The rear entry door panel on my Concourse is yellowed and cracked, i have made several phone calls and search the internet looking
for a replacement to no avail. Does anyone know where i can get a new replacement?
I am considering laying up a mold and building one myself out of fiberglass since i havent been able to locate a new replacement.
05 Concourse
Re: 05 Concourse
Which part of the door, exactly?
Also, got a pic you can post?
Also, got a pic you can post?
1994 Concourse dinette, Ford 7.5L (460 V8)
Re: 05 Concourse
I dont have a camera, the only camera i had was my cell phone and its destroyed currently. On the back side of the entry door there is a plastic door panel that covers the entire backside of the door. I dont know how else to describe it because thats what it is called. "Inner door panel".
Re: 05 Concourse
I plan on getting a seperate DSL camera for my travels so i dont have to rely on a cell phone but i just havent gotten around to shopping for a camera yet. I did order a complete solar system from Renogy corporation as well as a complete rear suspension conversion kit from Reyco/ Granning corporation to change the rear suspension to an air ride suspension which allows me to completely eliminate leaf spring and the MorRyde rubber blocks.
Re: 05 Concourse
On my rig that inner rear door panel is just a flat piece of what looks like "pebbled" fiberglass sheet. It's off-white. Is yours molded or "fancy" in some way?
1999 Concourse
Re: 05 Concourse
Details on your mods would be appreciated. I'm particularly interested in your solar project, but I'm sure someone would be interested in the suspension upgrade as well.
Re: 05 Concourse
I dont know that its fancy compared to any others, it is molded primarily in the window area, its molded inwards to conform with the shape of the pocket the window is recessed in. Meaning the window sits further towards the outside of the door versus inside, which would leave a gap between the window and the door panel if the panel wasnt molded inwards to butt up against the window perimeter.
Re: 05 Concourse
Manitou, i just ordered both the Reyco suspension as well as the Renogy solar kit this morning so i dont yet have any install details as of yet. I was told that Reyco manufactures the kits on an as needed basis which means it could be 5 weeks before it ships, Renogy states to allow 2-3 for order processing and another 5 days for shipping so its just a wait and see game at this point, all i know so far is my bank account took a hit. The solar kit i ordered is the Renogy Eclipse 200 watt panels with a 40 amp controller along with brackets, wires, fuses, connectors, and a system monitoring LED panel/box thingy. The reason i went with Renogy is #1 reputation #2 Quality of panels #3 overall dimensions of the panels. They have the smallest foot print i could find while maintaining at least 100 watts per panel. I should be able to mount them up without any issues because they only measure 40.9 x 20.8 x 1.4 inches. Here is a link to the kit i ordered....http://www.renogy.com/renogy-200-watt-1 ... emium-kit/
I upgraded the order to a 40 amp charge controller which kicked the price to 819 dollars because i have thoughts of expanding it later to 400 watts by stacking the panels with special brackets and sliders at a later date when everything else is completed and functioning. I will also add an additional sliding battery tray and upgrade my interstate batteries with AGM group 31 batteries versus the group 27's with a total of 4 batteries. Renogy tells me that the supplied 8 awg wires will handle up to 500 watts and that the 40 amp controller is also good up to 500 watts at which point you have to step up to a 60 amp controller. They claim the Eclipse series are far superior than their standard monocrystaline panels in the other kits. So far everything i have in it runs on 12 volts DC with the exception of the microwave. I put in a 12 volt LED TV, WIFI amplifier, Wireless router, DVD, and of course the stereo, all 12 volt equipment, the wifi equipment i purchased from RadioLabs, the 12 volt LED TV i got at the truck stop, oh i also moved the fantastic fan from the living area to the bathroom and then purchased another fantastic fan and put it in the living area, mainly because the fan in the bathroom was a cheep gob of crap. I installed all new Michelin tires, bilstein shocks, hellwig sway bars front and back, LED flourecent replacement bulbs, new microwave, restrung my blinds with 100 pound test catfish line, new velvac mirrors because someone clipped one on something and they were turning yellow as well so i replaced them both. Peeled off the no slip stuff on the rear steps and then went to the skateboard shop and purchased a roll of 10 inch wide no slip skateboard deck tape and cut to length, worked out great. Beyond that i have plans to remove the dinette set and turn that area into a desk/storage area to open up some walking space and replace the flooring with vinyl plank flooring versus the laminate flooring that the previous owner installed, primarily because i have a dog and sometimes he spills his water and that will ruin laminate flooring (sometimes i spill it for him). I have other smaller tasks i want to do once everything else is complete like change the belts on the engine, spark plugs, tune up the generator, and install a good quality omni directional wifi antenna on the roof. Seems like alot but once the suspension and solar is installed the rest is pretty easy stuff to complete.
Crap i just realized i forgot to inquire as to if the smart controller needed a temp sensor for the batteries or not..!!!
sometimes i forget things.
I upgraded the order to a 40 amp charge controller which kicked the price to 819 dollars because i have thoughts of expanding it later to 400 watts by stacking the panels with special brackets and sliders at a later date when everything else is completed and functioning. I will also add an additional sliding battery tray and upgrade my interstate batteries with AGM group 31 batteries versus the group 27's with a total of 4 batteries. Renogy tells me that the supplied 8 awg wires will handle up to 500 watts and that the 40 amp controller is also good up to 500 watts at which point you have to step up to a 60 amp controller. They claim the Eclipse series are far superior than their standard monocrystaline panels in the other kits. So far everything i have in it runs on 12 volts DC with the exception of the microwave. I put in a 12 volt LED TV, WIFI amplifier, Wireless router, DVD, and of course the stereo, all 12 volt equipment, the wifi equipment i purchased from RadioLabs, the 12 volt LED TV i got at the truck stop, oh i also moved the fantastic fan from the living area to the bathroom and then purchased another fantastic fan and put it in the living area, mainly because the fan in the bathroom was a cheep gob of crap. I installed all new Michelin tires, bilstein shocks, hellwig sway bars front and back, LED flourecent replacement bulbs, new microwave, restrung my blinds with 100 pound test catfish line, new velvac mirrors because someone clipped one on something and they were turning yellow as well so i replaced them both. Peeled off the no slip stuff on the rear steps and then went to the skateboard shop and purchased a roll of 10 inch wide no slip skateboard deck tape and cut to length, worked out great. Beyond that i have plans to remove the dinette set and turn that area into a desk/storage area to open up some walking space and replace the flooring with vinyl plank flooring versus the laminate flooring that the previous owner installed, primarily because i have a dog and sometimes he spills his water and that will ruin laminate flooring (sometimes i spill it for him). I have other smaller tasks i want to do once everything else is complete like change the belts on the engine, spark plugs, tune up the generator, and install a good quality omni directional wifi antenna on the roof. Seems like alot but once the suspension and solar is installed the rest is pretty easy stuff to complete.
Crap i just realized i forgot to inquire as to if the smart controller needed a temp sensor for the batteries or not..!!!
sometimes i forget things.Re: 05 Concourse
I'll have to take a closer look at mine today to see if it is molded to accommodate the window frame. I don't think it is, but maybe I missed that as it was late and I was a bit tired. I'll check and report back.
I'm a bit of a nut on solar and battery charging (I detest voltage drop and like to charge my batteries at juuuust the voltage they want) but I would say that temperature compensation is a must on the charger. I forget if you said what type of batteries you have - some are more forgiving than others but they'd all prefer what they spec.
Thing is, those voltages that the battery specs for absorb and float? They only apply at 77ºF. Go up or down from that and the voltage changes (up when it's colder, down when it's warmer). Even though I have my batteries inside (under the couch), they are almost never at 77ºF. Maybe in a house they would be, but if it's 50º at night, my batteries are still well below 60º at noon, even if it's hot out. Obviously if they were out in the battery tray it would be even more out of sync with ambient temp. Even if the controller is in the battery bay, the mass of the batteries is much slower to react. I have my controller about 12" from my batteries and I can display both the controller temperature and the battery temperature. They pretty much never agree. It would only be worse if the controller were indoors and the batteries out, but even with both in the same compartment the mass of the batteries keeps them "behind" or "ahead" of the air (controller) temperature. So that's why I'm extremely keen on temperature compensation. Just for example, if it's 80º at the controller, but 45º at the batteries - and the controller is not temperature compensated - the controller (even if set to your batteries' specs) would be putting out 14.27 volts (the batteries do want 14.27 volts at 80ºF). BUT, the batteries, which are outside and at 45ºF should be getting 14.81 volts. Doesn't sound like much of a difference but it's important in battery terms. It's like why buy an expensive adjustable controller, adjust it precisely to your battery's specs, and then it doesn't give them what they want anyway due to temperature difference?
The temperature compensation is typically just a thin wire (like 14 ga or so) that you run from the controller to the battery compartment and put on one of the battery posts - so it's no big deal to install.
On the other topic, voltage drop, I say try to eliminate as much of it as you can. I shoot for as close to 1% as I can get. Otherwise it's like "giving power away" and also, like above, affects charging voltages (although some chargers have a voltage sense wire, that's rare, and you don't want voltage drop anyway as you lose hard-earned power).
If you already know all this, then... never mind! You sound pretty up on tech stuff (lots of good mods you're doing!)
I'm a bit of a nut on solar and battery charging (I detest voltage drop and like to charge my batteries at juuuust the voltage they want) but I would say that temperature compensation is a must on the charger. I forget if you said what type of batteries you have - some are more forgiving than others but they'd all prefer what they spec.
Thing is, those voltages that the battery specs for absorb and float? They only apply at 77ºF. Go up or down from that and the voltage changes (up when it's colder, down when it's warmer). Even though I have my batteries inside (under the couch), they are almost never at 77ºF. Maybe in a house they would be, but if it's 50º at night, my batteries are still well below 60º at noon, even if it's hot out. Obviously if they were out in the battery tray it would be even more out of sync with ambient temp. Even if the controller is in the battery bay, the mass of the batteries is much slower to react. I have my controller about 12" from my batteries and I can display both the controller temperature and the battery temperature. They pretty much never agree. It would only be worse if the controller were indoors and the batteries out, but even with both in the same compartment the mass of the batteries keeps them "behind" or "ahead" of the air (controller) temperature. So that's why I'm extremely keen on temperature compensation. Just for example, if it's 80º at the controller, but 45º at the batteries - and the controller is not temperature compensated - the controller (even if set to your batteries' specs) would be putting out 14.27 volts (the batteries do want 14.27 volts at 80ºF). BUT, the batteries, which are outside and at 45ºF should be getting 14.81 volts. Doesn't sound like much of a difference but it's important in battery terms. It's like why buy an expensive adjustable controller, adjust it precisely to your battery's specs, and then it doesn't give them what they want anyway due to temperature difference?
The temperature compensation is typically just a thin wire (like 14 ga or so) that you run from the controller to the battery compartment and put on one of the battery posts - so it's no big deal to install.
On the other topic, voltage drop, I say try to eliminate as much of it as you can. I shoot for as close to 1% as I can get. Otherwise it's like "giving power away" and also, like above, affects charging voltages (although some chargers have a voltage sense wire, that's rare, and you don't want voltage drop anyway as you lose hard-earned power).
If you already know all this, then... never mind! You sound pretty up on tech stuff (lots of good mods you're doing!)
1999 Concourse
Re: 05 Concourse
No, the extent of my knowledge in regards to solar is that it creates electricity and charges the batteries so that i can run my stuff.