Sprinty Gets an Upgrade at Advanced RV

Monday, 20 May

After over two weeks of rest (Sprinty rested while Darrell and Kris did pre-season chores around the yacht club), Sprinty was ready for a road trip.  Fortunately, Darrell had scheduled an upgrade for Sprinty at Advanced RV in northeast Ohio for 22 May, a perfect excuse for a road trip.

Departing Deep Creek Lake, we enjoyed the backroads (which included passing through Eighty-Four, PA, home to 84 Lumber) to Lindenwood Golf Course in Canonsburg, PA, between Washington, PA and Pittsburgh.  We arrived just before 10 am and were surprised to find the large parking lot almost completely full.  Their tee time reservation system on their web site suggested a wide open day.  When we checked in, they said we could likely go off in about an hour, which was perfect as our warm-up routine is usually about an hour.

Just before 11am, we headed for the first tee.  A few moments later, the Starter came up and asked if we would mind having a single join us.  So Blake joined us.  We knew from the many golfers already on the course, almost all four-somes, that the day was going to be slow, so getting to play with someone would make the inevitable wait more tolerable.

We both felt we were not playing our best.  Both Darrell and Kris hit some good shots, and made several shots that were not up to our usual performance.  The greens were quite fast, and befuddled us all day.  Darrell was up by 5 strokes at the turn, which was not too bad for a course we had never played before.  Kris played better on the back nine, including making a birdie on the final hole, while Darrell failed capitalize on his best drive of the day, 238 yards.  However, it was not enough to catch Darrell, so he had to plot a course to a nearby Starbucks to pay up.

We liked the course.  The greens were quite a challenge, and we felt that we would play the course better if we play it again.

After Starbucks, we continued enjoying the backroads of Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio to Guilford Lake State Park near Lisbon, OH.  Checking the Reserve America reservation system indicated plenty of available sites, so we were pretty confident about being able to just show up without reservations.  The campground was only about half full, and we were able to pick from the available sites.  We picked a site where we could see the lake from the front windshield.

Guilford Lake was constructed as a canal feeder reservoir for the Sandy and Beaver Canal in 1834.  An ambitious project undertaken by a private company, the canal was to be 73-miles long and would require two tunnels, 30 dams, 90 locks, three reservoirs and one 400-foot aqueduct before it was completed.  When the canal era ended, adjacent landowners breached the embankment in two places and proceeded to use the lake bottom for farmland.  In 1927, the land was purchased by the state with the intent of rebuilding the reservoir.  The new dam was completed in 1932 by the Division of Conservation. In 1949, Guilford Lake and Ohio’s other canal feeder lakes were the first areas to be dedicated as state parks in 1949.

Tuesday,  21 May

Sprinty enjoyed a peaceful evening at the state park, as did Kris and Darrell.  After breakfast, we broke camp and headed west to Canton, OH to the McKinley Presidential Library & Museum.  

William McKinley was the 25th president, and moved to Canton, OH after the Civil War to practice law.  He ran for Congress and served four terms.  He ran for governor of Ohio and served for two terms.  And was elected president in 1896 after running an unusual campaign, completely from the front porch of his home in Canton.  Very hard to imagine any political campaign, especially a presidential bid, being conducted from a single location.

William McKinley was shot in September 1901 while at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, and died eight days later from gangrene.  Historians believe his record was overshadowed by his successor, Teddy Roosevelt.

Within days after his death, a private fund-raising effort engaged the country to construct a fitting memorial, at the time, the most beloved president in history.  $600,000 was raised, much of it from pennies and nickels donated by school children.

Over 70 designs were submitted for the memorial, and the design submitted by Harold Van Buren Magonigle was selected.  The monument is at the center of a large cross, which also forms the handle of a sword.  It is the largest presidential tomb in America, 26 acres.

There are 108 steps from the parking lot to the entrance to the tomb, which seemed to attract a number of fitness enthusiasts this morning.

After climbing the steps and visiting the tomb, we headed for the museum.  We watched two videos, one on William McKinley, and the other on the building of the tomb.  The majority of the museum is devoted to Starke County history.  Of all the Presidential Museums we have visited, the exhibits in the McKilney museum devoted to McKinley were quite small.  The McKinley Presidential Library & Museum is not part of the federal Presidential library system - and today, it is managed by the Starke County Historical Society.

One exhibit that was interesting was called “Inverted Intersections” consisting of a collection of photographs of intersections in downtown Canton in the mid 20th-century, with photographs of how those intersections look today.

While the National Football Hall of Fame was only a couple of miles away, we could not visit it and have time for golf.  It will have to be part of a future trip.  Darrell picked the Chenoweth Golf Course located about 20 miles north of Canton, OH to play.  While there were lots of people out on the course, they were fine with us getting on.  After warming up, we headed out.  Kris worked on her alignment for the first several holes and we went back and forth, making the turn tied up.  The back was also back and forth, with Kris finishing up one stroke up on the day.

Darrell plotted a course to the nearby Starbucks  for Kris to pay up, which Kris was happy to do since she has not had honors for awhile.  After Starbucks, we headed north to Advanced RV in Willoughby, OH.  Advanced RV (http://advanced-rv.com/) is the builder of custom motorhomes predominantly on the Mercedes Sprinter chassis.  It was founded by Mike Neundorfer.

We arrived just after 4pm and checked in with the staff.  We were warmly welcomed and invited to wander around.  We toured the fleet of rental RVs that were positioned near the entrance to see what ideas they incorporate into their designs.  While we were touring the rental fleet, Mike Neundorfer, President of Advanced RV, came to greet us.  Darrell had met him in October 2012 when Mike’s previous company hosted a learning community training event that Darrell attended.  Mike was just starting his motorhome building at the time.

As planned, Sprinty spent the night in one of the Advanced RV customer hookup sites behind the building.  Resting up for the big day tomorrow.

Wednesday, 22 May

Advanced RV is located in a light industrial area at the end of a dead end road - dead end because there are several railroad tracks blocking the street from being a through street.  As we settled in last evening, trains were going by every 7 to 20 minutes.  That continued for most of the night, making for a less restful night than usual.

We started seeing workers arrive at 6:30, and just before 8am, their official opening time, Darrell got Sprinty checked in with Frank, the head of service.  Sprinty was assigned to Ron to replace the existing Dometic Penguin II Low Profile air conditioner with a Quiet Air Conditioner designed by Houghton in Australia.

Background:

Advanced RV had done a lot of testing to find the best rooftop air conditioner available for RVs - and did not limit their search to North America.  The Houghton air conditioner was quieter and more efficient than all the rest.  

Since we adopted Sprinty, his Dometic air conditioner (original equipment) never seemed to work as well as Roadtrek intended.  When we used it extensively at the FMCA Rally in Indianapolis in July 2017, it could only cool the inside to about 80 degrees, despite running on high.  And after a couple of days, it quit cooling at all - and we found the coils had iced up, typical of a low Freon condition.  

The air conditioner was very loud as well, making it unpleasant to be around.  As a result, we rarely used the air conditioner.  The marginal effectiveness was not worth the noise we had to endure.

Last Fall in St Augustine, we had to run it as it was warm and muggy.  On the low fan setting, the coils froze up in about 20 minutes.  On the high setting, it froze up in less than 3 hours.  Typical of a low Freon situation.  So we decided something had to be done.  After all, sometimes we will need to deal with warm and muggy weather as you can’t always travel your way out of it.

After initially trying to get it replaced in Florida, we decided to take Sprinty to Advanced RV to do the replacement.  They are the sole source in North America for the Haughton unit, and have experience doing replacements on Class B and Class C RVs, including Roadtreks.

The replacement was almost an all-day process.  Advanced RV has a nice customer lounge with a big window looking out into the shop area where Sprinty was being worked on.

Darrell spent a lot of time watching - and wishing he could be out in the shop helping.  It took all morning to remove the existing air conditioner, prepare the roof opening for the new one, and install the seal ring.  

The sealant set up over lunch, and then the new air conditioner was installed.  

Once it was checked out on shore power, Sprinty was moved to the wash area for a leak test. 

And about 4pm, we were headed out.  The weather forecast for Thursday made golf enroute back to Deep Creek Lake pretty iffy.  So we decided to just head on back to Deep Creek Lake and try and play golf there early before the storm system arrived.  The 250 miles took us about 5 hours traveling mostly Interstates and Turnpike routes.

Epilogue:  on Thursday, 23 May, Darrell did comparison testing of the new air conditioner.  

Dometic Penguin II Low Profile air conditioner (original)

• Rated at 11,000 BTU
• 12v Current draw to the invertor on high fan:  107 amps (37% of invertor capacity)
• Noise on high fan:  70dB

Houghton Quiet Air Conditioner (replacement)

• Rated at 13,500 BTU
• 12v Current draw to the invertor on high fan:  98 amps (35% of invertor capacity)
• Noise on high fan:  52dB

In summary:  more cooling at less power consumption, and with significantly less noise.