Wednesday, February 28, 2024

23 - 24 Trip to the Southwest, Day 136

Wednesday, February 28, 2024 - City of Rocks State Park, Faywood, NM, Day 2 - 0 Miles, 4,192.1 Miles for the trip 

Last night the wind died down to a "gentle" 10 - 15MPH. At least the trailer stopped rocking. My Maxx Fan lift mechanism died due to the pot metal gearbox shattering. This is an often reported problem with the Maxx Fans, and while mine died quite awhile ago, and I have the replacement gearbox, I can't replace it until I can get on the roof. No problems up until the 40 - 50MPH winds of yesterday. The lid was slamming up & down hard enough that I thought it might shatter. So, I removed the screen and bungee corded the lid to the screen latches. I'll leave it like that until I need to run it to cool the trailer. Probably won't happen for a bit - low 60's predicted as highs for the week.

I discovered that the anchor chain for the picnic table isn't attached to anything, so I could have moved it to the correct side for a trailer. Too late now since I can't do it without hooking up & moving the trailer, but good to know for next time.

While I started with 81% batteries, with the mostly clear skies & cool temperatures, by 2:20 the batteries were back to full. 

I made a trip to Silver City (about 31 miles north) to revisit the Silver City Museum, and do some shopping at the Silver City Albertson's. The museum looks much the same as the last time I visited. 

The first three photos in the bottom row are from the copula windows. A climb up three long, narrow flights of stairs; I don't know if it is the 6000' altitude or just age, but quite a climb! The last photo is the gift shop.

I put a couple of photos here, but you will need to go to today's LakeshoreImages page for the rest.

The Silver City Museum

The Silver City Museum

The Silver City Museum

The Silver City Museum

After a quick stop at Albertson's, it was back to the trailer. Much better mileage without the trailer & headwind - 21.4MPG.

Much cooler than yesterday. At 2:45 is is already down to 58°F and the clouds are moving in. It is still windy enough to need a jacket. My weather app says it is raining, but it isn't. I was hoping to get some nighttime star photos since the campground is well isolated from city lights, but unless we get a clear night it isn't going to happen. Even the usual great sunsets haven't happened.

Dinner was a Country Kitchen Chicken Pot Pie. First time - "Delicious Eats by Kardea Brown." Strange cooking instructions - "Place in a room temperature oven, set oven for 350°F, and bake for 40 minutes." It took an additional 10 minutes to reach the required 165°F, and one pie provides 3/4 of the daily sodium limit, but it was edible.

Until Tomorrow -

2 comments:

  1. Jon, When my gear box shattered, no replacements were avaiable. It was the manual opening version. The motorized version gearboxes were available. You can swap out the splined shaft from the old manual to the new motorized unit and all is well.
    And yes, this work must be done from the exterior. Impossible to do it from the inside. I tried, one Winter.

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    1. I was lucky & found the manual gearbox at Panther RV. Thanks for letting me know you could work with the motorized version.

      Jon

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