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Today I installed the Brakeswitch which helps manage the jake brake and allows the jake brake to be on at all times, especially in a emergency. The relay engages the jake only when the air brake light goes on, and disengages as soon as the accelerator is engaged. The advantage is that with the jake switch on and you take your foot off of the accelerator, the jake only engages when the brake light goes on. It will be a few days before I can test it to be sure it works. The seller told me that it is essential for the brake light to be on whenever the jake is engaged, and he thinks all Newells do this.
Instillation is very easy and all connections are make in the fuse panel and terminal board located in front of the passenger seat. In my coach, disconnect the two purple & yellow wires located at fuse panel #30. Determine which wire powers the radar detector and which powers the jake switch. Connect the radar detector wire to fuse terminal #29. Connect the jake power wire to one of the red wires from the Brakeswitch, and connect the other red wire to terminal #30. Next, the Brakeswitch purple wire to terminal board #19 (not fuse #19). Insert under the screw with the existing wire on either side. Finally, just connect the black wire to the ground in the panel.

Winters on the ocean are hard on the Newell.

The attached image shows rust that I am in the process of dealing with. The trim piece has obviously been removed. The bulging of that trim was what alerted me to the issue.

I cut the trim with a small rotary cutter at the ends of the front slide. The trim was held on by adhesive. The product looks a lot like a thick double sided tape. By pulling hard at the top of the trim I was able to eventually separate the trim from the underlying steel. The surface rust was bad enough that the adhesive stayed on the trim and just pulled away the rust and the trim came off.
I will treat the steel with my favorite rust inhibitor - POR15 - and then put the trim back on.

But, why I am posting is for suggestions on how I might put the trim back on. For me, access is always better than no access, and the adhesive way pretty much makes it permanently on.
I would not mind at all seeing the heads of a few small fasteners on the trim strip. But I worry about the steel, aluminum, and fastener interface - from a corrosion standpoint. Also I have never been very successful at tapping - I 'm good with the drilling part, but usually break something during the tapping part ( cheap taps maybe ).
I have thought about adhesive, but using much less than Newell did hoping I could pull it off later if need be. I would like to be able to inspect the area in the future.

So, anyone have any suggestions? Thanks - Russ

If your route brings you threw North utah and Idaho,
Rendezvous Park in Bear Lake or Garden City, UT is a must stop over. Of all (and I've not seen more that 15 or 20 state parks) this one rates #1. The layout and easy of site selection is fantastic. 50amp+water&sewage.
$25.00 per night. Best reception of Verizon wifi and cell. GREAT Views of the lake. Host even brought us firewood.
This small town has a lot to offer, food, shopping, and golf. lots of water sports and atv right from the park.
Its not Hilton Head but very, very nice.
Hey maybe because most everyone has gone for the season

Michael,
Do you remember when Newell changed to the new style dashboard? Seems like it was somewhere in the '94-'96 range.

Just a maintenance reminder for those of you that have a 110V & 12V water pump--for those that don't you can just sit back and snicker. I had tried to test the 12V water pump after who knows how long, since I normally use my 110V water pump exclusively. It ran, but had lost its prime & I wasn't able to get it primed. I took another try at getting it primed & was successful by running each faucet, starting at the closest faucet to the pump and working to the furthest from the pump.

Also don't forget to test the 12V air pump occasionally. If we don't run these pumps occasionally, they won't work when we need them.

I was wondering if Newell used these mats under fresh water tanks, etc? There have been some issues with the tanks getting scorched and the underlying plywood floor being scorched, also. The fix- cut the wires and tape the leads. FYI-

I'm proposing a Black Hills Mini Rally next summer. June, or July sound like they might work, but let's get some feedback and see if there is any interest, and what time frames work for others. Either way I think Todd and I are going to try to hook up there, or at his home in Sioux Falls, SD. We haven't gotten together since August of 2009. Hope there is some interest!

Admin edit:

Temporarily, I'll just throw all the information on this first post so we can prevent people from digging through all the pages.

Location: Spearfish, SD @ Elkhorn Ridge RV Resort (http://www.elkhornridgervresort.com/)
Dates: June 22 - 29, 2013
Cost: Free (just pay space rental)
Attending:

1) Flickma (Flick)
2) McCloud (encantotom)
3) Day (Fulltiming)
4) Skeen
5) Reganall
6) Reganall - inlaws
7) Olivier (Folivier)
8) Stone
9) Bare
10) Hockwald (Whatsnewell)
11) Magown
12 Zonker
13) Entrekin
14) John and Vicki Clark (from the Newell Factory)
15) Jeff and Lynn
16) Bill Johnson (Bikestuff)
17) Ashley and Linda (ashley)
18) Bill and Heather Appel (bought Tom's coach-not registered yet)
19) Peter Haggins (hagcam) June 25th and 26th?
20) Jimmy Webb (Ozark Guy)
21) Wayne Williams
22) Chappell and Mary Jordan (qci)
23) Rudy and Carolyn Legett (Trainer)
24) Larry & Hedy Brachfeld (lbrachfe)
25) Tony and Drenda Moseley (Tmflyer)
26) James and Carol Brooks (homeonwheels)

To install my new BrakeSwitch, I need access to the jake brake switch. Attached is a photo that shows the panel where the jake switch is located. Before I start pushing and pulling, I would like to find out if someone and tell me how to take the panel apart.

   

The range of my CB is pitiful. I have heard it said this is typical of many Newells, but it is not obvious to me why that should be so.

I am at least going to try a new antenna and see if it helps - it sure cannot make things any worse.

So today I attacked the most likley looking of all five of the antennas on the roof of my Newell. Are you wondering why there are five, well I was for a while but here is the breakdown.

1. CB
2. FM
3. Cellular
4. XM
5. GPS

I removed what for me was the one in the center and more toward the rear of the coach than all the others. The connection looked a little nasty so I took it all apart and measured resistance between the center conductor and the shield. It seemed good to me - somewhat above 1/2 meg if I remember right. I then placed a jumper between the center conductor and shield ( all this with the CB disconnected from the antenna of course ) and on the other end of what I thought was the CB coax, noted about 1 ohm of resistance, so I had certainly found the correct cable.

Now I just need some direction of what antenna to try. Have any of you been down this road and have a recommendation for me? It has to be fairly short so I won't whack in too often, but if flexible enough it shouldn't hurt if it stick up above the exhaust stack which is presently the highest point of contact.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

If you have never been to the Black Hills of South Dakota...frankly I am not surprised. They don't tend to get a great deal of press, but then they are also not crowded. My family lives around the Spearfish area which is the northen Black Hills and also I think the most beautiful. There is a very nice city campground with a trout stream running right through the middle of it. There is also a state fish hatchery adjacent to the park with museums.

From Spearfish you are:
-15 minutes from famous Deadwood (you know the HBO series) that is a must see. You can see where Wild Bill was shot and his grave along with other famous gold rush settlers
-Minutes away from trailheads to the George S. Mickelson bike trail. this is 180 miles of world class biking trails through the hills (even tunnels). since it is all on former railroad beds there is never more than a 3% grade and all of them ar hard packed so you can take almost any bike except maybe a road bike up them.
-45 minutes from Mount Rushmore
-45 minutes from Crazy Horse
-Minutes from hiking trails some marked and some not (this is where hanging with a local like me ghelps you)
-12 minutes from Sturgis which is home to the world famous Sturgis Bike Rally. Each year the tiny little town swells from its meager population of 10,000 people to anywhere from 500,000 to 750,000. next year will be the 74th year of the rally. This spills onto Spearfish big time so we will not likely want to be there during the rally which typically the first week or two of August...beleive me we will see many Harley folks anyways as they all come to run the twisting raods of the hills.
-Trout fishing is everywhere so practice your flycasting
-45 minutes from Devils Tower (remember Speilberg's aliens landed there in the movie)

Dawn and I could plan many must see and do things for anyone who wants to meet there. We know many out of the way hole in the wall spots to go. So do some googling (is that a word?) and see what you think. Since we have four kids and fulltime jobs we will likely peg our week or so on the calendar in the next few months and let you all know. Here is the URL to the campground if you want to peruse that. I think they let folks who help man the fish hatchery and other things stay free so you fulltimers may want to give this a really good look.

http://www.spearfishparksandrec.com/camp...tions.html