Every day is a learning experience when you own a recreational vehicle. Our motorhome is awesome, and we have been having a great time with it since December. A quick recap--- we have been in the Mesa, Arizona area for 10 years. We have made the decision to work and travel in the motorhome full time. Our home is leased, and we have moved on from our jobs. The last 5 months have been spent making all these things happen. We have been living in the motorhome and learning all we can about it before we actually got too far from our comfort zone, and all the people we know that can fix what goes wrong.
In March, we had all the chassis maintenance things done at Massey Diesel in Phoenix. Tom did the oil changes on engine and generator, greased and lubed everything, found and changed a broken shock, and generally got our new home ready to hit the road. His extensive checklist is awesome.
Okay, so yesterday was our departure day from the "comfort zone". We got up and left Mesa about 4:30 am., and don't have any plans on returning to Arizona for 6 month or so. We are headed to Oregon first, so we decided to go up I-5 in California, and could be through Los Angeles by 1pm and avoid some of the traffic. Great Plan!! Then came our first real motorhome challenge. We stopped at a rest area just outside of Indio. We walked around a bit to get the kinks out and got ready to leave. THE MOTORHOME WOULDN'T START!!! Talk about feeling helpless. Now what? Call Tom. Now I get to crawl under the motorhome and tap the starter with a hammer to see if it has a flat spot, and see if power is getting to it. 
This is the picture of me under the motorhome pretending I have a clue what to do. We have 12.7 volts to the starter and it still won't start.
Now I am on the phone with Workhorse. The person on the other end of the phone is Donna. She says they will call a tow truck and get it to a service facility. This is my worst nightmare! I have been in the RV repair business for a long time, and there is never a good thing about putting a 40 foot motorhome on the "hook". I suggest that maybe she could put me on the phone with a technician for some trouble shooting. Donna puts me on hold and comes back with a checklist of troubleshooting ideas. We started in the dash area. Of course, she wants me to push buttons that aren't really there. When Workhorse builds a chassis, they send it to the motorhome Manufacturer (Mandalay), and they get to build a house around it. Since no two manufacturer will put the buttons in the same place on the dash, Donna has no idea where the button could be. I do...it doesn't exist. Okay, anyway, we went through the entire process, and ended up in the outside fuse panel. Yahoo! The fuse to the starter relay is blown. The bad news is, we don't have one. It is a great big 40amp blade fuse. I guess this is why we tow a car. Dorothy got in the car and went to find a fuse. Donna called ahead and knew they had them at the next truck stop.
New fuse..We are back on the road. Thanks to Tom at Massey and Donna at Workhorse, and no tow truck for us. We drove through LA at 4:30 with just a few white knuckle moments, and slept soundly at the first Flying J we came to.
Our adventure begins
Until Later...
Susan Cox and Dorothy Loll
RV Maintenance and Travel Safety
Maximizing Your RV Experience
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http://rvtravel.nicheinfocenter.com
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