FINALLY, it's almost time to start our camping season. As you can probably imagine, I am BEYOND excited. This is what I was put on this Earth to do. There's always a ton of things to be done before we hit the road, and unfortunately, I'm not much help in that department. For Gary, the weeks leading up to our departure time is chaotic to say the least. Basically, it's the storm before the calm. He can finally relax whenever we get to wherever we are going, but there's always a bunch of VERY long days to get through first. This year, a few things cropped up with me that don't normally need attention. My tongue jack broke during our final camping trip last spring, so that needed to be replaced. Gary decided to tackle the job of replacing it himself. With the aid of a reciprocating saw and an angle grinder, he removed the old jack. It was surprisingly painless. I thought for sure it was going to hurt, but I didn't feel a thing. NICE!!! Nothing ever goes perfectly smoothly though. The new jack had some issues right out of the box. The mounting plate was welded on at a crooked angle from the factory. Gary had purchased two of these jacks awhile back, and they both have the same problems. This weird angle made the jack lean to the left when it was put into position on my tongue. It looked ridiculous even to me, and I'm not a perfectionist like Gary is. So, an assortment of washers and a large nut was used to shim the jack into being straight. That left an unsightly gap under it, which required a bunch of caulk to eliminate. Since these pics were taken, the jack has a base coat of red paint on it. It will get a second coat when my entire tongue gets a fresh coat of Rustoleum Safety Red paint. I need some touching up after a couple of years of being on the road. There are lots of nicks and chips. After working on the jack, my bearings got checked and repacked with fresh grease. While everything was apart, Gary decided to adjust my torsion axle to give me a couple of extra inches of ride height. Doing this also positions my tires and wheels a little bit further out of my wheel wells, and that makes removing my tires and wheels easier. That has always been a problem, and it's a job that Gary always dreads. A 1 x 3 stick was cut at 27", which is the diameter of my tires. A 1" hole (my spindle diameter) was cut in the center of the stick. Gary used the stick to aid in the adjustment height of the torsion axle. It saved a lot of time. The old guy still occasionally comes up up with a good idea. Ha-Ha!!! My brakes were adjusted, and my tires and wheels went back on. Mission accomplished. Just when everything was going so well, Gary spotted a crack at the front of my door side frame rail, right in the area where my tongue is attached. UH-OH!!! Upon further inspection, he found out that the left side was cracked in the same place. DOUBLE UH-OH!!! Armed with iPhone pictures of the areas, Gary went by the shop that has always done the welding and fabrication for anything that broke around around here. They no longer do any fabrication work, and although there wasn't much of that needed to repair my frame rails, they refused to do the job. They referred Gary to Barry over at Bear Welding & Fabrication. This morning, I left the Green Acres Garage for the first time in months, and headed over to get fixed up. Barry and his buddy Mike were AWESOME to work with. Mike got me set up on a slab just outside their shop, and Barry fabbed up a couple of pieces of heavy gauge steel plate, and welded them to my cracked frame rails. The whole "operation" was almost as painless as when Gary removed my tongue jack. AMAZING!!! From now on, Barry and Mike will get ALL of our welding and fabrication work. They had me repaired in a matter of minutes, and their price was EXTREMELY reasonable. If it hadn't have been for them, I probably wouldn't be going camping anytime soon. So thanks SO much, Bear Welding. You've made me a VERY HAPPY CAMPER!!! Barring disaster, we'll be on our way to our first stop of the season soon, and I'll be chatting with you from there. Have a GREAT day, everyone. Bye for now!
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