A travel trailer (or any RV) is always a work in progress. First there are the inevitable things that shake loose while traveling. For example, I need to recaulk the shower because the flex from traveling has loosened up a few pieces. Next comes the new and improved things. We call these “mods” in the RV world, and huge amounts of time are expended on discussing, planning, and then finally building them. Kevin loves to have a project going most of the time we are home, so we have lots of lovely mods. The latest is replacing the OEM power converter with a much higher quality unit. This will charge and maintain our batteries much better and make for a faster battery charge when we use the generator. It definitely took Kevin more time than he thought it would. The electrical center of our trailer is a modular system with breakers, switches, fans, and 110v/12v conversion. There are only a few things in the trailer that really run on native 110v – the microwave, the air conditioner, and the 110v outlets. Everything else actually runs on 12v power. The converter charges the batteries and converts the 110v power (when hooked up to “shore power”) to 12v so the rest of the electrical systems (lights, heater fan, etc) will operate. This is what he bought:
And here’s what got removed. Lots of cutting and resoldering connections.
A quick check with the power meter shows everything is working well!
Other mods include replacing our dinette table with a Gidgit brand sewing table. You can see the cutout in the middle that can be lowered when you want a sewing machine to sit level with the table cloth. You can also see the fitted tablecloth I made for it. This table is just a little bit smaller than the original making it easier to slide in and out of the dinette. I like it!
Some other mods I will show include taking out the incredibly uncomfortable jackknife sofa and replacing it with two recliners from IKEA. Kevin modified a small table (with under lid storage) to sit between them. Of course the cats must have a place to relax, so he adapted a purchased cat tree to fit behind the table. The cat tree is attached to the table so it doesn’t fall over while traveling.
Nice huh?