Our First Trip in our GMC
In
March, 2000 we saw a GMC motorhome for sale on the eBay Auction site. We had seen
several others, and had watched the bids go to someone else. I thought I would
place one bid on this one as the bid was still a bit low, and the reserve bid had
not been not met yet. I raised the last bid by $500, and noticed that the
reserve had now been met. I got a bit nervous in the next few days, as no one
else raised my bid. I started corresponding with the owner Steve Harper, and he
sent a few more pictures and more details. The auction ended, and we were the
high bidder (but we really haven't figured out yet whether we won - or lost).
On
Sunday, May 14 Emma and I flew out to San Francisco to bring our GMC home. When
we left Chicago it was sunny and about 55 degrees. When we arrived in
"sunny California" it was raining and cold - probably 50 degrees. We
picked up a rental car, and went north through the streets of San Francisco
(they don't have a freeway to get there)to Marin County. When we crossed the
Golden Gate Bridge it was raining, and when we saw the motorhome for the first
time it was raining - a very dreary start to our adventure.
We went
to Steve Harper's home, and he made coffee and we chatted for a while, then
went to look at the motorhome. It sure did not look like what we had imagined
from the pictures we had seen. A lot of things needed fixing, correcting, or
replacing - we knew we would be busy for the summer. Steve started the engine,
and I knew we had an exhaust problem - very loud! Steve drove the motorhome
around for a while, then we parked it at Marin RV Park. Their lots are about 16
feet wide and just long enough for the GMC and a small car.
The
next morning we drove the motorhome to Fremont to get a front passenger seat
from Dean Hanson, another GMC owner. We enjoyed meeting Dean, and he gave us a
seat and an original base to install. Because of one thing or another, we ended
up fastening the base with just one bolt - it made it back to Indiana OK, so I
guess we didn't really need any more.
When we
started the engine at Dean's place it was running very rough, and appeared to
be flooding out. I thought this would clear up when the engine got warmed up. Well,
it got worse. When we got to a stoplight at the corner of Grimmer and Automall
(by a Chevron station) it stalled out - I tried to hold the pedal to the floor
to clear it - no go. We yanked off the engine cover and air cleaner cover -
gasoline was pouring out all over, even had some puddles of gas on top of the
engine. I finally stuck a screwdriver into the carb to hold both shutters open,
and got it running (after about two red light changes) We finally made the left
turn we had started, and got it to a parking lot, and it stalled out again. I
couldn't see what was wrong, but presumed it was stuck needle valve or drowning
float.
Finally
got back to the Chevron station and filled the fuel tanks. When we left their
lot it stalled again - we did same thing with the screwdriver, but this time we
got a backfire, and fire on top of the carb. I had visions of our motorhome
going up in smoke the first day we owned it! Emma grabbed one of the loose side
curtains lying on the counter and put it on top of the carb, and got the fire
out.
I
thought about going back to Dean's place, but figured we could make it back to
the RV Park, and we had an appointment with NorCal GMC to get it checked out
the next day anyway. We finally got back on the I-880 freeway and headed for
Marin County - doing fine until we hit a traffic jam. I didn't shift it into
neutral quick enough to rev the engine, and we stalled again! Five lanes of
traffic trying to get around us, and there we were, with the engine cover off,
jamming the screwdriver down into the carb, and hoping we wouldn't be on the
evening news because of a fried motorhome! I don't think I have ever felt so
helpless and unnecessary in my life. We finally got it going again, and Emma
finished fastening down the engine cover after we got moving. Surprisingly, no
one honked or yelled at us - I found that most CA drivers have better manners
than I had expected.
Sometime
after we crossed the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, I noticed that it seemed to be
running better, and by the time we got back to the RV Park, it was running OK.
The
next day we took the GMC to NorCal GMC in San Rafael to have Tony and Dave
check it out for our trip home. Tony agreed that it was probably dirt in the
needle valve - a drowned float would not have corrected itself. He had to make
some adjustments to the secondary throttle, and it had more reserve power after
that. They told us we would have to replace the 4 rear tires - the old ones had
good tread, but the sidewalls were badly cracked.
We went
to Brandon Tire, and John Brandon made us a good deal on 4 Cooper steel belted
radial tires. We left the GMC in the hands of NorCal and Brandon Tire, and took
a tour of Marin County in the rental car. We went to Stinson Beach to see the
Pacific Ocean - it was windy, overcast, and very cold, but I waded into the
Pacific with my shoes until the water was about 1/2 inch deep - that was as far
as I needed to go.
That evening
we took the rental car back to the airport, and took the shuttle busses back to
Marin County. We had to find our own way from the Larkspur dropoff back to the
RV park - about a half mile of dark streets, sidewalks along the 101 freeway,
and a wood bridge across some kind of river or bay - a mini-adventure by itself.
Wednesday
morning we started out for home. The motorhome was running good, and seemed to
have more power than before. I especially enjoyed passing some of the big trucks
on the upgrades. The front tires were running pretty warm, so I upped the
pressure to 68-70 lbs -they seemed to run cooler after that.
We kept
learning things about the motorhome all the way home. We noticed that the
heater was blowing only cold air. I found that someone had removed the hoses
that used to go to the water heater, and had installed a piece of hose across
the tees at the engine, which meant that very little water actually circulated
thru the heater. I bent this hose to kink it, and put some tape around it. I
also found that an air-operated damper in the heater was not moving, so I moved
it by hand. We had heat now.
We
stopped for gas soon after we entered Wyoming. The price was $1.379/gallon, the
cheapest gas we had seen yet. I thought we should pack every gallon into the
tanks that we could. WRONG! I noticed gas started dripping from somewhere near
the rear wheels, so I stopped the pump, and we pulled the motorhome out to the
edge of the parking lot. Gasoline was still running out. Emma went inside and
got some coffee and we left in a hurry!
That night
we stayed in Fort Steele Rest Park. There was snow on the ground (found out
they had 10 inches in Laramie the day before) so we decided to run the
generator set so we could use the electric heater. The LP space heater that was
installed did not have any thermostat (Steve had removed the original Suburban
furnace to make room for the batteries he installed for the solar panels).
Sometime
in the night I woke up, and noticed that the gen-set had stopped. The electric
heater was still running - using power from the batteries! I unplugged that heater,
and lit the LP heater, and went back to bed. When Steve had installed the 1500
watt Trace Inverter, he had all the recepts connected to run from the inverter.
This meant that anything plugged in would run from the batteries if no outside
AC was available. This has got to be corrected!
Steve
had also left the original converter/charger (buzzbox) installed, which is less
than useless now. It makes a lot of noise, and the Trace inverter/charger will
do a much better job of charging. The buzzbox has got to go!
The rest
of the trip home was quite uneventful. We arrived home Saturday evening, after
four days, 2,317 miles, and 346 gallons of gas. We are making a list of things
to fix, and will have to decide what will be first priority.
Erv and
Emma Troyer
Lagrange,
IN