{"id":113,"date":"2015-07-17T16:21:40","date_gmt":"2015-07-17T16:21:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/new.yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/?page_id=113"},"modified":"2021-02-22T21:06:52","modified_gmt":"2021-02-22T21:06:52","slug":"technical-details","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/technical-details\/","title":{"rendered":"RV Life & Technical Details"},"content":{"rendered":"

Preparing for RV Life<\/a>:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Full-time RV living can be a wonderful way to live and travel, visit interesting places and family, follow the weather to avoid excesses in heat or cold. It can be a very economical lifestyle \u2026 or expensive, depending on how you approach it.<\/p>\n

What RV should I buy?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

This is a topic that is the subject of tremendous debate.<\/p>\n

If you have not yet purchased a rig, take time to think about your lives together, what you like to do inside, what you want to do outside,<\/p>\n

BOONDOCKING<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

First, boondocking means different things to different people. For some it is any \u201cdry camping\u201d whether in a Walmart or Casino parking lot or the middle of the Mojave Desert. And most of the principles are the same, so let\u2019s carry on\u2026<\/p>\n

What does it take to \u201clive off of the grid\u201d?<\/p>\n

TRUCK CAPACITIES<\/a>:<\/strong><\/p>\n

We\u00a0did\u00a0a significant amount of research before purchasing our 2011 Silverado 3500 Dually. \u00a0As I reviewed the RVing forums (thanks to all the posters from IRV2 and ESCAPEES Forums) & analyzed the truck manufacturers specifications, I found that the trailer weight one can actually tow (at least for a 5th wheel RV like ours) is SIGNIFICANTLY different than the towing capacities the manufacturers like to toss around. \u00a0\u00a0<\/u>\u2014 More \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

COMPOSTING TOILET:<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Like other major endeavors with the 5th wheel, we tried to do our research. \u00a0Wanting to be able to function \u201coff-the-grid\u201d for periods of time, preferring to stay at National Parks, National Forest land, or Bureau of Land Management land, we needed an alternative to sewer hook-ups and dumping the \u201cblack tank\u201d (a nasty & potentially messy job, at best).<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0More \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

SOLAR POWER PLAN:<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Since we want to be able to operate \u201coff-the-grid\u201d for periods of time, one of the KEY components of that plan is adding Solar Power to the trailer.<\/p>\n

After much review of recommendations from various forum sources, especially from Jack Mayer\u2019s excellent website (http:\/\/jackdanmayer.com\/rv_electrical_and_solar.htm<\/em>), The 12-Volt Side of Life (http:\/\/www.marxrv.com\/12volt\/12volta.htm<\/em>), and of course Handy Bob\u2019s \u201cThe RV Battery Charging Puzzle\u201d (https:\/\/handybobsolar.wordpress.com\/the-rv-battery-charging-puzzle-2\/<\/em>) we decided to go with\u00a0\u2026 \u00a0More \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

Our 5th Wheel Trailer \u2013 \u201cLucy\u201d:<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

We spent months cruising the internet, reading RV forums, checking the reviews and comments, comparing prices on RVT.com and RVTrader.com.\u00a0 We finally narrowed our search down to the Heartland Bighorn model 3670RL.\u00a0 We found a 2011 in \u201cnearly new\u201d condition at an attractive price. \u00a0So here are the details: \u00a0\u00a0More \u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Preparing for RV Life: Full-time RV living can be a wonderful way to live and travel, visit interesting places and family, follow the weather to avoid excesses in heat or cold. It can be a very economical lifestyle \u2026 or expensive, depending on how you approach it. What RV should I buy? This is a … Continue reading RV Life & Technical Details<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":900,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-113","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4655,"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/113\/revisions\/4655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/yourpcgeek.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}