Our life often revolves around the BoggsMobile so sometimes that is what I write about. If you are here to read about our 1995/96 Prevost XL Vantare, you are in luck today.
IF you go to sleep every time I post something mechanical, humor me today, you may like tomorrow better!
The Best Laid Plans And All That! BoggsMobile News😍
I told you Tuesday that we hoped to roll some miles under our wheels that day. While we did roll some miles, it was not as near as many as we had hoped. We were gone from East Tennessee Luxury Coach before 7:00 AM, but we were back in 55 minutes.
Tuesday
By 4:30 AM, I was up and thinking about leaving. By 6:30 the bus was running and we were hooking up the Jeep. Thirteen miles later, KJo was in the back and smelled brakes getting hot. At the same time, my tire pressure monitor was telling me that one of my tag axle tires had pressure rising. Time to pull over.
Thankfully, there was a station we could pull into. Nothing was overly hot, but it was pretty obvious one of the brakes was dragging. I called Jeff and headed back to his shop. We unhooked the Jeep and Jeff pulled the BoggsMobile into the shop.
You may wonder why we make such a big deal about brake issues. There are two reasons. Number one, when we need to stop this thing, I want it to be able to stop. Number two, tires and wheels are the leading source of bus fires. Ouch!
The brakes drag or the bearings run dry, the wheel gets red hot, the tire catches on fire and the bus burns down alongside the road. I have seen way too many pictures and way too many videos and cried every time. We are doing our best to prevent something like that!
There are valves that control the air flow to the tag axle brake chambers. They are called R12 valves. I had them replaced in October 2013 at Prevost Houston. They were leaking like crazy then. They were not leaking Tuesday, but it was possible they were not working correctly. They are not expensive and relatively easy to change. That was the first thing to replace.
Jeff also recommended changing the tag axle brake chambers and they had to be ordered. They would not arrive until Wednesday so we were grounded for the day. I will tell you about Wednesday in a few moments.
A Different Subject
The bus has two 12 volt fresh water pumps and both are kind of difficult to get to. Pump #1 is very difficult to get to. It quit working a while back, but since the second one was working, we did not worry about it. The day we left Virginia and came to Tennessee, Pump #2 quit.
Since were in Vonore an extra day, KJo and I drove to Camping World to get a pump and Jeff put it on. Now we can use water from our fresh water tank when we are not near a spigot.. Yay!
For my own personal information, I purchased a Remco brand pump this time. The bus originally had Flojet and Sureflo pumps and the last two I purchased were Flojet. I like the variable speed 5 GPM Flojet, but it was $400 at Camping World. This one lasted about 4 1/2 years.
The Remco variable speed 5.3 GPM was $228. It is the 90-55AQUAJET-ARV. Jeff had a ball installing it. Hopefully, we are still friends. I need to redo that whole setup. It has not been good from the beginning.
Wednesday
I enjoyed a leisurely morning outside Wednesday. I walked a bit and then sat in the shade in front of the bus.
Just about the time, it was getting too warm for me outside, the parts arrived and it was time to pull the bus into the shop.
New brake chamber for the tag axle.
These are the two old chambers that were replaced in June 2014.
More road news later. Thank you for dropping in.
Davy
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