Back to Home Base for a few days

After our shake down trip to the Mountains some equipment and other things stand out that need to be addressed.

First the trip was great except for the weather the last couple of days, with snow and cold causing our "yard" to become a bit muddy.

The biggest failure was the " Solar Battery Bank"decided to completely die, making it necessary to use the multiple back up systems of power generation to keep warm

The first system was to use the house battery in the suburban to run the trailer, after a few hours, we utilized the trolling batteries from the boat to run the trailer into the night.

Not having a good way to monitor the battery condition of the boat batteries, I decided to try and use the  solar bank batteries throughout the night (lows in the 20's) (no antifreeze for the water pipes)

Once the battery voltage reaches 11.8 volts the heater system will shut down. the 3rd option is the charging system from the suburban (running the engine at idle). I found that if I ran the engine for about 1 to 2 hours the batteries would run the furnace for about 4 hours.

Running the engine worked, the only problem is it is hard to get much sleep through the night.
One failure of the truck was by doing this a spark plug was fouled in the process.

Second:  Mice....
They were coming in like crazy ... driving us nuts .. The dogs kept trying to get them but they are too fast..

So, a trip to the feed store to get the old fashion traps .. They worked great.. 6 dead mice in one day..

NOW.. back at base camp doing repairs and getting ready for the next adventure :)