Wyoming B.S. Thread

Yeah, I looked at some of the park sites and NFS sites. Most stuff didn't open until at least June for grizzly bear migrations and what not.

A few of us more or less needed a trip to get away for a few days. If we find good camping, cool, if not, we'll make it work.

 

Go back to your hole!

 

You'll still have an awesome time. It'll be gorgeous. Lots of animals in full swing. Snow capped mountains. It'll be awesome. Just not a remote expedition.


Traffic will be low though with gas prices and it not being summer. It's a prime time to enjoy those areas.

 

Can't wait! AS I sit here at my 3rd 18 hour day at work in like 3 weeks lol. Ready to relax

 

Yeah it'll be full of that! If you have snowshoes there are some hikes you could do I think. I mean honestly some of them you won't need anything more than boots. Some awesome hikes in Yellowstone.

 

Yeah, the more and more I look at it, Yellowstone might be a no go. The southern entrance from Tetons doesn't open until the day after we planned to get up there. Live cameras showing a good bit of snow on the ground too. 3 hour detour to get up to the north side of the park if the southern entrance doesn't open on time.

Tetons looks pretty clear though from live cams. Little snow on the ground, except for the high country obviously

 

yeah I suppose that's not surprising. Should have thought to look at that, figured the south one would be open though. The East is always the last one due to Sylvan Pass.

Tetons are awesome and beautiful to see. Could dip over to ID from there there, more Nat forest there. But again, most stuff could be closed/snowed in.

 

Snow line is still under 6k ft here.

 

Any it's still snowing in the hills. After making it through a couple dozen drifts we were blocked by a very large tree across the road.

Van did really well. Plenty of traction in the snow and plenty of power in 4lo! Home early because the house batteries are toast two group 27s sitting on shore power all week were down to 11.5v this morning running only the fridge and a couple led lights at night. Should be an easy but expensive fix.

 

While your AGMs might well be toast, who knows what all they've been put through, the shore power system you have is not doing them any favors. A 13.3 volt output is not enough for AGM type batteries. That charging system needs to output at more than 14 volts. Ideally, more than 14.5.

My guess is, it was never designed for AGM type batteries. Lead acid plate batteries (starting batteries) do ok at 13.3, but AGMs not so much.

If it were me, before replacing those batteries, I would discontinue use of the current shore power system and use that ctek charger in its place and see how your batteries hold up in the same conditions.

 

The shore will bulk charge at 14.5v when set to AGM. The float charge is at 13.4v. I don't know the history of the batteries and will always be questioning them so I just dropped two new blue top X2's into it. Immediately at 12.7v resting. Now that we have a fresh start it'll be easier to monitor them and their health with my current systems. Plus, my stove needs 12v minimum to start and I didn't like this morning when we couldn't cook breakfast. 4yr warranty is nice insurance for now.

 

I'd always be carrying a saw this time of year. Ground is soft and you never know when a gust of wind will blow a tree down blocking your way out.

 

I know I almost tossed it in but i figured I would be ok. Need to find a way to prevent it leaking into my carpet, trashbag would work. Even then, the tree was 20" diameter and hanging off the drop on the right about 30ft. I'm not sure I have the skillset to safely cut my way through it. My plan of attack would've been to drop the overhang and then pull the part on the road with the van. After it fell from where it's rooted 20ft up, I wasn't sure what would happen. So, even with the saw, I wouldn't have attempted it. Drove over other down trees though no problem.

 

That one looks like a tricky one to cut. I'd be winching it first.

 

But I would be pulling it in the middle so It wouldn't pivot out of the way so to speak. Certainly would need someone who knows what they are doing. I am not that guy lol. Poor 16" bar would've gotten a workout

 

I hope that solves the problem.

 

The results this afternoon is really confirming it. Sat resting sans solar at 12.8v. Turned the lights on, the fridge and both furnaces at once and that load dropped it to 12.5v. Hooked up the solar controller and went inside and the sun popped out. Currently resting at 14.3v. I'm going to leave the fridge on for the night and not hook up to shore and see where it's at in the am. I'm confident that this was the issue.

Doing the math, I have 100ah to play with (dual 100ah batteries). My fridge pulls 1.25ah per the manufacturer. So I should be able to get 80hrs of service out of the batteries before they hit 12v (50%) not including the solar assistance. The two led reading lights we used pull nothing and the furnace may pull some (glow plug, water pump and fan) but we still lost 80% charge in 12 hours. Having such a fancy van and feeling like charging a cell phone on the inverter will kill the batteries says something is majorly wrong. That said, if the batteries are still going flat over night, the culprit is likely the fridge. I'll report back!

PS: annoyingly I cannot find a main breaker on this thing so hooking up new batteries was.... interesting.

Pps: the duracells we're still under 30mo warranty at batteries+ but the warranty wasn't transferable with the reciept

 

What you didn't have a lighter to manually light the burners? Or is it all electric?

 

It's diesel.

 

The stove is diesel?? Really? I wouldn't think that would be safe..for a lot of reasons.

But still. Lighter can start that?