Reconsidered: Tow dollys, propane injection, life in general

[Lin]

We just got back from a one week trip to a campground near Temecula, Ca.  The area is quite beautiful and a bit cooler than the high desert where we live.  Although we have had this bus for about 8 months, drove it places, and moved with it, this was our first camping trip, and I didn't even realize it until we were there.  Anyway, getting to the entrance road to the campground was uneventful.  That's when the fun began.  We were told that they had a three mile, dirt road entrance.  I was not concerned assuming that it would be reasonably well maintained.  Although that was the case, we had not been told that there was a major hill also.  Being a dirt road, I carefully cruised along at the top of first gear-- about 16 mph.  As we chugged up the hill though, we just plain ran out of chugs and got stuck about half way up.  My wife, who had suggested that we take the car off the dolly and let her drive it in, did not find the situation as amusing as I did.  "Okay," I thought, "a challenge."  The first step was to get the car off the dolly.  One of the safety chains was too taut to remove, so I let the bus slip back a few feet, and by luck alone, the chain loosened up.  Next, I wanted to lower the ramp to drive the car off, but due to the hill, there was too much weight on the bolt and I could not remove it.  I decided to back the car off slowly thinking that it would be just like going down a curb.  Strangely enough, this worked.  Now what to do about the dolly.  Remember this is a dirt (packed sand) road that a mighty 8v71 could not climb with they evil Spicer in first.  The sides of the road had sand berms and did not seem to offer a place to put the dolly.  I decided that I would have to walk the dolly down the hill.  As you may surmise, the dolly outweighs me by quite a bit, it was on a hill, and the sand road did not give me much traction.  I can up with the idea of zig zagging down by angling the dolly into the berm on one side of the road, then pivoting it and heading for the berm on the other side of the road.  This method worked pretty well except that it is really meant for someone a bit younger and in better shape.  I must have been showing a bit of wear from the effort, since the wife was getting pretty mad by now.  Only my constant assurance that I was having a good time stopped her from going ballistic entirely.  Anyway, I got the dolly down the hill and backed the Challenger down.  Those new mirrors were just wonderful.  I thought that being minus about 3700 pounds would do the trick.  I hooked the dolly back on (definitely a mistake) and started up again.  I made it more than half way before running out of chugs this time.  I was not in a mood to run the dolly down the hill again, so I tried to back up.  I jackknifed it rather quickly.  Fortunately, I campground employee with a pickup truck was passing by.  He was nice enough to take the dolly and promised to deliver it later.  At this point, I did not care much if I ever saw it again.  Anyway, I back down the hill and gave myself some running room.  I raced up the hill and ran out of chugs a bit further than the time before.  I backed down again and gave myself some more running distance.  I got further this time, but not enough.  I think I took at least two more tries.  The last one, I backed almost all the way to the main road.  "Bumps be damned (or darned)," thought I.  We hit the bottom of the hill at the top of second, about 30 mph, downshifted (which I did not miss) at about 20, and chugged on.  We made it to the top with at least two or three chugs to spare.  I did not know what lay ahead on that road, but I got up to speed and just barreled along until the end.  This was quite unnecessary since there were no more serious hills.

This is another reason that tow dollys have a disadvantage.  They can be a liability in some situations.  The propane injection comes in because I sure would be loved to have some boost of some sort.  If I could get 10 % without a turbo, I think it would be worthwhile.  All in all, everything else went okay.  I raced out of the campground today to make sure there would not be any hill problems.  The only thing that slowed me down was that I was getting too close to my wife who was driving the car in front.  I had to stop and let her get some distance so I could hit the back end to the hill at at least 30.  The incline was not quite as bad on that side though, so no problem.  The bus drove reasonably well.  There is still some issue with the steering that will need to be worked out.  Climbing up Hwy 62 from the low desert, near Palm Springs, it was a good 100 degrees and the grade was Grapevine quality.  I had to do much of it in first gear.  The engine temp approached 200 while in second but dropped back to 190 when in first.  I figured that that was reasonable performance.  So I guess I am not feeling too bad about the little adventure.  It looks like I need to replace the toilet.  It's always a pleasure to see what's grown under those things, but we made it there and back.  Life is good.

[fraser8]

Sounds like quite an adventure for a first time camp out in the bus. I won't let my wife read this as every rough road could cause some lip flap before we explore it. Thanks for the information on the tow dolly, I was considering one for my toad but that is off the list. I'll stick to four wheels down, I can get into enough trouble without something adding to it. I'm sure your future adventures will be less stressful.

[edroelle]

I had to take many, many mountains in 1st gear, WOT, (Allison 740, 8V71) in the western mountains.  That convinced me of 2 things.  Replace the tow dolly, and tow 4 wheels down, and get an engine with a turbo.

Your story reminded me of the trip to see Sam Caylor.  I was prevented from getting to his place by a 10 ton bridge.  This forced us to take car off dolly, dolly off bus, turn dolly around, turn bus around, attach dolly, put car on dolly, continue journey.  I was ready for a nap.

Ed Roelle
Flint, MI

[jjrbus]

 Very interesting first trip!!!!  Thats why we say enjoy the journey, you may never reach your destination!
I went to Kings Canyon park a while back. I did not run out of chugs, but it was a loooooonnnng trip. I had to pull into every overlook area and let traffic by. In hindsight I would drive up there at nite or very early in the AM. Of course in hindsight I would have bought all the ATT&Standard oil I could have when I was 18.
                                                                                     Jim

[brojcol]

I learned the hard way that you should never think you can back up a hill in reverse.  You should have seen me trying to turn a 35' bus around in a 36' area.  Not an experience I wish to repeat.  Even with power steering, I was a wreck by the time I got back up the hill.

[HB of CJ]

Couple of things here.  First you need to consider either having an auto tranny and the second is that a small 1 axle toad trailer solves lots of problems.  If it had brakes you would even be Fed legal, which is nice.

But then, if you had had a Crown Super Coach with a 10-speed Roadranger, going up that dirt road would have been no problem.  You might even have had to use 1st gear. Over 20% startability/gradability. 

[Barn Owl]

I agree, don't like tow dollys. I wouldn't be able to get a manual bus to my house because of my driveway, very steep and very long (7/10ths of a mile). You might want to concider an auto; makes for easy climbing.

[jjrbus]

 I have an auto but thought a standard would be beter for climing hills!

[Barn Owl]

An automatic transmission has the benifit of torque multiplying:

"The torque converter portion has the ability to multiply torque from the engine. The impeller (sometimes called the pump) has specially curved vanes and is driven by the engine's crankshaft. The turbine also has specially curved vanes and is connected to the input shaft of the transmission. Adding a third element, the stator (also called the reactor), gives the assembly the capability it's named for. The stator has vanes and is mounted on a one-way clutch, to allow it to freewheel in only one direction. The stator assembly is located between the impeller and turbine and redirects oil that bounces back off the turbine. The force of the redirected oil assists in rotating the turbine, resulting in torque multiplication. When the impeller's speed is high and turbine's speed is low, torque can be multiplied by as much as 2:1. When the impeller's speed and the turbine's speed are about the same, torque can be transferred at almost 1:1."

http://www.carcare.org/Auto_Transmission/torque_converter.shtml

HTH

[Barn Owl]

This site might have a better explanation:

http://www.tciauto.com/Products/TechInfo/torque_converters_explained.asp

[Utahclaimjumper]

Lin, I guarantee that propane would have made a huge difference.>>>Dan

[Lin]

Barn Owl
     Thanks for the info on the torque converter.  I once had a motorhome with automatic.  We were climbing a hill to a friends driveway when the RV seemed like it would not make it.  All of a sudden, it motor revved and we continued climbing with ease.  I thought it felt like there was a secret lower gear that just popped in.  I never figured out what had happened until reading your post. 

Claimjumper,
     Do you use propane without a turbo?  What has your results been?  I was thinking of hooking up some temporary system just to try it out.  I have some gauges I could use.  If you use it, what pressure do you set your gauges at?

[jjrbus]

Thanks for the infor on transmissions, very interesteing. I was under the impression that a standard was all around the better transmission. 

[06 Bill]

Towing 4 down, you can start the toad put it in gear and help push the Bus. Not ideal but amazing how much this helps. Obvious do not steer just push. 06 Bill

[rv_safetyman]

Lin, great story.  Your words produce very vivid pictures in my mind. 

Now for a tip to the readers:  my wide screen laptop made reading the story a bit difficult because of the very long lines of text.  Both Firefox and IE have a feature where you can enlarge the text.  That makes the column of text much narrower and very easy to read.  Try it.  In Firefox you will find it under the view tab.  In IE (7 I think), it is harder to find, but you will find it under the page tab.

Jim