Eric Stark

Welcome back, Smart RVers. Today's episode is going to be awesome. And these are the things we're going to be talking about in staying on the road.

We're going to talk about the most common top 20 RV repairs and in enjoying the RV life, we're going to discuss mail, money and meds solving logistics for the avid RV traveler. And then in the next stop, we're going to visit Tonopah, Nevada.

And then the town right next door in shadows of the past, towns that once were Goldfield, Nevada. And then in RV envy, we are going to discuss what the tools are that techs use. Yes, we're going to get into the what the techs are using these days.

So this is Eric Stark with the Smart RVer podcast, your trusted source for tips and insights to embrace the RV lifestyle without worries. Let's talk everything RV and today is episode 185. So let's dig, dig into this. So hey everybody, I want to welcome you back.

I'm glad you're back listening to the podcast. We love having you here. I love having you here. There's only one of me, a lot of you, so it's me, I, not we.

Anyway, so it's early in the morning breaking this down today. Looking forward to this all night long, thinking, well, this podcast today is going to be absolutely awesome.

You know, one of the things in life that, that we all appreciate our thank yous appreciation. So hey, I want to tell you guys something.

Recently we did something or a customer came in July traveling from Virginia and he came in kind of in a bit of a bind, needed a simple little fix, but he wasn't sure how to do it. He had kind of a complex solar system in his rv. So we took care of him, got him on the road in a matter of minutes.

And then he learned something as well. He learned how to take care of that portion of his rv. He learned about this podcast. So now he's a smarter RVer.

But what's so cool about it is he sent us a card. He sent it to me because I'm the one who took care of him and he thanked me for what we or what I did got him on the road.

He enjoyed the rest of his trip and that's absolutely awesome because he learned something, we did something for him and he appreciated and he sent us a card. So my point is not how awesome I am just kidding.

The point is if you have somebody who takes care of you when you're traveling or it doesn't matter when you really appreciate What? Someone did send him a card, a handwritten card. I don't have it here in front of me. It's actually behind me on the table.

It's going to be in the hall of fame there, back there, you know, which I just pointed to the back of it. You know, on the podcast. You can't see it in YouTube. You could. Well, YouTube. You might be able to see it behind me. I'm not sure.

I could turn around now. I can't. So anyway, send someone a card. It'll mean the world to them.

You know, it's pretty impressive to take the time out, buy the card, pay for the postage and send it to somebody who did something for you that shows real appreciation. And speaking of appreciation, that brings us to Wholesale Warranties. How do they connect? Right.

Well, you're going to appreciate what they can do for you.

If you're looking to buy a new or used rv, doesn't matter from a dealership or a private party, Wholesale Warranties has the extended warranty for you. If you want an extended warranty, Wholesale Warranties is your place. There's a link in the description. Just go ahead and check it out. Use that link.

It'll take you, get you started, get you on the road to a transparent extended warranty. Now, one other thing before we get into enjoying the RV life, this podcast has gradually crept into like 60 minutes worth of me blathering on.

So it's getting dialed back. We're going to get back into more of that 30 minute range.

So as you notice, the podcast will change some and we're kind of working on some changes in the background as well. So you'll see these gradual changes or hear them, actually see them. You'll hear them. Just so you know, they've gone long.

And if, you know, I changed it up on you, I apologize for that. We shouldn't have really done that. We need to stick within our 30 minute area.

But we get excited about the things we want to share with you and it just gradually got longer. So we're going to dial it back. Fleet today's episode will be a little bit shorter, so we're going to start working on that.

And so it's going to change. We're going to get more into just RV maintenance. We've kind of drifted into more of the shadows of the past, all these towns.

We're still going to talk about that today, but it's definitely going to be much shorter. We're not doing it the same way. So I hope you like that. And the Other thing too is let me know what you'd like to hear about on this show.

You can go to the smartrver.com use the contact us page. Contact us. That way you can write an email, you can use a video ever how you want to get a hold of me.

But I want to hear what you guys want to talk about. The show's about you, it's not about me. So I want to hear what you guys want to talk about. And we will go down that road in that direction.

Now let's get into enjoying the RV life. Lawyer, Guns and my. Oh, wrong one. That's a song. Lawyer, Guns and money. Right? An old song. Bob Dylan, maybe. All right, let's get back to reality now.

Let's talk about mail, money and meds. Solving logistics for the avid RV traveler.

You know, when you're a full time RVer, you're on the road, it's a, a, a lifestyle that you truly like doing. It's a lifestyle you appreciate. You don't want to be bogged down with worrying about mail, money or meds.

And there are three essential things you got to have mail, money and meds, right? Well, maybe not in that order, maybe not all of them, but you need at least two of them, I would say.

So keeping that stuff organized and on track can be a bit of a chore.

Now, some people have been full time RVing for many years or decades got this dialed in, but those that are just getting into it might need a little assistance. So hopefully we're going to help out both audiences here. You don't have to worry about this.

This isn't something that's super complex, so complicated, you know, that it's going to take hours and hours to get it all set up. That's not like that. So mail is pretty simple today. I mean, how much mail do you need in a year, right? Or how much do you get in a week?

You know, it just depends on you, your circumstances, how you set things up. Now, I personally would recommend just getting away from regular mail, going with email if you can, when you're traveling full time.

And there's companies, or I shouldn't say companies, they're like escapees, which most of you probably heard about. Escapees. It's an RV club. They have a Mail forwarding services. And then there's also traveling mailbox. And these are game changers.

These can help you get your mail sent to you wherever you're at now. What's cool about them too is they will shred your mail, forward your mail, open it, scan it, and send it to you via email. Whatever you want to do.

These services are awesome. Now you know before they open up your mail, you want to make sure something you want someone else to read. So you got to be careful there.

But they have these options that can be game changers for you. And so it's worth looking into those. And another thing besides the mail, I think the mail is pretty straightforward. If you want it forwarded, great.

And you might have to keep a mailbox or mail forwarding system on hand, depending on your life and your circumstances, just for important documents, occasionally you might need to get something sent to you that has to go through the mail. Then it's great having it.

But now, sometimes depending on what it is, you know, an important document, it might just be worth getting the next day letter type thing sent to the RV park where you're at. It gets there, takes a day, not a big deal. Maybe it costs you 15 bucks, a little extra money, but you get it. You don't have to worry about it.

My wife and I, whenever we have important documents to send someplace, they go next day, air next day letter, boom, you got it. Doesn't matter what it is, you have it. That way we don't have to worry about it. So that's an option for you as well.

But mail forwarding services can take care of your mail, whatever you have. Now another thing to know is you have states like Texas, South Dakota, Florida.

You can register a domicile in those states and that's going to allow you to register vehicles, get insurance, have a place of residence as you well or as you will. So that gives you a mailing address or a physical address in the U.S. you know, that would come in handy if you've sold your rv.

I mean sold your house, sold everything. You're on the road 100%. And some people will use a friend or family's address, which can be great.

But sometimes you might not have that option or you'd rather not exercise that option. One of those states, Texas, South Dakota or Florida, could be an option for you. Another thing are meds. We talked about that, so.

Or we brought that up. Meds are. So you have a hard time today? I have a hard time every day. All this stuff got so much in my mind, I got the whole show wrapped up.

In my mind, I get ahead of myself here. So Walgreens cvs, so these are national chains and they can take care of prescriptions wherever you're at on the road, or they should be able to.

Now, maybe you prefer not to use those because you're not in towns where they're at or you've had some issues. You can always do it online. You have like Optimum Rx, you have Express scripts.

So there's different places where you can do this, get your meds sent to you, different ways of doing it. And then again, if you're using a mail service, they can send them to that mail service which they get forwarded to you.

Or if it's physical, you go to Walgreens CVS and pick it up. You just have to make sure they get your prescription in advance. Don't wait. Then also think about it too.

You know, make sure your meds can be stored in your RV someplace not only safe, but where they won't go bad because of heat or cold. You know, meds have to sometimes be stored at certain temperatures or, you know, on a temperature range. So keep that in mind as well.

Now, paying the money as you travel, you know, you can go digital with apps like Ally or Chime. They're for your online banks.

Yeah, online banks are probably a lot safer than regular physical banks anymore, especially with the problems in the United States banking system. Nonetheless, you got to have a bank someplace.

So you might use one of these online banks like Ally or Chime, or you're just going to have use ATMs withdrawal cash. Maybe your banks are a national brand and you can go in and get cash every how you want to do that.

So that way you have access to money, to physical cash, because you do need cash while you're traveling. Now, along the same lines, just automate everything.

You know, your phone, your insurance, your subscriptions, whatever you have, just make it all online. That way it's automatic, comes out of your account, it's taken care of, whether it's directly out of your bank account or a credit card.

Oh, you don't have to worry about it. There's no late fees. Things aren't getting shut off because you forgot to pay the bill, because you're out having a good time on your trip. Right.

You're living in your rv. You don't want to be messing with bills. Now another thing too is keep a credit card, keep a debit card and keep cash on hand.

Cash is always good to have. There's always places that take cash and they don't take credit cards.

And there's places that take credit cards that will charge you a service fee to use it, like 3%, something like that. Don't pay the fee, man, just pay cash, save your money. Don't give them that extra percentage because it's a scam.

It's already built into the price of the food or whatever. They don't have lower prices to do that. You know, it's nonsense, especially this day and age. So that's my little tip there. That's a money saving tip.

Should have saved that for the next one.

But another thing too is have your documents, things like that, that are important to you stashed away in your RV in a folder, a binder or something so they're accessible things that you know you need to have. You might even have a little safe which we're trying to find a safe for RVs.

If you know of a safe that works great in an RV or a nice strong box, let me know, contact me. I'd love to hear it, hear about it and see pictures of it. Or we can find it on the Internet and get those pictures. Let me know.

So keep everything automated, keep it simple. You know, the online stuff is great. It's secure today so it's definitely worth looking into.

So hopefully that helps you with some traveling and how to manage your money, meds. And I had lawyer guns and monies in my mind. Mail, money and meds. So mail, money and meds.

So the whole article will be@the smartrver.com under Enjoying the RV life. So that hack will be there. Now we're going to get into the money saving tip. Sometimes we spend a little more money on a. Well, let me rephrase that.

Sometimes we might do a repair that's going to cost us more than if we were to replace the part or the, or the appliance, whatever it might be. So sometimes a repair is a band aid. It gets you through the minute, but it doesn't get you through the future.

And let me break this down a little bit. I don't want to spend too much time on only because we're trying to reduce our time here.

So when you think about a repair, I'm going to stick with an air conditioner for now. Sometimes the AC or the, the fan will go bad and the motor will go bad in an air conditioner. Seems pretty straightforward.

So let's say you take it to a service center and they're going to Replace it. And I'm just picking this number here. It's probably relatively close. Could be higher, could be lower.

Depends on the air conditioner, the fan, you know, little variables there. And they say, okay, we can put a new fan motor in, but we're also going to replace the blade. This is a plastic blade.

It's got a little bit of wear on it, you know, so we're going to do that at the same time, which makes sense. And they might also say, and we're going to replace the capacitor for it as well. We do this as a package. That way you're covered.

If something, you know, the capacitor goes bad a week from now, a month from now, then you're not back because you got a brand new one. We solved that ahead of time. So maybe it's 400 bucks for this repair.

Might be a little more, might be a little less, might be a lot more, depending on where you go. So that seems pretty reasonable. Get you back, you know, the air conditioning working, back on the road, everybody's happy.

Now, the problem is that 400 bucks that you spent on that.

Now, depending on the age of your RV, let's say it's 10 years or older, that money might not be the best well spent money only because something else could fail in that air conditioner.

And maybe you're back at the dealership or the repair center a couple of months later, six months later, maybe you had that done in the summer, and then the next spring you're back because the air conditioner is not working. Maybe you pour another two or three hundred bucks into it, something else went wrong, maybe the compressor failed.

Now, compressors aren't replaceable. You have to buy a new air conditioner. So now you're looking at a $1,400 to $1,700 air conditioner job.

You know, it should be around $1,400, depending on the air conditioner of the shop and so forth. Depends what their labor rate is too. And that all plays into this. You know, whether you're paying $100 an hour or $200 an hour for a labor rate.

So if you put $400 into repair, then maybe in six months, you have to do another two or $300 repair, you're halfway there.

Now, I'm not advocating you just automatically replace your air conditioner, but what I'm getting at is take pause and think about what you're doing here. Is this going to be a band aid or is this going to get you down the road for several more years? And sometimes there's an unknown.

But buying that new air conditioner, you know you're buying longevity, you know you're buying efficiency. Because new air conditioners are so much better than the older ones. You got an air conditioner that's 10 years old, 15 years is 20 years old.

The new ones are so much better. They're efficient, they're quiet, they draw less power, they start up easier. It's just a better way to go.

And then you're buying peace of mind so you're not panicked about this thing failing on you right and left worried about it. It becomes a no hassle deal. And so air conditioners was my example. Apply that to anything. Now, some things that might not matter.

A dollar five part versus a fourteen hundred dollar job, right? But think about it that way. Am I just putting money into a. Sometimes it's called a dead horse.

Am I pouring money into something that in six months is just going to come and bite me again? Should I just upgrade?

It's going to depend on your circumstances too, what your finances are like, where you're at in life, where you're at on the road, what you're doing. But take pause and calculate the cost then and look at it from a future standpoint.

So hopefully that gives you some benefit on saving some cash because that's what it's all about. And sometimes to save money, we have to spend a little bit more. Sounds odd, but that's the way it works out sometimes, right?

In this crazy world we live in, we don't know what's coming at us each day. But we do need to be able to rationalize things, take a moment and think about it and make good decisions.

And finding an honest service center, someone you can talk to who's going to give you the straight shot. Shoot on it. That didn't sound right. The straight shot, the straight information. Shoot straight. Shoot straight with you. How's that?

If they're not going to lie to you, bs. Yeah, whatever you want to call it, they're going to tell you what you need to know. That's what you got to find.

Honest guys who are out helping you and your best interests as well. Not Just there, not lining their pockets with your cash. Save your money. Try to find safe ways to save your money.

Now that's going to bring us to staying on the road. So today we're going to talk about the Most common top 20 RV repairs and how to prepare for them.

We don't have time to hit all 20 of these, unfortunately. So what we're going to do is kind of go through the top 10. And what's interesting is all the top 10 are things we've discussed on this show.

Number one on the list is water leaks, mainly the roof. Water leaks on the roof absolutely can destroy your rv. You don't want those things. Get rid of them.

You need to get on that roof and inspect it two or three times a year. Get yourself some dicor lap sealant, seal those seams around the vents, and we'll have this entire article on our website as well.

So don't worry about it. You don't have to write everything down as we go along here. Just relax and listen. And maintaining that roof, Let me get back to that.

It's imperative you do it. Your entire investment is underneath that roof. Take care of the roof. And that's probably one of the number one things I see in RVs.

When people buy a new RV, they got a roof leak. It's just a little one. And you know, the walls falling in. There is no such thing as a little roof leak. A leak is a leak. Take care of it.

Don't allow it to happen. And if it does happen, get on it quickly. Do not let a roof leak continue on. It will destroy your rv or it has the potential of doing it.

And if you need help, you know where I'm at. You can contact me. I will walk you through it. There's no repair that can't be fixed. Now, the other thing too is tire problems.

Sometimes tires on trailers, especially trailers, fifth wheels and travel trailers, they become kind of a weak spot and they're ignored until there's a blowout. Blowouts are expensive. You know, it's not just the tire. The tire might be a couple hundred bucks, but it's the damage it does to the rest of the RV.

You might have $2,000 in damage, and that absolutely blows. Get it? Blow out. Blows. All right.

So anyway, now if you're not using RV Defender, which I don't know if you've seen them, I'll have a link to their website in the description of this podcast. But RV Defender makes an awesome product to help blowouts that contains the blowout so you don't get all the extra damage.

But more importantly, prevent the blowout. Keep your trailer tires aired up to the maximum tire pressure. If it says 80 psi is the max, put them at 80.

You can't go wrong with that because trailer tires are carrying excessive amount of load. It's a confined area and they're under a lot of stress, turning, backing up, going forward. It's a lot of stress on the sidewalls.

Now, motorhome tires, they fare a little bit better, just like car and truck tires. They do better, but still. Maintain those motorhome tires and all your tires on your trailer motorhome doesn't matter.

Keep them covered when you're not using it. Keep the sun off them. The sun can destroy tires as well. And one thing about trailer tires, they get destroyed from the inside out.

So you don't always see what's going on. It's important to know that. Now the next thing on the list, appliances and how they can malfunction. Refrigerators, water heater, furnaces.

Now, one thing they all have in common for the most part, is the propane system. Now some new water heater, new refrigerators are, you know, 12 volt or 110 volt. So they don't have the propane or.

Yeah, they don't have the propane on them, which is okay. They have their problems too, but not as much as the propane things might.

And then if you have a water heater that has propane, furnace has propane, you can have some issues with that. So one thing to do is keep the burner, tube, the orifice, those things clean.

And what you can do to clean them out is bring a little can of compressed air for like cleaning computers. You can buy one of those. You just hit it with air and it blows it out. And then keep the igniter clean.

The igniter is what sparks in there and lights the propane so you have that flame, that electrode can get carbon buildup on the tip, it can get dirty. It doesn't take much for these things not to work right. So keep them clean.

That's not necessarily going to keep all your problems away, but it's a starting point. It's part of that maintenance. You know, keep your furnaces clean. We talked about that, I think in the last episode.

You know, all the pet hair things around it, vacuum it out, keep that bad boy clean. Pull the access door down from the inside, clean out underneath the cabinet or wherever it's at. Appliance repairs. I would.

When it comes to your Appliances. I would download the manual for every appliance in your rv.

I would find out if there's a service manual that shows you how to repair things, has troubleshooting on it, the owner's manual. Sometimes they have little things in there that can help you diagnose a problem.

Sometimes you have to read it two or three times and it might not make sense. Until you have a problem, you go back and look at it. If you have those available on a computer, on a device, it will make life easier.

Especially if you're traveling and you got to do a repair. Something fails, it's going to make life easier. Now let's get into number five, plumbing leaks.

Any type of plumbing leak is no good, so carry spare parts. Be able to repair this whether it's in your driveway or on the road.

Now, at SunPro Mfg, our website, SunPro Manufacturing, we have some repair kits on there, which I'll have a link to in the description. And these kits have multiple fittings to help you stay on top of the repairs. And these fittings, once you get them, you go, okay, now I get it.

You look at your RV and if you use one of those fittings, you replace it. Use it in your driveway, it doesn't matter. You go replace it the same, next day, next week, whatever, just keep it replaced.

That way you have fittings. So if you're out on the road, you have a water leak, you can take care of it.

Now, slide out maintenance, we talked about that recently in a couple episodes back, I should have looked that up, but I didn't. Slide outs, you know, it's maintaining the track on them, keep them going in and out the gears. You might have cable.

So there's not a lot of maintenance. It depends on the rv. If you have a Schwintek, where the gear, or. Excuse me, the track is on the side of the slide room.

So when you're outside, you can see that track. That's an aluminum track. Use a lubricant with PTFE in it for those tracks. That's what's recommended. And then you have your rubber seals.

Keep those clean and maintain. There's rubber seal conditioner, and the conditioner is nice because it keeps the seals from sticking to the side of the RV or the slide room.

When it goes in and out, it's just sliding by it. It's not actually trying to pull it because it's sticking to it. So slide out is another deal. Keep them maintained.

Check your gears, your cables, clean off the grease and add new Grease, because the old grease is filled with dirt. Maintenance is key, and unfortunately, an RV has a lot of little things to maintain. But if you get a routine going, it's not so painful.

You know, you don't have to do it all at once. You can stagger your maintenance.

It's just if you're going to do something three times a year, maybe you do the roof three times a year, maybe that's enough. You maintain the roof and, okay, I'm going to do that this day.

And then maybe two weeks from there, you get to have another set of maintenance tasks that you do. But just stay on it or you dedicate a day to it two or three times a year, ever how you want to do it.

But just get a routine down that your awning is another thing. Awnings are kind of maintenance. Just keep them clean and dry. Keep your awning arms, wash them with soapy water, hose them out.

Dirt on awning arms is the biggest killer of them or the thing that makes them not work, especially manual awning. Keep them clean, soap and water, no dirt. They work great. If you feel you need to lubricate something on the arm, use 100% silicone.

It doesn't attract all the dirt and the garbage that other lubricants will use. Lubricants are kind of a unique thing because they. There's not one lubricant for all. You can't use WD40 on everything.

Well, you can, but you're going to have poor results. There's lubricants that are better than WD40. WD40 to me, is just a cleaner.

You use it to clean stuff off like you got bolts, and you want to clean the threads out. You spray down WD40, you want to wash your hands, get some grease off. WD40 works great for that.

You know, you got sticky stuff on the side of your RV. That's what WD44 is for. Yeah, it's a lubricant, but it's not the best. There's other lubricants that are better.

It's just the mark has been flooded with it. We've been brainwashed. But there's better things out there. You might have two or three or four different types of lubricants.

And speaking of lubricants, we're going to get back to this in a second here. This new product called Easy Grease and go just sitting here on my counter. I forgot all about it.

Been waiting for these samples for a week, and now I finally got them. And, oh, this product's awesome. But we'll get to that in a minute. So awanies then you have holding tanks. Keep those holding tanks clean.

There's products like pure power and liquefied that help break down all the waste and keep the walls of the tank clean. Don't let them clog up. When you're camping, let's say at an RV park, keep that black valve closed.

We know you're going to keep it closed when you're off grid. But an RV park, keep that black tank valve closed. Do not let it drain. Otherwise you will get a mountain in there, a poop mountain as they call it.

And then you have als on your RV, whether it's, you know, around windows, slide outs, slide rooms on the roof, different types of seals or sea lengths they're cracking. They need maintenance, they need attention, take care of them. So that's the top 10 thing or repairs that are common. And I know those top 10.

There's little subcategories of each one, like the appliances. Now every appliance becomes a subcategory, but your refrigerator, water heater and furnace are your most important appliances.

They need the most attention. You know, plumbing you got, you know, you could have faucet leaks, you could have fitting leaks, you could have fresh water tank leaks.

There's potential for different things. That's what I mean is subcategories. But that gives you an idea.

And these are the most popular, most popular, the most common things or problems that people have with their RVs. So that's where we want to put our focus. Taking care of those problems. Now it seems overwhelming, but it's not all that overwhelming.

These are all things that you can take care of, no problem. You're the smart rver. And that's what this show is all about, man. We are about helping you remain your rv.

You know, here in Victor, Montana, we have an awesome following. We have some of the best customers in the world because they love doing their own maintenance. They get into it and they do it right.

They're not cutting corners. They're doing it how it should be done because they see the benefit of it and that's what's important.

And I know you guys out there doing the same thing. You're taking care of your rv. You want to learn how to maintain it. And that's what we're here for. We're going to keep the educational work going.

Now there's 10 more on this list that we're going to add to the website. Like I said, the Entire list will be on the website.

And you know, for some of your maintenance things like slide outs, you might need a new slide out awning fabric. You can go to sunpro mfg.com There'll be a link in the description. You can buy Slide out awning fabrics there.

We got great awning slide out awning fabrics. We also sell Dometic, Carefree and Solera fabrics off our website and we can help you through that process. Awnings are not straightforward anymore.

Awnings have become a little more complex. We get orders for fabrics that are wrong all the time. You know, we catch them, we look at things, we call customers.

We don't just process an order and say, there you go, tough beans. When it doesn't work, we try to make sure you're getting the right product every single time. So if you have a question about awning, you can call us.

I am an awning expert. I dream about them. Nah, just kidding. But sunpromfg.com there'll be a link in the description.

And you know, we have tons of parts we don't have on our website. We pick and choose what we're going to sell.

But you can call us with questions and we can give you some advice where to buy it or if you don't, you know, we can ship from our store, not a problem. But we get it. You know, prices are cheaper on some websites and you want to shop that way. But we can definitely guide and direct you.

We are here for you, man. That's what it's all about.

Now that's going to bring us to the next stop and we're going to go to Tonopah, Nevada, you know, specifically the Clown Motel in Tonopah, Nevada. That sounds crazy right now. Some people love clowns. Some people are terrified of clowns.

The Clown Motel is supposed to be the scariest motel in the world. It may or may not be, I have no idea. But the Clown Motel, you know, that's one of my destinations now. I've got to go see this.

And I'm surprised they never have. I never heard of it. Started doing a little research, looking for something here, and bam, the Clown Motel.

Now, Tonopah, Nevada, kind of you're out there in La La Land. There's not a lot of. It's just in, you know, Nevada kind of desolate in areas. But there's more there. It's the Clown Motel is the attraction.

They've done movies there. There's a billion different types of clowns you can buy clowns you can donate clowns. You can be afraid of the clowns. The rooms are very nice.

Very nice. If you go to the website, I think it's the clown motel.com, something like that. Google the clown Motel in Nevada. Boom. You'll find it.

Make your reservation. But Tonopah is a great place, is RV friendly. There's a ton of historic attractions there. It's not just the clown Motel.

That's what drew me to it, but you have the Clown Motel, along with, at nighttime, the stargazing, because you're out in the middle of nowhere, basically, so you don't have a lot of that light pollution. So you can look up at the sky and see the beauty of it. All those wonderful stars, planets, satellites.

The entire Elon Musk satellite deal for your Internet satellites. They blend right in with stars, except they're moving a lot faster. We catch with our eyes anyways, but see, get sidetracked a little bit.

Tonopah, Nevada. And what else I liked about Tonopah is it fits in with the shadows of the past as it once were. And Goldfield, Nevada, is just like 36 miles away now.

Goldfield, Nevada, or 26 miles away, that's where you have all the cars, the car museum, where they've all been like over 40 cars, they've been buried nose first in the ground, and some are stacked on top of each other. You have vans, buses. It's. It's an amazing thing. Now they're covered with graffiti and stuff.

So some of that original flavor when it first took place, you know, and the two guys that created this, you know, probably had a totally different look. But it's still pretty cool to see it. And what people do, man. What was going on in their mind? What inspired them?

Was it, you know, a drug inspiration or just inspiration in general? Who knows?

I kind of went into the shadows of the past with Goldfield, Nevada, because they are close, and either one of them is an awesome place to go RVing. So whether you stay there for a few days a week or you're traveling through, buy out the time to check out both of them.

If you go to one, you have to go to the other. And you notice we're not doing the reading today like we've done in the past, we're gonna. I think we're gonna shelve that. It takes more time.

The other thing, too, is, you know, with our.

With getting back to the podcast in a shorter amount of time, it makes it easier for us because we are spending so much time editing and processing this stuff, the podcast is not so hard, but we do the YouTube videos. Takes much longer to edit. So we appreciate again, like I said, letting us know what you want to hear about.

And hopefully these two things are something you want to hear about. Tonopah and Goldsville, Nevada.

And there's going to be more on both of them on the website@thesmartrverver.com a lot more information than what I'm giving you here right now, but it's going to whet your appetite, right? The clown museum. I mean, come on, man, you got to love that. I mean, heck, I'm a clown and I want to go there.

Now, some people, like I said, they're afraid of them, some people love them. Who knows? But go to Tonopah, Nevada, check out the clown museum. And when you check in, you tell America at Highway 93, RV sent you.

I am the smart RVer. They won't know what you're talking about, but hey, it just adds to the whole flavor of the day, right? All right, so now let's get to RV envy.

The tools that techs use every day. Now, do technicians that work on RVs, do they have some secret store where they're buying their tools and only technicians are allowed in?

You gotta show your RV technician badge to buy the tool. Absolutely not. Now, technicians have a better, their taste in tools might be better.

They might buy more expensive tools because they're using them every day. They might have a better feel for what tools they need every day. So they're not going to be buying stuff they don't need, which is good.

They're not wasting their money, but they're buying tools at a lot of the same places you're buying tools. Now they might have a tool truck, like a snap on truck come by their place, they might buy some stuff there.

But ultimately your, your average RV tech doesn't have a $30,000 snap on toolbox filled with tools. They have tools, but they buy what they need.

And they're not that complex, you know, like, you can't see this, but I'm holding up a Dewalt impact drill. You know, it's a drill with an impact on it, basic tool, it gets used every day.

A dewalt flashlight because it has rechargeable battery, the same as the drill, makes it handy. Voltmeter, Gotta have a voltmeter or a multimeter, I should say. So it's volts. Ohms, 110 volt, 12 volts.

Has an amp meter built into it for checking amps. Or for shorts, a few sets of pliers, needle nose, wire cutters, duckbill pliers come in handy.

And then having a bunch of bits, a quarter inch bit 5, 16, 7, 16 half inch, a square tip, a Phillips head, it's basic tools. Now this entire list will be put on our website.

It's much more in depth what I just went through here, but you can pretty much work on so much on your rv outside of like let's say the suspension or chassis work where you need bigger sockets and wrenches, most everything can be done with a cordless drill and a couple pairs of pliers and a few wrenches. And you know, your bits, your drivers like quarter inch, you know, a hex head, the square tip, the Phillips head, it's basic.

So what I'm going to do is I'll add to this list and kind of break it down in a little bit different way, maybe what gets used the most. It's a comprehensive list that lists a lot of tools, but I'll narrow it down some and just single out the basics.

And what I just brought up, you know, the drill, the flashlight, the bits, the multimeter, the pliers, these are things that are easy to carry in your RV when you're traveling. They don't take up a whole lot of space.

And you might have a set of tools that you bring, but these ones are the ones you want to have more available, more accessible so you don't have to go hunt for something, you know, you keep it in a compartment. You know, I keep my cordless drill and the bits in the back of my truck because I carry a half inch cordless impact with me in case I get a flat.

I don't want to be out there with tools and wrenches and crap trying to undo it, you know, put on the spare. I got a cordless impact from, you know, it's a dewalt, works awesome. Just make sure it's charged up and boom, boom, boom.

You know, I can do like 12 wheels with it, no problem on one charge. But that's me. I also carry a jack from Harbor Freight, a floor jack. It's the off road floor jack. Absolutely awesome. Lightweight, small, compact.

And I will have a link to that as well in the description of this.

It's a must have if you're going to carry a floor jack because floor jacks are safer and they're easier than bottle jacks and some of the other garbage.

And I would be willing to bet that many of you don't have a jack that will work on Your trailer, you think it'll work, but when you got down to brass tacks, it probably won't work. Or it'll be very complex or a pain in the butt and you'll wish you never had it.

So if you have space, that floor jack from Harbor Freight is the way to go. Now, you know, there's flashlights, there's caulking guns, there's sealants, there's Pex tools, there's water fittings.

There's a lot of things that can go along with this. Like I said earlier, you know, carry extra water fittings. They can make life easier, but it's being reasonable. You know, carry the tools you need.

You don't need a socket set that goes from, you know, five, 16 to an inch and a half. Maybe there's some sockets in there you need. So, you know, makes it lighter. Unless you just want to carry a complete set like that.

You know, I carry more of the seven, eight down with me, and then I have a couple bigger sockets that I know are going to fit certain things. Like for my weight distributing hitch, I'll have it on the website, like I said, the smartrver.com/do it yourself articles. So carry tools, though.

Make sure you have them. You know, I've worked on lists in the past, so this one's a little bit more complete.

I think creating these lists is kind of a, you know, it's a little bit of a chore, I guess, because there's so many different tools, so many different ways to explain it. Everybody has a different idea on it. This will give you at least a starting point, give you some direction.

If you're a little not sure about it, which is understandable. Now, the other thing I want to remind you to is subscribe to our podcast, whether it's on Apple, iTunes, Spotify, I heart.

Subscribe and share it with others. Go to our YouTube channel. Subscribe. We want the subscriptions. We want you there. I say subscriptions. It doesn't cost you anything. It's free.

And then share it. People love it. They love our show. They love our YouTube videos. So help. Help spread the word. All right, guys.

Now on the way out of the show today, because we've come to the end, it's amazing. I'm going to do more on this. It's a product called Easy Grease and Go. I just got these samples yesterday, and these things are absolutely awesome.

You're saying what's an Easy Grease and Go? It looks like a little can of chewing tobacco. You peel the lid off of it. And it's got a blob of grease in the center of it.

And the bottom of it where the grease sits is very flexible. It's rubber.

And what you do is you peel the lid off and you put it on the top of a ball on your weight distributing hitch or a ball mount for a cargo trailer, any type of ball. And you can put it on the ball, smear it around, get the grease evenly spread without getting your hands all dirty.

You take it and you throw it away when you're done. It's that simple. And the grease is made for doing that. It's a high quality grease. It won't melt in the sun. So this thing won't turn into a liquid.

If you have it sitting on the dash, there's clean, they're spotless clean when you get them. So you can put them in the, you know, in the door of your truck. You can put them wherever, just having sitting someplace.

When you hook up, you need to grease it. It's there, you know, so it's convenience, 100% convenience. But also it protects the coupler and the ball from getting destroyed.

Some people don't put grease on their ball and coupler. It makes noise. It wears it down much quicker. You know, if your ball has a chrome finish on it, it'll be gone in no time. It wears the coupler out.

You must grease the ball and coupler. It's important you grease the ball, then the coupler gets greased. So like I said, I'm going to have a video on this, maybe one or two.

I'm going to put them on our website, L the company that makes these things, so you can buy them. We just got them yesterday, so it's a little early for me to like totally get into all the details, but it's absolutely a cool product.

Tried it out yesterday, loved it. So you got to check it out. So like I said, I'll have more information on that. So now that's bringing us to the end of the show.

Next week we're going to have episode 186 or not next week in two weeks from now. Episode 186. I don't know what it's going to be about. I forgot and I don't have it in front of me.

But it's going to be an episode jam packed with good stuff just like this one. So I want to thank all of you guys for coming by today and listening to the show. Truly appreciate it. So we did cut a little time off it today.

Went fast. And we don't. I don't want to go so fast where you can't follow along. You know, I have a tendency to talk really fast.

We're going to keep improving this show, and I want to hear from you. Please, please reach out to me and tell me what you want to hear about.

And if you think a part of this show absolutely sucks, don't be afraid to tell me. You can't hurt my feelings. I want to know. With that being said, thanks again for coming by.

So, as a reminder, if you forgot who I am, I'm Eric Stark with the Smart RVer podcast, your go to guide for smarter RVing and unforgettable adventures on the open road. So I will see you next time.