Stupid stuff you've done.....

[RedWing Nut]

Originally Posted by michelb

Like many of you, I've done more than my share of stupid things but my most recent was bad since probably could have easily hurt myself.

I was equalizing my battery and I read somewhere that said to remove the vent cap when equalizing so I was trying to that but one of the caps was blocked by the cable so I loosened the bolt to the post while the batteries where still 'connected' to the charging system and sure enough, the wrench I was using was long enough to touch both posts and next thing I know my ears are ringing and the battery had exploded. I ran inside to flush anywhere where liquid might have touched me and luckily enough I didn't really have a mark on me (I had a red scratch on my forearm but I think it's actually from a piece of the battery case hitting me not from battery acid). After a few days, my ears even stopped ringing.

I hope you bought a lottery ticket after the incident because that was definitely your lucky day.

[Bruce C]

Originally Posted by dogpatch

Now I'm rolling! Maybe some of my stupidity will help others!

We were at Lake Pleasant RV park in Bothel Washington. I was looking up numbers to car rental agencies cause we didn't bring our car, when suddenly the A/C went out along with some lights. I looked around sure enough, many other things were out. I left the RV to check the pedestal, heard the neighbors A/C working and thought maybe I blew a Breaker. Got to the pedestal, saw my surge protector lights were on and breaker was still on. I turned it off and on anyway. DW says "it's still off" so I sat down in my recliner to ponder what to do next. Suddenly the power came back on. My thought was, resetting the breaker must have done it. A few minutes later, the A/C and lights go off again. WTH?, I ask myself. So I went outside and did the same routine I thought fixed it before. Came back in, waited and nothing. So I get up, start looking at the breaker box. All breakers are on, but I switch them on and off anyway. DW says "What's going on, I'm dying here in this heat". I tell her "How am I supposed to know I'm not an RV technician"! So....I go sit down in my recliner to ponder my next move and everything comes back on. This is tooooo weird for me! I start on my car quest again and ........The A/C goes off again! I go out to the pedestal, all on, I go in the bedroom check the panel, all on. Checked every fuse in every fuse box, all good. Some things like the microwave are flashing the time and the TV lights are still on. I ask myself....self, why would some be on and not others?
Now, I'm thinking maybe a disconnect. I go over to the inside battery disconnect switch by the door and hit the button and Voila!!! Everything came on!!!
I sat down and everything went off, so I turned around in my chair, hit the disconnect switch and it came on.

I finally found the culprit.....it was me! Every time I sat in the chair or learned forward or back, the corner of the chair hit the battery disconnect switch for either on or off causing me about 1.5 hours of misery.


Attachment 45466

Now, that did have me laughing. Sorry!

[RickO]

Originally Posted by charliej

Oh, forgot about the street light pole, discovered the MH leans about a foot when parked in front of the house :(

This is actually a great heads up for everyone! I haven't done any damage because of it but I've come close.

While traveling, often times when going through small towns, there are no parking lots so we pull to the side of the street to park and run into a cafe or store. These streets are often crowned and when trying to get as close to the curb as possible to get out of the traffic lane, it's easy to just focus on where the tires are relative to the curb so we don't scratch our wheels.

The problem is that because of the crowned roads, the top of the coach will lean right more than a foot more than the tires are tracking. Any kind of sign or pole and... well, you know the rest.

Rick

[RedWing Nut]

Originally Posted by RickO

The problem is that because of the crowned roads, the top of the coach will lean right more than a foot more than the tires are tracking. Any kind of sign or pole and... well, you know the rest.

Rick

That reminds me. Our garage has a 24" overhang plus eavestroughs. I parked close to it one day. Screeeeech!

[Dogpatch]

Another from the archives of Dogpatch:

During one of our earlier camping trips, we had arrived at our campground in southern BC. The week before we left, I had gotten a new black water cable put on the RV as it was acting up. At the site, I got everything set up and got to the task of hooking up our sewer, water and power. I now unscrewed the cap on my sewer to hook up the sewer hose and to my shear horror, filled my water station compartment full of the foulest smelling conglomeration I had ever come across. You guess it...100% raw, unrefined sewage. Yes that's right. That nasty word nobody wants to say let alone have to deal with...[ Moderator Edit ]. It's obvious that the newly installed cable didn't close the gate valve. This is a BIG problem. Even more so when I noted that my rubber gloves, my savior from what would have made the handling of the situation a bit more bearable were laying in the bottom of the compartment. Both DW and DD yelled out in unison "What is that awful smell?" They thought our dog had dropped a bomb but couldn't find any evidence. I yelled out "Don't worry about it, I've got it under control!" Ya right, I think to myself. I felt like every camper in the resort now had their eyes on me after their announcement as the smelly conglomeration glooped onto the ground. I quickly hooked up my water hose and washed down the compartment, hoses, controls and accumulated pile on the ground. In a few minutes, it was gonna be nothing more than just another memory ingrained in the annals of my holiday experiences. DW asked me if I wanted a drink. I said "yes". She said "Are you ready to have dinner"? I said "Give me a few minutes"!

[RoyM]

Went out on the maiden run with our new to us fiver last weekend. Broke camp on Monday, removed rear leveling blocks to hook up. The jacks are stiff so got lazy and didn't run them all the way up, I now have a bent jack to deal with. Then there was the time I felt a thump as I pulled out of the site. Hmm, what was that? Oh well, press on regardless. I was missing one of my landing gear blocks when I set up that night.

[Cliffy]

Went to dump black water about a month ago and when I closed the valve I felt it close on "something" as it wouldn't go all the way in. Had enough sense to say I need to remove it and clean it out. Didn't have enough sense to reopen and completely flush it out BEFORE I pulled the valve. Had enough sense to have a trash bag handy for what I thought would be a cup full. Had a gallon or more before the tide went out :-) YUCK!

[terry735001]

at the RV park we where staying at for around 8 months nice park owner keeps the parks grass cut

cutting the grass one day and a new 2012 TT has both water lines in for water to the Rv and black dump tank flush he pulled both lines to cut the grass and installed the water back .. but turned back on the water to the wrong line with a all most full black tank

park owner moves on to keep cutting grass owner of TT is out of town and water stays on over night to TT

nice to say the TT owner was not happy to come home a week latter to hes TT

park owner payed for the fix when i think the TT should have been a tootle loss

any one that likes the T vales and keeps there Rv setup like this keep this in mind
not saying the TT was wrong or the park owner just like to make sure things like this can never happen

[cucamelsmd15]

Somewhat RV related, since this was a gooseneck with living quarters... That counts, right?

Friend of mine and I were doing the first big race weekend with his new car and my current car. Mine was loaded in back, so it came out first. His was in front, and we unstrapped it like we normally would. We had the trailer at a nose high angle to minimize the break over for the ramp and subsequent ramp extenders for our cars that have less than 4" of ground clearance.

Did I mention it was business as usual? Well, it was, until his wife says "Uh, guys?" at which point we both whipped around to witness his brandy new six figure money pit roll into the chain link fence opposite the paddock roadway from us.

More Class A related, we have been lucky thus far with the toter. At 75ish feet, it can be a pain to maneuver, and it bit us badly one night in Dayton. We pulled into a truck stop we thought would be easy to get out of. The next morning, and 3 hours later, we were on our way. A kind gentleman by the name of Darrel offered his tractor to move the stacker trailer while we moved the toter home. While the lot was maneuverable for a tractor trailer, it wasnt for a toter home.

A couple of near misses, and changing a few flats, but no big issues other than some mindless actions of our own accord. Did I mention that the racecar takes 550 ft/lb to torque the lugs, and that air gun/torque wrench/breaker bar combo comes in really handy for 22.5in tires?

[Redman07]

Ok, my turn. Moved from a fiver to a 40' Class A. On our first trip camping with the Class A we were headed through our small home town. It was mid afternoon with normal traffic. As we got near the Police Station on Main Street in the middle of town there was a police car in the on-coming lane that turned on his flashing lights and another Police Officer in my lane pointing at me and then the curb?!? Pulled over and opened the door. He politely informed us (suppressing a laugh, no doubt) that another unit had passed our RV and noticed the TV antenna was in the up position and had called it in. Doh!!! Needless to say I have not done that again (yet) and the wife still gets a giggle out of it.

[Mario-John]

Sanicon system, remember to take cap off before hooking up to the park sweage. Yup, switched the pump on.. it was like a scene out of the movie RV except corn was involved. Friends heard the scream and I got hosed off.

[guymaster]

I am relatively new to this life style but if I confess all of my mistakes all of the readers will be laughing for the next 20 years.

What I have learned is that is ok to get lost and learning from our mistakes has caused lots of laughter on our part!

[ka7suz]

One of our mistakes has been to listen to the GPS when we questioned the choice she suggested. We have had some very interesting tours of the downtown, narrow street, business districts of some very big cities compliments of that instrument of torture.

JoAnn

[topdownman]

Here's one of my many: We were preparing to leave on a trip and had everything loaded and ready to go. I pulled the motorhome out of the driveway onto the street to hook up the toad and failed to unplug said motorhome from garage outlet. It pulled the cord under the garage door bending it all to heck and ripped the wiring and transfer switch out of my basement.