVs are fed HDMI via factory cables wired to the factory switch outputs, the other three are fed via HDMI cables from the HDMI splitter (one factory, two added).

But this setup only provides DirecTV or BluRay as an all or nothing choice across all six TVs based on the position of the 2x4 factory HDMI switch.

Generally, that is not a big problem for us as one simply wants to be able to see and hear the same program as one at times needs to move about the coach, go sit or cook on the rear deck, or perform some outside work where the outdoor TV is mounted under the main awning.

And the 4 factory TVs always offer via their "source selection" option, instead of their HDMI input (Coach-wide DirecTV or BluRay), tuning High-Def off-air signals from the roof TV antenna via the coax cable the factory ran alongside the HDMI to all 4 TVs.

To cover the option when two people both really want to watch different DirecTV programs from the Ginnie DVR, when the Ginnie was installed, the DirecTV "wireless bridge" was also wired into the entertainment cabinet with a cable to the Ginnie. This device is a closed private network WiFi device needed to enable "Wireless Ginnie Clients." With this configuration, for the additional monthly fee, one or more Ginnie client boxes are mountable at any HDMI TV in the coach, and via source selection on the TV to HDMI2 instead of HDMI1, this provides full function High-Def viewing of any live or recorded program, INDEPENDENT of the main Ginnie's program driving the 2x4 HDMI switch and coach HDMI cables.

[MonkeyClaw]

Originally Posted by Badlands

I have the same thing going on. The latch is not lock but the bolt system is engage even when pull on the latch, it flips back and forth. Anyone have any ideas how you can get into the basement door. O

I had to crawl through the bin from the other side and unscrew the latch from the inside (luckily it was a one of the pass-through bins!).

I found the the pivot screw was loose, causing the latch mechanism to overlap. The meant that the latch didn't move all the way back and then got stuck in that position.

The fix was easy - move the latch so that it can't overlap and tighten the pivot screw. Of course, nothing is quite that easy. If you over-tighten the pivot screw the latch won't release. Also when you re-install the latch, don't over tighten the installation screws or it won't release (great design!). I used white lithium grease to lube everything before installing, so it's not a question of too little lube.

In the future, I will probably use some blue lock-tite on the pivot screw so it won't loosen. I'd hate to think about what to do on a non-pass through bin.

[Scarab0088]

Great update, Tim!
Thanks and congrats on the fix...time to thread lock all the bin latches, I guess

[MonkeyClaw]

Originally Posted by RV.Driver

Not sure how the other models are wired, but the 2015 38RE has the coax input as previously mentioned in the 50A compartment. As delivered from the factory, it is wired into the power module for the roof off-air TV antenna. If power is on, the circuit sends DC to the antenna which has a built-in amplifier, and routes the antenna signal to a splitter that then fans out the coax to all the TVs in the coach. If power is off, the circuit routes the signal from the coax from the 50A compartment instead to the splitter (and on to all the TVs).

. . .

Our 37LS is the same. When we use our 'portable' (really it's the same dish as our house but on a tripod) we wired it to the co-ax in the electrical bay, then attached the DVR to the co-ax in the entertainment cabinet by disconnecting the 'input' side of the antenna booster. This gave us a direct connection to the dish. In the case of DirecTV with SWiM, you can add the power inserter at the same spot in the cabinet. Then hook the HDMI from the DVR to the input on the 'BOMB' (box of many buttons) to distribute the signal to the various TVs. This restricts you to one channel on all TV's. If you want multiple receivers so you can watch football on one channel while your wife watches The Bachelor on another channel, you can either get a Genie DVR and wireless receivers (that's what we have now) or you can use a splitter and a receiver in each room.

We have since added a DirecTV Trav'ler on top of the RV but still carry the portable in case we have too much tree cover.

Larry added lots of good info on his set-up. Ours was pretty similar but we didn't start out with SWiM on the RV dish.

[MonkeyClaw]

Originally Posted by MonkeyClaw

Well if it's not one thing, it's another. I was fixing the light/fan/step switch in the garage (I didn't take pictures, but it's basically poorly glued in place) and now I can't get the basement latch to open! It's not locked and pulls all the way, but it's not actuating the latch inside. All my tools are in there except the ones I was using. Any ideas?

A little more info on the fan switches in the garage for when it happens to someone else.

The factory definitely went with a poor design here. The switches are on their own mount. That is then mounted to the main plate with screws. But there are no screw heads showing? The screws MUST be integrated to the main plate then, right?? Nope! The screws are literally glued to the plate using the screw heads. Nylon nuts are used to hold the switch plate to the screws. So one hard press of the switches and the pop back into the wall!

The fix was simple - remove the glue, drill through the plastic main plate and use the same screws to mount the plate. I only used three screws and could probably have gotten away with two. You can see that the only spot the screw interferes with the lettering is at the word 'Fan'. Unfortunately I didn't notice this until I'd drilled through. Oh well, not the end of the world. If I did it again, I'd drill into the lower part of that side and leave the upper one out.

The switch mount is now way stronger.

[JeffAZ]

Originally Posted by MonkeyClaw

I had to crawl through the bin from the other side and unscrew the latch from the inside (luckily it was a one of the pass-through bins!). . ."

Wow, that sounds like a fun chore Tim, good job! I didn't realize you were such an accomplished spelunker

So did you exit thru the newly opened bin door, or back up to the side you originally entered from?

[MonkeyClaw]

Even after unscrewing everything, the latch was still sticking out. I probably could have pushed it open but crawled out the way I came it.

I purchased some blue lock-tite the other day and will start using it on the bins after a test to make sure it will work.

Good times!

[Timlo]

Hey Steve or DG I did that fix on the fuel station pump I had a Blown fuse the guy that own had a 25 amp in there I replace it with a 15 the pump work only once since I had it and that the only time I used it , had some time today so I did that mod fix on the gears . I still have no power to the pump I check all the other fuse and the one up front and driver side out side didn't fine any others blown , I just took a break next Iam going to pull the fuse pane and check the wire connection , you know the little red light that come on when take the fuse out , it does come on for 11,12,13 but everything else works the spot the slide room but not the pump and I check with a meter no power . Thought many Iam missing some thing or someone else ran into this before ? Thanks guys this sight has made my life so much easier work on the 07 workhorse outlaw we love it !

[Timlo]

Meant to say the little red light doesn't come on for 11,12,13 but the spotlights are 11 and they work and the slide room everything works , hate typing on this phone !

[focker]

Originally Posted by Timlo

Hey Steve or DG I did that fix on the fuel station pump I had a Blown fuse the guy that own had a 25 amp in there I replace it with a 15 the pump work only once since I had it and that the only time I used it , had some time today so I did that mod fix on the gears . I still have no power to the pump I check all the other fuse and the one up front and driver side out side didn't fine any others blown , I just took a break next Iam going to pull the fuse pane and check the wire connection , you know the little red light that come on when take the fuse out , it does come on for 11,12,13 but everything else works the spot the slide room but not the pump and I check with a meter no power . Thought many Iam missing some thing or someone else ran into this before ? Thanks guys this sight has made my life so much easier work on the 07 workhorse outlaw we love it !

Did you try running the pump with no gears in it (with the cover off) before making the mod? I did that to make sure my pump had power and everything was spinning before I put the new gears in and would suggest doing the same to insure it is working as it should.

[Scarab0088]

Originally Posted by Timlo

Hey Steve or DG I did that fix on the fuel station pump...I still have no power to the pump... Thought many Iam missing some thing or someone else ran into this before ? Thanks guys this sight has made my life so much easier work on the 07 workhorse outlaw we love it !

Tim,
Don (DGShaffer) has moved on and I can offer no help, except that power-in is as important as power-out (ground). I would start chasing the power with a continuity gauge, test light or volt meter.

Our current Fuel station pump expert is Scott (Focker)

[f15epilot]

Replying to both the External Generator and the Fuel Pump Posts...


External Generator:
- I went to several rallies/NASCAR events where 30amp was all that we were given. You can run one A/C + lights/TV, or one coffee pot/water heater + lights/TV...just don't fire up the microwave while doing either...it will pop you off.
- I've connected a 30amp Honda gen-set to the unit when the 5500 Onan ate the drive belt (lesson learned...if you replace the belt on the Onan, go ahead and replace ALL the belt path parts to include the dampener and idler pulley. It was the latter that caused the second belt failure).
- I've also run ABAC (all but A/C's) on a 1800watt inverter gen-set using a CAMCO 'cheater' plug. That is one that taps both a 30amp (big) and 15amp (standard 110, 3-prong) plug and sends to a 50amp, 4-prong plug. Still can't run an A/C.
- When operating off an external gen-set after being off-grid, don't forget that your battery charger will pull a hefty load charging the batteries (it is on its own 20amp C/B)
- And you can get external gen-sets with 50amp RV plugs, or even a 30amp + 15amp plug (and use the cheater from CAMCO). Also, many of the inverter gen-sets (Honda, Yamaha, and others) have harnesses that let you chain two of them together to get more juice...your neighbors will appreciate the quiet of an inverter generator over the construction-grade with minimal muffler.

BL: running on an external generator (preferably the quieter inverter types) is like running on shore-power...just mind the electrical load. And the CAMCO cheater plug is worth the price--might gain a few extra amps, depending on the generator to which it is connected.


FUEL PUMP:
- Here are a couple pics from my fuel pump overhaul. I had the same issue of it binding, and tried the 'sanding' approach. The problem I had was that tightening the case bolts that hold the face of the pump area onto the pump sufficient to prevent a leak also resulted in the wheels not turning.
- Purchased the overhaul kit on-line (pretty inexpensive) with new gears and gaskets (and even grease for the gaskets). Only installed the gears and the gasket for the gear housing. Worked well...for a while.
- Then, switching on/off didn't start the pump...no click, nothing.
- Remembered the other gaskets, so I pulled the pump. Note the corrosion in the pick showing the switch-side...should have replaced the gaskets over there, too...moisture got in and corroded the switch. The fuel pump compartment (not the ones on the pump...the door/bay on the Outlaw) is NOT sealed, guessing so gas fumes draft out...road spray and moisture will get in there.
- I pulled the fuse, then cut the wires to the pump. Note in the pic, I put moisture-proof bullet connectors back on the wires so the pump can be removed/reinstalled without another splice in the wires.
- The switch is not included in the overhaul, but is a standard 1/2" hole-mount SPST switch. The mounting bracket swapped over easily, connected up the power wires, replaced ALL those gaskets, tightened it up, and voila...works like a champ.

Bottom Line: save yourself the frustration (especially if your rig is a Gen-I like mine) and buy the overhaul kit. The new gears and gaskets can be installed in under 30min, and your pump will work like new.