More miles on Thursday...

We headed out from Jackson, TN, at about 8am, stopped at the Love's to get wheels re-torqued (no charge!) before getting back onto I-40 and were on our way by 9am. All the way across Tennessee and into Virginia before stopping for the night at the Cracker Barrel in Wytheville. The rig did not start right away in the morning, but turning off the chassis batteries and back on did the trick, and we didn't cut off the engine from morning through stopping in the evening.

The Welcome sign is still there coming into Virginia, even though we've heard that campgrounds cannot accommodate anyone for stays less than 2 weeks... so we're glad to be self-contained and able to stay at other facilities on our trip.

Some pictures from Carl's phone over the past two days...

Carl was impressed with the high flyovers of the interchanges in Dallas... I told him that I thought that the High-5 at 75 and I-635 was the highest, but we didn't get there - so he took this as we were leaving Lewisville at I-35E and PGB Turnpike.

I mentioned in the post yesterday that I had washed the windshield when we stopped for fuel (even though you couldn't tell it by the number of bugs on the windshield in the picture)... so this is documentation that I did, indeed, wash the windshield.

It is nice that truck stops have nice long handled poles, and they keep nice clean water available.

Additional information from Friday morning:
We woke up to *snow* (!!!) on the ground this morning at the Wytheville, VA Cracker Barrel:

At first we thought, "Is it a heavy frost?"

It was also lawn mowing day... neither rain nor snow nor dark of night will stop these yard maintenance guys from their appointed rounds!

It started really coming down... tiny flakes....

And then the sun was shining and the snow was falling!

Accumulation on our windshield wipers

If we would move the rig, the snow could melt on that bank beside us... notice that the light pole shadow also has left a trail of snow!

We hope to soon be moving east, to make it to the farm before too late today!

Moving along east... with just a few bumps in the road...

.... both literal and figurative bumps in the road...

While the rig was at National Indoor RV Center (NIRVC), it developed a problem associated with the engine batteries and/or gauges... at some times, some of the gauges just stopped working. It first occurred when they were doing testing on the auto gen start module - the generator stopped running before they expected it to, and they wondered if it was out of fuel - when they checked the fuel gauge, nothing was showing -- for fuel, DEF, battery charge, and RPMs. In doing debugging, they found that a fuse had blown and thought that was it, and it did correct the problem initially, but... the problem continued to happen, seemingly randomly. They found that it could be corrected just by disconnecting and re-connecting the engine batteries (which is a switch in the battery compartment). It wasn't happening all the time, so it wasn't possible to get it debugged while we were there.

Well, it has been happening very consistently since we left there Wednesday morning - every time we turn it off, we have to disconnect / reconnect the engine batteries to get the gauges working. And... honestly, we could "live" without the gauges, but when it is having this problem, it has a wonderfully annoying buzzer that sounds continuously. We don't think we could drive with that buzzer... well... not and maintain the small amount of sanity that we have left!

After our lunch stop... doing the battery disconnect/reconnect didn't fix the problem... so we decided that we needed to check the fuses and see if the fuse that had been replaced had blown again....

Carl checking the fuses... he may be praying too... I was!

Schematic / labels for one set of fuses

... and for the other set of fuses

While Carl was looking at the fuses and pulling ones that appeared likely, I called back to NIRVC to ask which fuse they had replaced. We needed to wait for the technician to get back from lunch, and in the meantime, Carl decided to try to start it up again, and, it started. Even though he did not find any fuses that needed to be replaced, maybe removing and re-seating them corrected the problem, at least temporarily.

The service advisor from NIRVC called back and said that the fuse was the "instrument cluster" fuse in the bottom set... I didn't have my picture to look at to say, "there isn't one with that label", but we figure it is either "INSTR IGN POWER" or "INSTR BATT POWER".

We decided to call our private RV on-call technician (otherwise known as my brother Jimmy) to get his opinion of whether we should try to find a Freightliner dealer to try to help us with this problem that has become persistent instead of transient... his recommendation was to turn off the rig as few times as possible and to hope that the various techniques we've been using will continue to allow us to start it and drive it - and get to the farm where we can do additional debugging and research - so that's the current plan.

The other "bumps in the road" are literal ones -- wow! coming into Tennessee in Memphis, well, let's say that the gas tax funds are *not* going to fix the roads around there!

A view of some of the other vehicles on the road with us... almost all trucks except right in metropolitan areas. Excuse the bugs on the windshield - even though I washed the windshield when we stopped for fuel, we are collecting a large number of bugs. Carl thinks it is a very large number considering how early in the season it is... I said that it is because there are so few vehicles on the road that fewer bugs are getting hit by other people, and therefore there are more bugs around for us to hit!

Coming up to the Mississippi at Memphis - still quite flooded.

Entering Tennessee

Interesting building right across the river.

Turns out it is a Bass Pro Shops retail store with the Ducks Unlimited Waterfowl Heritage Center inside: https://www.ducks.org/conservation/national/welcome-to-the-du-waterfowling-heritage-center
Sounds interesting - but I am sure it would have been closed... and we didn't stop...

Current status

Our view on Tuesday included this:

I don't know whether you can see it or not, but there is an item hanging by a wire from the panel above the windshield...

That item is our Magnum "Advanced Remote Control" (ARC) panel.

We have been having difficulty with the Auto Gen Start module that was installed while we were here at National Indoor RV Center (NIRVC). It is supposed to cause the generator to automatically start when certain criteria were met. It was not working correctly (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/03/auto-gen-start-testing.html).

So, on Tuesday, one of the fellows came and replaced the auto gen start module.
Unfortunately, the new one failed in the same way.
This time, one of the techs from NIRVC was on the phone for hours with the tech from Magnum.
They eventually determined that another unit, the Power Control System, that has always been on the coach (from the time it was built) was causing a signal to be sent that stopped the generator. When the wiring was changed to no longer include that module, the auto gen start worked fine.

The determination was made that they needed to re-wire the connection from the auto gen start so it would not go through the Power Control System but rather directly to the ARC. They were able to get that completed by end of day Tuesday!

Also on Tuesday, the (almost) last work needed on the damage from the wind / awning being torn off was completed:

vent covers replaced - they were broken off in the incident with the awning being blown off - probably from the awning blowing up onto the roof and down and back...

roof antenna whip replaced (it had been removed in some of the work being done and just needed to be put back on)

Hole for the wiring of the awning temporarily patched because....

...unfortunately, the new awning has not come in, and, honestly, it is not clear that it is even available from the factory at this point. So, we've decided that it is time for us to leave... we are ready to get back to Virginia and be able to settle into a place that we can "stay in place" while we work on consolidating items between our two RVs. We will need to come back "sometime" to get the awning installed... maybe when life gets to be more normal again?

So... I'm completing this post on Wednesday morning and we are heading east on I-30 on our way to Virginia. We are about halfway to the Texas-Arkansas border from NIRVC. We are happy to be on our way!

Building fences

As I've posted before, construction is going on here at NIRVC (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/03/our-current-status.html).

Part of the property where the construction is proceeding was not previously owned by NIRVC, so there was not a fence (or not a *nice* fence) between NIRVC and the mobile home park next door. So, they had put a fence in the front of the area a week or more ago:

The fence is at the back of this parking area, the front of the mobile home park...

A little closer up... they were painting the panels - the panels appear to be made of concrete shaped to look like a brick wall.

Carl checked to see if they were really concrete or some other material that might be lightweight... they were *not* lightweight!

On part of the area where they are doing construction, the property had previously been owned by NIRVC so there was a nice metal fence - similar to the fence that exists between where we are parked and where the construction is going on:

There used to be a fence like this all along behind those mobile homes that you can see through the fence. But, a couple of days ago, the construction workers cut the fence into segments of 3 panels and lifted them out of the ground, concrete footing and all, with one of the big pieces of equipment.

So now, they are putting in the concrete posts and the fence sections along this portion of the property too.

We figure that it could be a benefit to the mobile home park folks - especially for those on the front side, who previously just had a rickety wooden picket fence between them and the roadway on the other side of the parking lot. I don't know whether the folks who had the metal fence would prefer it versus the concrete wall...

Where we are parked, and the remainder of the parking area behind us, they are leaving the metal fence between the NIRVC and the mobile home park... or that is what we've been told at this point!

Losing one's mind?

This was posted on Facebook by a lady who lives in Coppell - where Dwayne and I used to live:

Losing one’s mind....

I stop by KFC to get the kids something to eat. 

They wanted the Kid’s Meal with a Leg, so I say,

“kids meal with a leg” 

and the lady says “which side?”

Me- *complete silence as I heavily contemplate such an odd decision*

“I guess the right side, I don’t know what the difference is?”

After several moments of laughter she says, “No hun, which side would you like to go with that Leg? Mashed potatoes or the wedges?”

Jesus take the wheel! 

It’s been a long few weeks! 🤪

🤣

Some "interesting" vehicles and sights

I was going through pictures from the last couple of weeks, and found a few that I took to document "interesting" things we've seen... these are some vehicles we've seen:

This was parked behind the building at National Indoor RV ... let's just say that it is not similar to most of the rigs parked here...

Can you read what is written on the window?  "No brakes. driveline out."  Yikes!

We just noticed on Thursday night that it seems to be gone... I don't know whether they have in the shop now for repairs or if it was towed away...

We went out to get lunch at Pan Acean in Coppell a few days ago and noticed this Hummer parked nearby - the wheels on it looked odd to us...

A guy got in and drove it away...

Later, when I was inside picking up our order (and it had started to rain), it came back - it seemed to be the delivery vehicle. We just thought that the wheels made it look really odd, but I'm sure they are very special wheels.

A couple of days ago, a rig with a very "interesting" contraption on the back was parked by the NIRVC "valet" team next to us...

I was taking pictures through the window so I wouldn't be obvious...

Look at that hitch!

That's a lot of extensions on that hitch - and it appears that the motorcycle/toolbox lift is somehow supported on the hitch as well!

I guess he really wanted to carry his tools with him. I am pretty sure that the RV was 45' long, and then another 5-6' for the motorcycle/toolbox lift. They also had a large tow vehicle - an Avalanche, I think.

Seeing things like this make us a little concerned - it would seem that there is an awful lot of weight at the end of a very long set of combined items with that towbar. From what I researched with Miss Doozie, each additional link weakens the capacity. I hope the fellow who had this has done his research and didn't believe a salesperson who just said, "I'm sure that will work!"

Finally, we saw this rig in the parking area of NIRVC - the rig didn't catch my attention as much as the awning on the passenger side... yes, we are waiting for an awning for the passenger side, but...

This awning was also growing something!

We had stopped at Home Depot and also saw growing things, so I'll include that too, even though it isn't a vehicle:

Nice front of the Home Depot -- but... do you see something green up there on the orange roof?

Yep, quite a crop - probably some kind of tree!

At least it is interesting getting out and seeing some things!

A couple of music parodies...

I saw these two Sound of Music music parodies on COVID-19 this morning, and they made Carl and me smile... so I hope they make you smile too...

Do-Re-Mi:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMBh-eo3tvE
My Favorite Things: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aAnPFeo11s

I hope you're finding things to do if you are in enforced isolation!