Many of you are opening your doors to Spring and waking your RVs up from a loooooong winter’s nap. Whew! That was no fun.

As part of the process of putting your RV in service this week’s podcast features Gary Cipa who is an instructor and expert on RV leaks…and how not to experience one!

We were so impressed with a seminar we attended that we got Gary to share his expert knowledge with you. This is a must listen for anyone who has an RV, quite frankly.

Other places to hear the podcast

Mentioned on this episode

Our guest, Gary Cipa, spoke about the RV Leaks website.

We have several articles about camping in Bottomless Lakes State Park in New Mexico:

• A story about Bottomless Lakes State Park - camping and geology

• Our story about things to do near Bottomless Lake State Park

• One of the things to do is to visit Roswell, New Mexico

If you’re looking for a tracking system to keep tabs on your RV our friends at WhereSafe GPS are having a sale - and we have a discount as well.

We really enjoyed spending several nights at Harvest Hosts locations on our recent journey. We also have a discount to Harvest Hosts for new members.

Have you noticed that we’re doing more videos and short? This week we have a short video on the SnapBag food storage system.

This week’s RV of the week is the Brinkley Model Z 2900 and we have a review of it.

If you’re confused about solar, battery power or just want to upgrade your RV we have found the solutions from ABC Upfitters are both reliable and exceptional.

We have a podcast episode and video where you can learn more here.

Automated transcript of StressLess Camping podcast episode 199

Welcome to the Weekly podcast, all about turning the great American RV adventure into stress less camping. Each week we explore tips, tricks, ideas, and destinations, and talk to the happiest campers in the RV world. Pull up a seat at the campfire as we enjoy some Stressless camping.

Welcome to the Campfire.

I'm Tony.

I'm Peggy.

And we are two RV industry veterans who travel part-time

In a small trailer

Looking to share big adventures and help you with great tips,

Tricks,

And discounts.

We are back off the road for the moment.

Yeah, 50 days, 10 states. What an adventure.

It has been fantastic.

It truly has. And we've got some recaps of it. We already had our Nalin article and we just stayed at Bottomless Lakes and we'll have an article for you on that as well.

Right. So that is Bottomless Lakes State Park in New Mexico. It's actually the first time we've been camping other than when we like didn't have a home. <laugh> <laugh>, the first camping we've done in New Mexico. So that was pretty awesome.

Yeah, we really enjoyed it. We had fantastic tour guides who really brought the experience alive and were sharing that with you, some of the tips and places they took us in the article. So look for at stressescamping.com.

Yep. So we visited in that 50 days, a couple of national parks, and I just wanted to sing out this reminder cause this will be the last chance I get to tell you that the next free National Park day is April 22nd. That's this coming Saturday.

Yep. It's Earth Day and also our wedding anniversary.

That's right. There will be a couple more dates coming up later in the year, and we'll remind you of those, but the next one coming is coming right up. So if you are anywhere near a national park and you have a chance, go take advantage and go for free.

I mean, they're worth the price of admission anyway. And we have our National Parks Pass. Yeah. Which is another thing, but a wonderful experience. Right.

So we also wanna let you know that Team Wear Safe has just kicked off their annual spring into adventure sale event, which is now live and it runs through June 20th, and you can save 20% off of their rugged GPS tractor and 15% off of all the other GPS trackers.

Yeah, you can learn more about the Wear Safe gps, but essentially what it is, it is a GPS tracking device for your RV. So for example, if it gets stolen, this will help you locate the RV and get it back, or let the law enforcement know that it has been stolen and give them the location. Right. We inteRViewed Sean Gatx from Wear Safe GPS in episode 142 of the Stressless Camping podcast where we talked about vintage trailers with Tim Hz as well.

We have a discount to the wear safe G P S product and there are additional discounts going on, as Peggy said, through June 20th, 2023. So check it out on our discounts and deals page at stressless camping com com. I know a lot of you are now just finally breaking free of Winter <laugh> and you're getting your RVs out on the road. And we had a question of the week a few weeks ago on our fun and friendly Stressless Camping podcast Facebook group.

Whew. Em asked, would you do a podcast about sealants and keeping leaks out of your RVs? And we thought, what a great idea. And we happened to speak with Gary Cipa at an F M C A convention where he gave a really terrific workshop about this. Without any further ado, let's hear from Gary and keep some leaks outta your RV. Get it all ready for camping season.

We have the privilege of having Gary Cipa with us. We have enjoyed Gary's workshops and seminars in the past. He is the man who knows his stuff when it comes to RV sealant. So Gary, welcome.

Well, thank you. Good to be with you guys.

It's great to have you. And we coincidentally met you recently just about the same time that one of our listeners said, could you do an episode where you talk about sealants and cas and silicones and just right then we met you and we said, well, this is good timing now <laugh>, we know how to do that. Good deal.

It's a very important subject.

Yeah. I was very impressed with your knowledge of the topic. And so I think this is something, if you own an RV, you probably should be listening to this podcast. Yeah.

<laugh> and Right. And if you own an RV and you are ever going to a place with seminars and you see Gary's name, be sure and attend that because we can only get in a portion of what the seminar usually covers. We just don't have that much time. So we're trying to hit the highlights, but there is more to know, obviously, perhaps there's a place that Gary can tell us that we can go to look for more information. Or is it just come to a seminar?

Come to a seminar.

Okay.

Yeah. <laugh>, I agree. They're great. I think a lot of people don't realize that every RV manufacturer has some stipulation in their instructions to owners to inspect the exterior of the RV regularly for leaks. So they're not designed to be leak-proof for life

<laugh>. Well, the manufacturer does their very best. They're always trying to find new products and better products to seal the inside of the RV from the outside elements. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, unfortunately, when you take a very sophisticated chassis of some kind, whether it's a towable or a, uh, motorized unit, and then you put a very sophisticated house on top of it, that house is not really designed to move at 65 miles per hour down the highway.

So after a period of time that house rocks and shifts and, and shakes and the seams that the manufacturer hopefully has sealed up, have a tendency to break open and allow access of outside elements to the inside of the RV. What I found also in my exposure to RVs is water leakage is probably the single most evasive, elusive and damaging aspect of RVs.

A leak happens, you can't locate the leak, many times you're not aware of the leak, and by the time you are aware the damage can be incredible.

Right. Yeah. We've seen all kinds of delamination where the RVs are often glued together, where the glue layers come apart, and that is next to impossible to properly fix.

First of all, biggest issue is trying to find out where the leak is. And as I said, leaks can be very evasive or elusive. You may have a leak at the front of the RV, but it may present the leak at the back of the RV over the bed. Oh yeah. And water has a tendency to travel. It will travel, uh, according to gravity, it will travel and saturate everything that it touches until the point that it can't hold any more water and then it starts dripping water in some unforeseen area that nobody's aware of.

Yeah. You could have a leak at the front, right top and it would present at the back right rear. Yeah. Just a very elusive issue. Now, one of the things that I did talk about in the seminar very strongly, and, and although I'm, I'm not here to promote any products whatsoever, there is a product called Seal Tech, S E A L T E C H, and you can find a description and a very nice video at RVLeaks.com.

The seal tech device is undoubtedly the most important device that any mechanic technician repair person could have in order to definitively locate the leak source. Okay. We've had people who have had leaks for years and years and never been able to find it. Well, they go to the repair shop and somebody turns a water hose onto the RV with their fellow technicians standing inside looking for water infiltration.

Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Well, that water may never come into the RV until everything is saturated, which could be Oh, right. Gallons of water. Yeah. The leak test or seal tech leak test process pressurizes the inside of the RV. Then the technician walks around the outside spraying, uh, leak test solution on the outside. And the presence of bubbles shows that that is a leak source. Very important.

We've been to a few manufacturers including Rockwood, and Rockwood has a fake door that they put in at the end of the assembly line and they put this door in and pressurize the RV and walk around and, and test it. I always thought that was kind of neat. It

Is absolutely the same principle. Unfortunately, by the time that brand new RV gets down to the dealer, sits on the dealer's lot for a couple of months or a year mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it could be a whole new circumstance. Yep. Personally, I'm testing mine, uh, at least once a year and usually more often.

That's a good idea. Now, a lot of people ask, can't I just go to the hardware store and get a tube of silicone and be done?

Absolutely not. <laugh>, first thing you need to do is go to the manufacturer of your RV, let the manufacturer tell you precisely what sealants they have used and recommend using for each application in the RV. Some of the manufacturers, and again, I'm just going to refer to Winnebago, if you go to the Winnebago site, you can actually pull up diagrams of any year, any make or any model, uh, in the Winnebago line, and it will give you a callout to exactly what sealant is used in what location.

Okay. Generally, the sealants are falling into one of two categories. It's either a, uh, butal sealant or a silicone sealant. And some of them are paintable, some of them have superior UV resistance, but they always should be using a sealant that is rated and acceptable for the Riggs of an RV. Last weekend I had the opportunity to put my screens in my house here, and when I did, I uh, went around and sealed the windows sills as I do regularly, ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Right. Yeah. Unfortunately, other than Hurricane Sandy that came through 15 years ago, my house has never experienced the 65 mile per hour wind condition that my RV does every day.

Right.

So it is a whole different animal and what you're trying to do is overcome all the forces of nature.

Yeah. Yeah. Boy, isn't that the truth? And the thing I think people don't realize is to your point of going to Winnebago's website, if you own a Winnebago product or your manufacturer, they may use several different types of sealant that kind of look like a tuba cock, but aren't on the exterior of the RV. There may be something different on the windows and the baggage doors and that sort of thing. Right.

That's what I was gonna ask. You said there's like bele and there's silicone, but those have such different uses that there probably is both kinds in every RV. Is that right?

Absolutely. Actually for my RV, there are five different sealants that are Wow. Those, some of those sealants are paintable so that if I seal, I can touch up the paint after I seal. If I try to touch up paint over a non paintable, the paints gonna like right off.

Exactly. So is it possible to tell what sealants the RV manufacturer used by looking at them? Or would you be better off the way you said to do it?

Well, uh, as Peggy said, there's, there are so many variations of each sealant, and there may be 20 or 30 different manufacturers of each type of sealant. Each one may have their own proprietary formula. Basically what I do, if I'm on the roof and looking at a sealant, if I take a piece of the sealant that's coming off or falling off and slice it with my pocket knife, generally a silicone based sealant will not change color.

It just separates and you've got the same color inside all the way through. Okay. Whereas if I slice a bele, generally speaking, when you pull it open a little bit, you'll see color changes as it's stretched.

Interesting.

Oh, so like if it's a black piece of bele and you stretch it, it'll like turn gray and

Turn a little gray. Usually. Yes. Okay.

Okay.

Okay. As a side note, boy did I have fun with butyl tape on our 1970 Aristocrat <laugh>. I, I, uh, I will never use butyl tape in the hot sun again. <laugh>.

Well, and we're up in the north, and oftentimes you are doing your repairs when it's cooler. So when I use a butyl tape, I have a tendency to find something dark and lay the tape on the dark surface so it gains a little heat and gets a little more pliable. Because one of the things that you want to do when you're using butyl tape, you never rip it when you're taking it off the roll, you always make sure you cut it because you're not wanting to stretch it.

So it comes up the different thicknesses. You would like to have a consistent thickness all the way around your butyl seal. Right. So when it is tape, you want the tape to be a little warmer, a little more pliable, and you want to tighten your screws or your fasteners slowly, one area at a time, go over the screws several times. If not, the, the first thing that's gonna happen is you're going to get an uneven seal uhhuh. But more importantly, it's very likely that your screws are going to either deform or crack the flanges around your trim strips or your roof vents or skylights as you're tightening them up.

Oh, right. Yep. So people realize the extent of this. Where would one look to find sealants on the outside of the RV?

Gee, everywhere. Everywhere there is had, has been a penetration. Yep. Anywhere, two materials are joined together, many of the RVs will have a fiberglass front or rear cap. And when you attach a fiberglass cap to either an aluminum or a composite siding material, there's going to be a seal there. And that's a place for sealant all of your roof penetrations, roof vents, tank vents, skylights, antennas, TV antennas.

I actually had an RV probably five or six years ago that was a brand new RV high end, came out of the factory, and, uh, upon going up to the roof of the RV inspecting it, one of the things that we found is they forgot to attach the, uh, GPS antenna. Oh. So it was inside the RV connected to a wire, but all they had put on the top of the RV was a hole. Oh.

So,

And it was wide open through the manufacturing process, through sitting in the lot through transport to the dealer. Oh. Transport from one dealer to another dealer, and then the owner buying the RV. And nobody had ever checked that, but there was about a two inch hole wide open in the front of the RV.

Oh boy. So then that leads to if somebody is buying a new, well, even a used RV, I think you would probably agree that it's a good idea to do that leak, that pressurized leak test on it.

At this stage of my life, uh, I just happen to have the equipment to, to test an RV, but I certainly wouldn't buy one unless I had done a leak test. If you don't have the capabilities of doing it yourself, again, if you go online to, uh, RV leaks, they have a map of what, uh, repair facilities and mobile techs might have the unit that they could come to you to test it. So what I would do, if you're buying an RV, whether it's new or used, have the dealer run a leak test on it through internal pressurization.

That's a non-destructive test before you would agree to buy it. Yeah.

I used to work at a dealership when I ma ran the warranty department, and people would come a year, year and a half after they bought their RV and they're like, Hey, it's leaking. So one of the things that we would say is, you know, there's a sticker on the trailers that we sell that said, inspect the exterior for leaks every 90 days. Is that a good inteRVal based on your experience?

I don't know that anybody is really going to do it every 90 days, uh, other than me <laugh>, but I probably inspect mine once a month. I'm very vigilant because I know what damage can be caused. I would say every time you are ready to go out with your RV, do a walk around. Make sure that what you're seeing looks right. If you see a problem, try to figure out how to fix it or get an expert opinion on how you can fix it.

Don't let things slide because if you put it off until tomorrow, chances are your problem that today is a slight leak. Tomorrow could be a devastating roof replacement. Yeah. And roof replacements can be thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.

And I don't think people realize that these sealants often are not a warranty item. They are a maintenance item, just like putting air in your tires or changing the oil if you have an engine or that kind of thing.

Absolutely. And you can't expect them to be warranted because of the transitions that an RV goes through again. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, 65 mile per hour winds, headwinds, side winds, torquing, twisting. Not all RV parks have paved driveways and paved sites. So every time you go into a site and you use your levelers or your stabilizers, you're putting torque on your RV and that creates a twisting or a warping that could open up any leak that previously wasn't there.

And I ensure that, uh, one of you has stood outside the RV and watched your wheels on one side as you were backing into the site. Yeah, yeah. I recently, uh, was just out in Florida and, uh, ran into a, uh, a higher end fifth wheel where the shackle bracket that was welded to the frame between the two axles had literally bent in about a 25 degree angle.

Oh, yeah.

So they were absolutely stranded there until they could have major structural repair. If you've got a two axle unit, probably the, the most wonderful thing you can do is lift an A one axle off the ground while you're backing or making a tight turn. However, now you've put all your weight on one axle that's not designed to carry that load. Right.

Yeah. A lot of people will look at their warranty papers or whatnot, and they go, well, my roof is warranted for 15 years. I never have to get up there for a decade and a half. And look at it,

Your roof warranty applies generally to the material that the roof surface is composed of, and generally the application of that material to the substrate. So in other words, the actual surface of the TPO o or PVC or whatever the roof material is, and the adhesive that is gluing it down or fastening it to the surface below.

Other than that, any penetrations to that roof are not covered under warranty. Now, they may be covered under a warranty for 30 days or a year, but beyond that, not likely.

Right. Right. And that's, as you had mentioned, where the skylight is, where the vent pipes for the sewer system are, where in our, in our case we have five solar panels with four mounting points per panel. So that's 20 little holes where there's screws going through into the roof and of where vents are. And all of that has a, there's a sealant around those so that they don't leak.

Well, and even with the solar panels, the manufacturers of the panels and these lithium ion batteries who are relying on those panels, uh, they look at that roof as real estate. Anywhere they can put a solar panel, they're going to put one

<laugh>. Yeah.

The bigger the roof, the more solar panels, then you've got to get the energy from that solar panel down to the power distribution and the batteries. And that's some pretty good size wires that have to be run through the roof at possibly multiple locations. Yeah.

Yeah. And that's another potential fail point. Yeah. And so all of those seal and those sealants are sitting out there in the sun 24, well, not maybe 18 hours a day, depending on where you live, <laugh>, and then they expose to rain and all of that. So that's those, all those seal points or failure potentials that should be regularly inspected.

Well, hey, you know, speaking of sitting out in the sun, is the sun like really bad for these? You know, I mean, it's bad for everything in that way, but is it particularly important if you're in a sunnier location, are you more apt to have problems with sealants?

Absolutely. Especially if you are in a location where you have very high daytime temperatures, very low nighttime temperatures, and I think you guys are completely familiar with that. Yeah.

Yeah.

<laugh>, everything changes shape and viscosity hardness as the temperature changes. Right. And when you have two materials next to, uh, each other, which are not the same material, you have a thermal comb efficient of change, I have fiberglass next to aluminum. The two are going to, to shift or change shape at different rates.

Wow. And as that's happening, it's like rubbing your hands together constantly. You are just moving those two planes and it's gonna naturally break any seal sealant apart from one piece to the other.

Okay.

It's a natural phenomenon.

What an interesting way of, of thinking about it and how it's a really clear demonstration Yeah. Of that.

Now that's just on a daily basis. Like you folks sitting out in the Arizona desert <laugh> very hot at pay time, very cold at night.

Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. And that grows and shrinks, and

That's just daily. Now let's go a step further and you get a windstorm out there. Yeah. Now you've not only got the wind that's twerking and flexing things. We put our awnings out, the awnings a big sale that's causing things to move even more. Now you decide you're gonna go to the next campground and you hook up and go down the road. Now you've got a whole different set of circumstances when you're leaving the campground than you had when you, you were pulling into the campground in that your sealants are even more compromised than they were when you came in.

Right. So every 90 days you might wanna check it every 90 minutes.

<laugh>,

That would make it hard to get anywhere. Yeah. But every 90 days is, is pretty, is pretty good number. So I guess the takeaways are know what sealants the manufacturer chose for your RV. Inspect any void regularly and know how to reapply those sealants properly. Absolutely.

And do that proactively. Don't wait until you know, or even suspect that you have a problem to try to find and fix that problem,

<laugh>. Well, absolutely. And and you did bring up a a very good issue there too. When you are replacing seal or sealant, you wanna make sure that you remove as much of the old sealant as you possibly can. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Now, I'm not saying get in there with a, uh, chisel and scrape it off. Remove any of the sealant that might be compromised. Try to get down to a good solid substrate level. However, be very careful that you're not damaging your roof or your skylights.

Yeah. Be very, very careful when you're working on the roof, especially, or on a ladder <laugh>. I know. That's when I find that I am most likely to have an accident. Yeah. Because you're trying to pull on a sealant or push on a scraper as a result, uh, you lose your balance. Yeah. Yeah.

Which that's its own special bummer. Yeah.

<laugh>, uh, yes, it's, yes, it's, and uh, my wife tells me that I have no business being on a roof at my age anyhow. <laugh>. But uh, also using a plexiglass or a polyethylene scraper is far better than using any kind of a metal blade. Oh, sure. Now, once you get the old sealant off to where you feel the new sealant will adhere, uh, make sure you clean the area very well. I will often use, uh, an isoprol alcohol or a denatured alcohol to clean the area very well.

So I get a stick to the area that, uh, is compromised. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>,

One of the neat things that you showed at the workshop I attended was you had taken a cutting, like a sheep plastic cutting board and sliced it such that it was a really good scraping surface. Yeah. Scraper, what do they call it? Smudger, I think is one of the terms I've heard.

I use a high density polyethylene, one of the trade names. Uh, and I come from a very different industry where we use a lot of it for many different things. And uh, the product is, uh, I think Alite was the name of it, but it is essentially the same thing as one of these white cutting boards that are self-healing. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you can cut it into pieces. I use a bandsaw to cut it to the size that I want and then use a sander to shape it into a wedge or a ramp, then sharpen it up a little bit on a, uh, piece of sandpaper.

Yeah. That gives me a scraper that can be exactly the size I want. Something that fits my hand, fits the nooks and crannies I'm trying to get into. And, uh, I jokingly tell the guys in the programs to use their wife's cutting board <laugh>, but you can find the material I'm sure on Amazon. It's an NSF National Sanitation Foundation approved material. So you'll also find it at a lot of the, uh, restaurant stores.

Yeah. Yeah. I was really impressed when you had that. I'm like, oh, that's a brilliant idea. Yeah.

Yeah. And I, I take a half a dozen of those each seminar and I come back with a half a dozen less each seminar

<laugh>. Yeah. I didn't get one <laugh>.

Oh, we'll have to get you one. Well,

We haven't had the rig for 90 days. Well now we have, now we have, we almost haven't had it for 90 days, so Yeah. But we, we weren't ready for one yet. <laugh>

Well, but we put over 7,000 miles since December on this thing. So it's seen some use.

Yep. Well, it's time to have it leak checked. Yep.

Yep. I, I agree. Any other tips you'd like to share with our audience?

As Peggy said, be proactive. Don't wait to see, see the problem. Yeah. I can promise you the most devastating other than fire, the most devastating element to an RV is water infiltration. And it will destroy everything

And it'll do it slowly until you fire it.

Yeah. Slowly. And, and as you said invisibly that you don't know it until it's sometimes it's just too late.

So keep an eye on what you're doing. Take time to call the manufacturer. The manufacturers may be able to provide you with a list of the sealants or a chart showing the diagram of your unit and what sealants they use at specific locations. Okay. Have that information with you and available before you need it. Yeah. Get yourself some good sealant, some beautiful, some silicone. Generally speaking with beautiful sealants, there's a sag and a nonag.

Right. Don't use a self-leveling sealant on the side of your RV <laugh>. Cause I promise you'll have surprises. It will continue to, to follow the course of gravity. Yeah. And you'll have a gooey mess down the side of your RV down the side. Very difficult to get off. Yeah. Yeah. So it's your self-leveling for the top, for the horizontal surfaces and non-ag or non leveling for your vertical surfaces.

Right now, for our friends out there that have vintage trailers and can't contact the manufacturer, that tip about how to tell the difference between the silicone and the butal is gonna come in really handy for them.

It will. And, and to go to a chemical process of trying to determine specifically what's in that sealant. Uh, good luck <laugh>. Cause it's a very expensive process and a very lengthy process scientifically. Yeah. Okay. That's the best thing that you can do is familiarize yourself with what it looks like, what it feels like and how it reacts. And hopefully you can find something. The other thing you can always do is test a repair sealant with an existing sealant.

If you put a sealant down and uh, a week later it's peeling off, you know that that's not something that, wasn't it compatible with what you have <laugh>.

Right. Yeah.

Well, and I, a lot of times if you do have a RV where you can't contact the manufacturer, let's say it's a vintage or whatever, usually you can find a club or a group or some gathering of like-minded folks and contact them and see what they've done in the past. Cuz usually they will have had experience with that.

Absolutely.

This is great information and I think something every RV owner should listen to. So hopefully they do

<laugh>. They do let let me know what your reaction is.

Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. One more little point, if you own a travel trailer or a lot of RVs, but particularly I see this on travel trailers along the edge, there's sort of a plastic molding that's called insert molding. And a lot of times that is worth replacing every year from my experience, because what that does is lets you take that old molding often, see if the seals that are under it are any good.

Absolutely. And that insert is, is very inexpensive. That also shows you, uh, the screws and some of the screws may be snapped, they may be severely rusted. What you're gonna find is when you replace that, you wanna replace it in one piece, you buy it in a hundred foot rolls. So it's, it's not a burden bank breaker.

It's really cheap. Right. And if you are fancy, you could even change the color if you choose. Oh,

Absolutely. <laugh>

<laugh>. Absolutely. So we have a little bit of a non sealant type question for you, and we like to spring this on our guests. <laugh>, what is your best camping memory?

Oh, my best camping memory. I, I can't really say that I have a best, but I will tell you that I generally, uh, I, I've been in business for many years and I've been in a rather sophisticated business that has been in the corporate world, let's say. I have come through the years to the point where I just don't really like dealing with people anymore. <laugh> years and years and years of doing it.

People say, well, why do you RV? Well, I RV because I like the people. I like what I find in the RV community. I like the RV lifestyle. I like the fact that you're at the campground and one person's on the roof and there's six people down below trying to help <laugh>, sometimes seven on the roof trying to help

<laugh>.

I like sharing tips, both receiving and sharing them. I like the people that IRV with. Were very active with F M C A and with uh, our uh, local chapter here. Yeah. It's a wonderful group of people. Our granddaughter, who's four years old has been camping with us since she was four months old.

Oh. Oh wow.

I guess, uh, granddaughter camping is probably my favorite time. RV.

Oh,

That's awesome. Nice.

Conversely, do you have a, uh, worst camping memory to share?

I can't say that there's a worst one. Generally speaking, almost everywhere I go I wind up getting involved in some kind of repair for somebody

<laugh>.

And for me that's a learning experience. I believe I've gotta learn something every day. I guess I take the, the attitude that uh, no matter how grim things look, my mother used to say it's always darkest before the dawn and something better's going to come tomorrow. Great. Where I used to really worry about things going wrong. I guess I'm at to the point where I truly understand that RVs or RVing is fraught with repairs and problems,

<laugh>

And you just kind of live with them. You RVs are not necessarily an investment. I find it to be a money pit. Put it on style and you have to enjoy it. Yeah, I do. Right. I have to take it and stride.

If you go to hotels or if whatever recreation you choose, it's an expense. The good thing about an RV is you bring your fridge and your bed and your shower and all that with you or or your tent or

Or whatever pressure machine. <laugh>.

Unfortunately going to a smaller RV, you don't have the room to carry all that stuff.

<laugh>. Right.

Well thank you so much for your time and I'm gonna peer your background. I'm gonna assume you seRVed this country as a Marine.

Yeah, I did. <laugh>.

<laugh>, thank you for your seRVice. We really appreciate it. You

Welcome. And thank you for thanking

Me. Absolutely. Well Gary, we really appreciate your time and your knowledge and I look forward to, uh, attending your seminars again in the future. And until then, hope Life treats you very, very well.

Well you too. Both as well. And uh, anything I can do, let me know and uh, let's keep in touch

Absolut. Absolutely. Yes sir. Thank you. Have

A good day. Thank you so

Much. You too too. Bye-Bye.

Did you have any idea that there were so many ways to seal a hole <laugh>? I kind of just thought, you know, you grab one tube of Caul and you're good to go for the rest of your life.

<laugh>. Yep. No, Dior stays in business with all the different stuff Yeah. That they offer and they're not the only ones.

So you know that we love HaRVest hosts, we talk about it a lot. PS we also have a discount on our website to join HaRVest Host. But our last HaRVest host we stayed at on our way on our, you know, trip back home on our Epic Road trip was at Hangar 25 Air Museum HaRVest Host in Texas. It was so lovely. It was just a great place to park. And we had some neighbors that we got friendly with.

The way we got friendly with them was it was starting to get towards the end of the day and they had fired up their generator and I just went outside cuz I'm nosy <laugh>. And they were saying, oh, I'm just topping off our solar system. We've been using the air conditioner all day. And I was like, what? Air conditioner on batteries, <laugh>. And yeah, they had done their own install and were topping it off with a generator. But as you know, we can run our air conditioner on batteries as well and have on this trip.

And that's thanks to our Master Volt power system from ABC Upfitters. Right. It has made boondocking and off-grid camping so much better. So if you're looking for a great solution to get off the grid without having to listen to a generator, check out the systems from ABC Upfitters. In fact, I just shared a post this week on our fun and friendly stresses camping podcast Facebook group.

Whew.

It was an install they did on an escape trailer, which is a Canadian fiberglass egg type trailer similar to Cita if you're familiar with those. And it's just a beautiful installation. So if you wanna see the caliber of work that ABC Upfitters does with their engineered solutions, take a look at our Facebook group. They did such a great job. So HaRVest Hosts is where we went and ABC Upfitters is how we enjoyed it.

That's right. We even got to turn the air conditioner on for a few minutes ourselves just to cool things down. It wasn't super hot there but we were able to do it and didn't even have to fire up a generator to top off our battery

<laugh>. Yeah. Cuz we didn't bring one with us.

That's right. <laugh>.

This is about where we usually have our destination and our destination this week is Bottomless Lakes State Park here in New Mexico. But we're not gonna say much more than that because next week's episode is all about traveling in New Mexico with some great New Mexico folks. But we do have an article about bottomless lakes that you can see@stresslesscamping.com. So check that out as kind of a preview. So everybody's been telling us you gotta do a bunch of short videos on TikTok, YouTube and all of that.

So we've started,

We've been threatening to for a long time.

Tony Zippy tips are sort of the theme of those this week and two weeks ago we did videos about a gadget that we really like and what was that?

We did a video about the grip stick and a video about snap bags. And they're actually both made by the same company. A grip stick is a device that helps you reseal plastic bags, like maybe a cereal bag or some frozen vegetables and seal those back up so that you don't have to transfer them into something else or whatever. And then the snap bag is actually a silicone bag with a locking latching top that becomes waterproof and well, I mean there are videos.

So those are <laugh>, that's the general idea of the both of them. We would appreciate if you go check out and maybe even share those videos

By the way, if you know we've had people say, Hey, how can we help you out? The best way to help Stressless camping is to basically share anything you find on our website. So wherever you know, social or email or what however is convenient for you, if you share any of the content that's on our website, we can't tell you how significant that is and how much it means to us. So Right.

How about, uh, RV of the Week? Tony, do you have a good one this week?

Boy do I ever. One of the things that you'll find is companies that make fifth wheels almost always make at least some version of floor plan where there's a couch at the back, dinette and theater seats on the campsite and a kitchen on the roadside that is probably the most widely produced fifth wheel floor plan. And one of the reasons I keep reviewing those is looking at how a company does that floor plan really gives you an idea of how they build things and what they do that may be different.

And so this week I looked at the Brinkley Z 2,900, you might say, who's Brinkley <laugh>? Well, Brinkley is a brand new RV company that, to be honest, last time we were in Indiana, the other RV companies were very neRVous about this company. And that could be because it's a bunch of kind of RV industry superstars for lack of a better description.

Yeah. As I have often said, the first thing you should do is look underneath how an RV is built. And in case of the Brinkley Z 2,900 few things I really like, they're using 7,000 pound axles with 8,000 pound capacity springs on a moride C r E 3000 suspension. They're using Cooper H rated tires. They've reinforced the chassis at a significant level where the springs and suspension attach, which is a failure point.

A lot of times they've also done a different job with the upper deck on the fifth wheel above the pickup box. Most of all, the way these things are sealed is crazy impressive. And it goes back to our topic this week, <laugh> anywhere where there has been a hole punched on the roof has a lifetime warranty, which is absolutely unheard of in the industry. Wow. They use a turnon tape between the roof and walls. There are just so many examples of how they're building these things differently and better.

But a lot of people shop for RVs by looking at the cabinetry and such. And I really love the kitchen. One of the things that I also really like is there's a silverware drawer in the dining room table,

Just like we have at home. Oh,

That's right. We do <laugh>. That table does not have a pole on it. It's not a knee knocker table. So, uh, so great. But another thing that I like, it has electric gate valves. So the black tank and gray tank are push button operated, but as, or Kern pointed out and Orrin Kern is a plumber, you know, those things can break. And what happens if that happens? Well, there's a hatch on the underside of the trailer where you can manually open and close those valves too.

But because the valves are in the underbelly, which is heated, they're less likely to freeze. Oh. So that's a good thing. Lastly, the windows on these are a square frameless that open about twice as far as they typically do. And then they have integrated nightshades and screens. There's a lot of things where Brinkley is doing things that are just above and beyond. So check out my review@stresslesscamping.com in our honest RV review section.

There's also a video from our good friend Josh Winters from Fish's RV.

Just a quick reminder too, if you are going through that process of checking all your seals and maybe replacing some seals, Brad, who we met at F M C A reminded us to make sure that if you have weep holes in your windows, they still weep after you're done sealing everything up.

Yeah. You know what's funny? I've seen a lot of older cars and the cars have sort of painters tape around the sunroofs. And typically it's not that the sunroof is leaking, that's just the symptom. But what's happening is all sunroofs are designed to drain. So they're actually drainage ports on sunroofs and they get plugged over time. That's the same with those weep holes in the windows of RVs and they get plugged over time and oh my gosh.

And some people will reseal them. Right. Don't do that. <laugh>, the holes that are in windows are there for a reason. Right.

So last week in our question of the week, we asked you what was your earliest memory? And thank you Tom for asking that question. We didn't get a whole lot of answers, so maybe a lot of people are still trying to remember their earliest memory <laugh>. But the people that did answer, everyone seemed to be around three years of age. So think back all of you to when you were three. See if you can come up with something to add to the list of memories. But thank you to those of you who did answer that was nice to read and there's some good memories there.

And a couple of them actually involved baby siblings <laugh>. So this week we were wondering, have you replaced your RV mattress?

I think a lot of people have. You know, some people put foam toppers, some people replace the mattress. Yep. You can weigh in with your own answer at our Fun and Friendly Stresses. Camping podcast, Facebook group.

Whew. <laugh>. That is a long name for a fun group that is really interactive and fun and you can check out every question of the week. And some people even ask their own questions sometimes. Yeah.

You're welcome to weigh in with your own questions, input opinion, keep it friendly. That's how we like it. That's right. There's a link to that on our website in the upper right corner where there's a link to all of the places where we are feeling social.

But also on the website is a place to sign up for our weekly newsletter, which is absolutely free.

Woohoo. You can either sign up for the newsletter at the bottom of any page of our website, or if it's your first time there, well welcome. You'll probably see a popup. And remember that we only send one email a week and never ever share your information with anybody at all.

That's right. We just provide links to stories and videos and podcasts that we think will help you get the most of your RV experience.

You'll also find the show notes for this episode with links and other things. Episode 1 99 on the podcastPage@stresslesscamping.com and 1 99. That means next week, Ooh,

Is

Episode 200. So we're kind of doing a big little shin diggity. Dig, dig, dig.

Big little thing. <laugh> also on our website, don't forget that we have a very active and wonderful deals and discounts page and we have some of the best deals on things you'll need for your Stressless camping adventure.

Yes, indeed. For example, we mentioned Wear Safe gps, we mentioned HaRVest Hosts. We have discounts to both of those. Plus our friends over at ABC Outfitters are also having a special, if you come see us at the Frog Rally, which is coming up in August.

And don't forget, if you know of a great deal that we don't already have, let us know because we'd love to add more things to that page for you.

Yes, indeed. That's what it's all about. It's not the hokey pokey really

<laugh>.

If you don't wanna miss a future episode of this Stressless camping podcast, don't forget that it's always free to subscribe on any podcast app.

We are saving you a seat around our virtual campfire.

Oh, and a review sure. Helps others find this podcast. And the more people who find it, the bigger we can grow our little family and keep getting great deals, discounts, and guests. So thank you so much for all of the great reviews.

If you haven't already written a review, please do. But if you have already written a review and you think, gosh, how else can I help? Please know that sharing articles or podcasts or anything that you think is worth sharing on any social place is very, very helpful to us.

Yeah, it sure is. So we appreciate you. We sure appreciate the opportunity to seRVe you and most of all,

Happy camping.

We hope you learned a lot and had some fun and got some tips for your next Stressless Camping Adventure. We're honored by your reviews on Apple Podcasts, which helps others find us too. Don't forget to subscribe so you won't miss out on the adventure. And we look forward to your joining us next week. Until then, happy camping.