Adding a removable cloths hanging bar to the shower provides additional space to hang cloths while traveling, AND, a great place to hang swim suits, wet towels, etc when parked.
In our ole Toyhouse we installed two bars, one high like this one and one about 1/2 way down. Continue reading “Add cloths hanger bar to use shower as closet”
When we are on the road, we like to keep the bath door open so it doesn’t get to cold (or to warm) in there.
The problem is to keep the door from swinging or slamming as the Mirada swings and sways down the road. Continue reading “Latch to hold Bathroom door open”
The first time we slept in the Mirada, we both agreed, the reading lamps above the bed are nice and bright for reading, but needed dimmers for watching TV or whatever else.
I replaced all the interior lights with LED panels mainly to reduce electrical use and to modernize the interior. I ran a couple tests to see what the current draw was and decided to use a 500 ohm variable resistor as the dimmer. Continue reading “Adding a dimmer to LED lighting”
The brush style mud flaps hopefully will reduce occurrences of crap being kicked up, specifically being throw against the Civic that we flat tow. They might also help reduce some of the spray and dust, but time will tell.
Purchase was under $60, Installation took about 2 hours. Continue reading “Adding brush mud flaps”
While searching for our “New to Us” motor home, we noticed a lot of people had removed the “chair” that was located behind the passenger seat and in front of the door. This seemed weird, as we were welcoming this “chair”. Why would someone remove it??After we bought the Mirada and started getting some experience with it. I believe we discovered why some people opted to remove the “chair”. It was somewhat non-functional, it was to close to the passenger seat, and the passenger seat was in the way if I wanted to sit in the “chair”. Continue reading “Moving chair aft to get it away from passenger seat”
The bathroom was originally wired with a standard ole two bulb ceiling light fixture. OFF – ONE BULB – BOTH BULBS.
If I used the bathroom at 3am it was either take care of business in the dark, or fumble around with the ceiling light and be prepared for that blinding light when it came on. Continue reading “Adding bathroom light wall switch converts ceiling fixture to LOW-MED-HIGH”
One of the easiest and least expensive ways to make the coach battery last longer is to reduce the electrical loads placed on the battery. Every ceiling light bulb in the Mirada uses 1.4 amps when its turned on. The double fixtures (two bulbs) draw almost 3 amps when they’re turned on.
By converting to LEDs, that 3 amps can be reduced to 1/2 amp, with the same brightness, AND, a light fixture that will last forever.
Our Mirada originally came with an electronic version (7345RU) of the old single stage converter / charger (6345). These units are designed to supply the coach with 12 volts and recharge the coach battery any time shore power (or generator power) is applied.
The unit worked fine as far as supplying 12 volt power to the coaches needs, but falls short of the needs to recharge the coach battery. Continue reading “Upgrading converter to 4 stage”
Prior to purchasing our “New-to-Us” 2001 Mirada, we took it on a short test drive. One of the items on the list was to evaluate the handling. During the test drive the handling seemed tight and responsive, and didn’t appear to have any nasty behaviors.
Back at the dealer, I crawled around underneath, I didn’t know specifically what I was looking at, but generally, all the bushings and movable parts looked ok and I didn’t see anything lose.
Having a generator is nice, but there are occasions that it doesn’t make sense to run it. i.e. When we travel down the road and need to plug in a cell phone or lap top to re-charge the battery.
I decided to install a small inverter for these situations when it just wasn’t worth it to crank up the genny.
These small inverters are inexpensive and can supply 110 volts (unfiltered square wave) to many small appliances and even tools like a drill or small compressor. Continue reading “Installing small 400 watt inverter”
