Purchased first FWC (used). Remodeling questions!

[Snaves]

My wife and I recently purchased our first FWC and couldn't be more excited. Here is a pic from our trip home from to UT from MT.



The camper came with some of the original paperwork, which I thought some might find interesting. There is a handwritten note from a former owner (not the most recent) regarding WTW - so I am wondering if you are out here in the forums? We may be able to save others some reading if I could contact you directly with some questions.



First question - The warranty clearly states that it is a Granby model, but the schematics of the various interior layouts match the Ranger model. Ex: bed slides out to the edge of the stove unit. I have photos of these but seem to be limited by how many I can attach. Any ideas what model we are working with here? Thought it might help to know as we do research.

Second question - the rear pop up assembly had a blowout at some point, and now it hits the rear countertops when driving (isn't able to be held up to the roof anymore). it looks like a simple fix as there is only one hole, but my question is what hardware was here? Was it a button? There are two straps with buttons on the end, but I am unsure what they clip through. Or maybe they clip together?



3rd Question - The faucet is cracked, so when I filled the water tank last night and began hand pumping water quickly leaked onto the counter. Wish I would have noticed this when we picked it up as we were promised that everything worked. Easy fix, I am just looking for recommendations for everyone's favorite faucet.

4th Question - Related to the above. Camper is wired for a water pump (I think, see photo below), but there isn't currently a pump installed. We would like to add one back in which shouldn't be too hard as the wiring is already there. What pump/s is everyone using? Looking for something dependable but doesn't need to be top of the line.



The camper has had some wiring modifications, so I may be back with more questions as I attempt to wire it to our truck (if a previous owner who did the wiring is on WTW your insight would be extremely useful!). As of now we have just ordered an AGM battery.

Thanks in advance everyone!

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

“Second question - the rear pop up assembly had a blowout at some point, and now it hits the rear countertops when driving (isn't able to be held up to the roof anymore). it looks like a simple fix as there is only one hole, but my question is what hardware was here? Was it a button? There are two straps with buttons on the end, but I am unsure what they clip through. Or maybe they clip together?”


There is typically a knob there, the straps wrap around the knob and snaps together. Or, that was how my Grandby was.

 

[Jon&Sue_DeArman]

Second question - the rear pop up assembly had a blowout at some point, and now it hits the rear countertops when driving (isn't able to be held up to the roof anymore). it looks like a simple fix as there is only one hole, but my question is what hardware was here? Was it a button? There are two straps with buttons on the end, but I am unsure what they clip through. Or maybe they clip together?



It is correct that the knob is missing, However, to hold the pop-up panel up while driving required a sliding door latch that may or may not be there since I can not tell from your picture

 

[Snaves]

“Second question - the rear pop up assembly had a blowout at some point, and now it hits the rear countertops when driving (isn't able to be held up to the roof anymore). it looks like a simple fix as there is only one hole, but my question is what hardware was here? Was it a button? There are two straps with buttons on the end, but I am unsure what they clip through. Or maybe they clip together?”


There is typically a knob there, the straps wrap around the knob and snaps together. Or, that was how my Grandby was.

Thanks for the response! So my take is that the knob is there to hold the panels in the upright position? As the strap is coming from the top panel, would go around the knob in the bottom panel, and then button back to the top. Easy!

 

[Snaves]

Second question - the rear pop up assembly had a blowout at some point, and now it hits the rear countertops when driving (isn't able to be held up to the roof anymore). it looks like a simple fix as there is only one hole, but my question is what hardware was here? Was it a button? There are two straps with buttons on the end, but I am unsure what they clip through. Or maybe they clip together?



It is correct that the knob is missing, However, to hold the pop-up panel up while driving required a sliding door latch that may or may not be there since I can not tell from your picture

Jon and Sue: Thanks, I was wondering about this as I had seen images of this on newer campers. I am wondering if these older models are different as there is quite a gap between the panels in the down position and the load lifter (board? bar? Not sure what this is called). So because of this gap a door latch would not work. I believe the second strap would potentially reach the knob and button back to itself, so I will try this for now and let you know.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

Snaves, yes on the strap. I have a photo somewhere of the sliding latch. I’ll post it when I find it.



Here’s the latch. It’s on the rear lift bar, and slides into a hole in the aluminum frame that’s on the lower portion of the back lift pane. The block with the big hole is for a speaker lift to raise the top when its too heavy to lift manually. Look for speaker lift threads to get an idea of how that goes together.

 

[klahanie]

As an addition to the above posts ... ours is from that era, a '97, the rear panel has been replaced with a home brew but the locking bolt remains. It is attached onto the ceiling cross piece at camper centreline and was positioned right at the rearward edge (relocated slightly in this pic. you can see 2 of the orig fastener holes towards the left). Can't remember the orig lift panel part but fwiw was told the bolt prevents a bad guy from being able to lift the closed top from outside.

ON EDIT maybe I've got that wrong, and I put that latch in there... I think the draw bolt action was side to side into part of the AL frame on the panel. That would prevent lift. anyhoo you get the idea ...

 

[Snaves]

Thanks all for the photos and suggestions!

-Found a knob at Lowes that works well keeping the rear panels in the upright position.

-Here is a picture of the ceiling in the “down” position. As you can see there is a large gap between the ceiling cross piece and the rear panel, so the door latch hardware wouldn’t work in this case. It looks like for this model there was a second buttoned strap installed here for this task, however as soon as I stopped holding the weight of the ceiling the button popped. I’ll have to re-rig a stronger system.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

I’m not certain that slide lock is needed.

 

[WyoIDI]

No slide lock on my 90's grandby. Just the nylon strap buttoned around the knob.

 

[DavidGraves]

Hello Snaves

Hopefully your question has been answered.

I see some confusion through out this thread as to whether you are concerned about the rear lift panel in the closed, down position or in the open lifted the roof position.

Hope you can clarify.

Good luck.

David Graves

 

[WyoIDI]

Seaflo 12V DC 1.2 GPM 35 PSI 21-Series Diaphragm Water Pressure Pump for Caravan/RV/Boat/Marine (amazon)

I'm going on 3 years of moderate to heavy use with this thing (kids use a lot of water) and have had no problems. Definitely not top of the line, but dependable so far.

 

[Vic Harder]

factory uses Shureflo pumps

 

[Living The Dream]

If you need any more info about your faucet replacement. This should help you.

Here is the exact faucet I used.
Amazon.com

Let me know if you have any more questions.

 

[Snaves]

No slide lock on my 90's grandby. Just the nylon strap buttoned around the knob.

Thanks WyoIDI ! Seems like replacing the knob fixed multiple problems.

 

[Snaves]

Hello Snaves

Hopefully your question has been answered.

I see some confusion through out this thread as to whether you are concerned about the rear lift panel in the closed, down position or in the open lifted the roof position.

Hope you can clarify.

Good luck.

David Graves

Thanks for checking David - seems like the knob that was missing on my rear panel held things together both in the down and up position, so problem solved!

 

[Snaves]

Thanks all for the great suggestions. Ordered a sureflo pump and a faucet which should be here early next week. Now is a good time to be at home working on camper projects, so I may be back with some electrical questions! Stay safe out there everyone.

 

[Snaves]

I know that there are wiring threads all throughout the WTW forum (and others), which I have been taking advantage of. But I found this hand drawn diagram in our camper so I wanted to post it here to see what people thought. I'm guessing it was drawn by a former owner who did a bit of re-wiring of their own.

We have a diesel truck so the setup will be on the left side of the vehicle (as opposed to what is drawn on the diagram). I've already ordered a deep cycle battery which should be here tomorrow. Was thinking of using Renology DC to DC charger between the truck battery and the house battery, with 4 gauge heavy wire as recommended on many posts. This is different than what is drawn on this diagram, so if there is any reason I should not change the set up let me know!

My questions are:
-Are people generally mounting the breaker and DC to DC charger in the camper and not in the engine compartment?
-If so, is there some sort of quick connection that can be used to make hooking up easier when putting the camper on and off?

I can't quite read the writing on the left hand side of the diagram, but a previous owner has already installed a powermax 120 to DC converter which works great. I am also curious how this all will be tied into the battery - seems like just running wires with appropriate fuses. I'm going to try to take the front counter off today to get a look at how things are currently wired up and can post a picture later. In the older models the fuse box isn't super easy to access without taking things apart.

Thanks all!

 

[rando]

There are lots of posts on this, so it maybe worth doing some reading. Vic Harder has an excellent write up of his power system and decision process, which would be a good place to start.

If you plan on adding solar than a DC-DC charger is probably unnecessary.

To answer your specific questions:
Are people generally mounting the breaker and DC to DC charger in the camper and not in the engine compartment?

If you are going to use a DC-DC charger, then you want to mount it as close to the battery as possible to minimize voltage drop between the charger and battery. This poses an issue with the Renogy, as it needs a 'trigger wire' to know the engine is running and that it should be charging. This means you need to run 3 wires back to the camper. There are other choices of DC-DC converter that activate by sensing the voltage on the input, such as the Victron Orion-TR.

-If so, is there some sort of quick connection that can be used to make hooking up easier when putting the camper on and off?
Any connector capable of handling the current will work. Another thing to note - if you are using a DC-DC charger, then voltage drop between the truck and the charger is not so important. The wire just needs to be able to handle the current. For a maximum of 30A, 10AWG wire is fine.

I know that there are wiring threads all throughout the WTW forum (and others), which I have been taking advantage of. But I found this hand drawn diagram in our camper so I wanted to post it here to see what people thought. I'm guessing it was drawn by a former owner who did a bit of re-wiring of their own.

We have a diesel truck so the setup will be on the left side of the vehicle (as opposed to what is drawn on the diagram). I've already ordered a deep cycle battery which should be here tomorrow. Was thinking of using Renology DC to DC charger between the truck battery and the house battery, with 4 gauge heavy wire as recommended on many posts. This is different than what is drawn on this diagram, so if there is any reason I should not change the set up let me know!

My questions are:
-Are people generally mounting the breaker and DC to DC charger in the camper and not in the engine compartment?
-If so, is there some sort of quick connection that can be used to make hooking up easier when putting the camper on and off?

I can't quite read the writing on the left hand side of the diagram, but a previous owner has already installed a powermax 120 to DC converter which works great. I am also curious how this all will be tied into the battery - seems like just running wires with appropriate fuses. I'm going to try to take the front counter off today to get a look at how things are currently wired up and can post a picture later. In the older models the fuse box isn't super easy to access without taking things apart.

Thanks all!

 

[Vic Harder]

Like rando said -- https://www.wanderthewest.com/forum/topic/13230-i-need-more-power-scotty/

No need for big wires if using that DC-DC converter. If you want big wires, use anderson power pole connectors.

And you want fuses/breakers within 6-12" of each battery to protect the wires.