Using the right RV terminology to get the right RV parts is staying on the road today. That's what we're going to talk about is RV terminology, but we're going to do it in a game show fashion and hopefully make you laugh a little bit back. We brought in my wife, Karen, to help make this even more humorous.

So this ought to be good. Usually before staying on the road, we entertain the RV lifestyle, but not today. We're going to focus on RV terminology. So we're giving the time from stay or from RV life to staying on the road. And then we're going to visit the Shady Dell RV park in Arizona in the next stop.

And I've been waiting for this all week long. This is going to be a cool little, uh, next stop. Now we're going to wrap up the show with RV Envy. And in this episode, we're going to talk about RV decals. Yeah, that's for you Canadians RV decals for the Americans and where to get them. So this is Eric Stark with the smart RV or podcast, delivering the smarts.

You need to enjoy the freedom of the RV lifestyle without the fear of breaking down. Today's episode is 133. So let's dig in. Welcome to the show, Alexis and Karen. Thanks, Eric. Hi. So this is Karen's debut on a podcast. Say something, Karen. Hi, Eric. Wow, this ought to be good. See, she wanted to be an actress when she grew up.

Not happening right there. I never grew up. All right, well, we'll get her fired up in a minute and she'll be ready to go. Speaking of the show, did you guys know out there that we are one of the top rated podcasts on Player FM? So that's pretty cool. We just saw that the other day. Wow. They sent us a big trophy about 25 feet tall, 30 feet wide.

Nah, just kidding. Well, we didn't really get anything, but we noticed that. So just letting you know out there that our podcast is being noticed. It's the real deal. And another point. If you're buying a new RV, don't. These dealerships don't care. The manufacturers don't care. I say, don't buy an RV for a year.

Let the manufacturers start suffering a little bit. You know, I'm not calling for this Bud Light boycott or nothing, but let them know with your wallets. Just fix up your old RV, buy a used one, but these new ones, we just hear it every single day. Somebody bought a new RV and the manufacturers don't care.

The dealerships are selling junk and they know it and they're not honest about it. Stop supporting it. So that's my little 30 second rant there. Alright, now let's get to what everybody's been waiting for. Staying on the road in the RV Terminal, Terminology Game Show. So this is like a show that nothing matters.

There's going to be points. I'm going to make it up as we go. But what we're going to do is ask questions. Karen's going to ask questions and Alexis is going to ask questions. They have five each. So they're going to ask me a question. And I'm going to try to figure out what they're talking about. And as we get into this, you're going to see what I mean about the RV terminology and how it gets kind of mixed up, you know, and there are times where it can get frustrating for both parties.

Sometimes the person, the RV are asking the questions. They think we're just idiots. Don't want to deal with us. And it could be in the store. It could be on the phone and sometimes on the phone, this is where it kind of becomes a bigger issue. We think we know what the person's talking about. They want to order something.

We're going to ship it to them. We ship it to them. You know, we think they wanted a, a skylight, but what they really wanted was a three inch waste valve. And that sounds crazy, but sometimes that's what it is. Well, that's what I told you I needed. And you look at your notes, that's not what you said. So it's getting things, the right terminology or explaining to the person.

I really don't know what I'm talking about, so I'm going to try to explain this. Or take it to the next step, take a picture of it. Everybody has a smartphone today with a camera technology. So take a picture of it and you bring it into the store and that rules it all out. We're not making fun of our customers, we're just having fun with the questions.

Cause, I mean, we all do this stuff. We walk into a hardware store and you know, Hey, I need one of these and the guy's looking at you like you're crazy from Mars. But you know what you need, you know, he just doesn't see what's in your mind, right? Or it's like when you're... You send your wife to do it, but you really don't give her all the information she needs.

Because you think it's just that, not a big deal, you go get it. So we're going to kind of break this down in a humorous way and make it... So you can see what we go through and even what you might be going through and thinking this guy's the RV store He's an idiot. Well, he's probably not he just doesn't understand what you see in your mind.

All right, so let's dig in this We're gonna start with Karen. She's ready to go. She's raising her hands all fired up. All right, Karen So what's the first question for me to answer? I need the white plastic thing on my RV Oh the white plastic thing on your RV. Okay, so now With this white plastic thing having to do with the electrical, the fresh water, the air conditioning, the furnace, can you narrow that down a little bit?

It's the fresh water. The fresh water, the white plastic thing. Is it on the side of the RV? Underneath the RV? It's underneath the RV. All RVs have one. Alright, so a sarcastic comeback, that would be all RVs have black tires too, but we're not going to come back with that. So it's a white plastic thing for the fresh water system.

Could this quite possibly be a drain valve? That's it, exactly. So it drains the fresh water. Yes. Alright. It's broken. It's broken. That's why you're here. Alright, so that's worth 500 million points for me. I won. So it's a white plastic drain valve. Now that's a pretty simple one, right? Got to that pretty quick because she said fresh water system, so that narrows it down.

Alright, so Alexis, what's your first question? Well, I need a part for my door. For your door. Yeah, it's standard. Standard, standard door or standard part? The part's standard. It's on every motorhome. Okay. All right. So Lexus has a motorhome. So would it be the refrigerator door? Bedroom door? A compartment door?

The door you walk through to get into the motorhome? No, it's on the outside. So it's not a refrigerator door. Okay. So it's not the refrigerator doors on the outside. So it could be a hatch for like the electrical or a water hookup. Is it where you store stuff? Maybe? Yeah, that's the one. Yeah. So a compartment door.

Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you need a what for it? What part? I need a handle. A handle. Okay. So most compartment doors don't have handles. So this is where we're going to go next. I'm going to show her the. Latches and the cam locks and things like that. Yeah, it looks like one of these and she's going to say yes or no.

So we got there. All right. So that's worth about 50 billion points too. So I'm just smoking it here, right? And so these are real life questions. So these things are what come up in our store and on the phone every day. Okay. So these have been pretty easy. All right, Karen, what's your question? Number two.

My furnace is broken and I need a part. Alright, your furnace is broken and you need a part. So are you working on this furnace yourself? I'm trying. Um, I think I'm pretty smart. But, um, I can't seem to figure out what's wrong. Okay, so what's the furnace doing or not doing? It just doesn't come on. Just doesn't come on.

So you turn this thermostat on the wall? And what happens? Nothing. Nothing happens. Okay. So there's a good chance it's the thermostat. Now are you able to do electrical testing at all? Oh, no, no, no. I'm scared of the electricity. All right. Do you know somebody who could work on this? No. Okay. Do you want to call a technician out or bring it in to us?

I don't have that kind of money. All right. So you see how this gets a little difficult here, but it's probably the thermostat on the wall. Maybe. But you see the uncooperative NIFs to help. Well, I don't have any money. I told you I don't have any money. Gets a little difficult, right? So we got to figure that out.

So, again, that's kind of simple. It was more to the point. There's kind of like two steps there. But we can see how now it's like, how do we get this fixed when someone doesn't have the money or doesn't want to spend the money? Okay. Next question, Alexis, number two. Well, um, I need the skylight thingy that's on the roof of my motorhome.

I need that. Okay. The skylight thingy on the roof of the motorhome. So that makes it pretty, um, Easy, I guess. So, Alexis, this, um, on your motorhome, this skylight thingy, do you know what size it is? Uh, it's like a square, so it's like, a little over a foot by a foot. Okay, foot by a foot. So, does it open and close?

Uh, yeah, it does. Okay, yeah. So, I see the confidence there. Oh, yeah, it does. So, she's talking about a skylight. Now, that could have gone about many different directions. It could have been, um... It doesn't matter what size it is, I just need the lid for it. Things like that. And that's what we get, kind of that snarkiness sometimes.

So that's a roof vent lid that she needs. Not a skylight cover. Now, I get it when you're staying in the RV, it lets the sun in like a skylight, but it's not really called a skylight. So that's that terminology, you know? And then that vent cover even goes into deeper on that. What hinge do you have on it, Alexis?

Do you know? Uh, I don't know. It's standard. Standard. Okay. Yeah. It goes back to the, back to the black tires. Those, that's standard. All right. So you see how we can get, you know, now it delves into a whole nother set of issues. All right. So again, I got that one. That's worth a billion, uh, credits at, um, Starbucks.

Yeah. All right. So Karen. Drink coffee. Yeah, I know, but it's, I can give it to my friends. Got it. Aw. Give someone a billion credit gift card at Starbucks. Pretty good. Or no, Starkbucks. Starkbucks. Yeah, did I mention we have our own coffee now? It's not called Camper's Choice. It's amazing. No, Camper's Coffee.

Camper's Choice used to be a Camco thing. All right, anyways, question number three, Karen. My husband sent me in to get a sway control. Okay, so this starts off with the husband sent the wife in to get a sway control. Okay, so now, when you say sway control, do you need the bar that mounts on a ball on the ball mount and a ball on the trailer frame?

He just said it's something to keep the, everything from swinging in the wind or whatever it is. Okay, so does he have anything on the trailer now? Do you just buy the trailer? You're outfitting it for the first time? That's a good question. Um, no. No, we don't have anything on it. Didn't come with anything.

Didn't come with anything. Okay. And you already brought the trailer home, I'm going to assume? Yeah. Should we have not done that without it? I don't know. I'm not sure what you need yet. Should I call my husband? You could. If he'll answer the phone. Maybe. Okay. So I'm going to say you probably need a weight distributing hitch.

That's what he called it. Not a sway control, weight distributing hitch. Alright. I didn't remember. Now we're going to have to determine the weight of the trailer so we know which weight distributing hitch you need. Gee, all this other stuff. Okay. Maybe I should call my husband. Alright, why don't we do that.

So, weight distributing hitch. Alright, so that's for a free tank of gas at Conoco. Okay, so we're racking it up here. You're probably getting the point by now. Alexis, number three. Hey. Get on me. How's it going? So, I have a motor home. And I have a thing on the outside of it that attaches to the dirty hose, you know, the, the hose with the poo.

Okay, a thing that attaches to the dirty hose. Wow. This dirty hose, would that be the drain or the dump hose for emptying the black water tank or the gray water tank, maybe? The sewer hose. The sewer hose. Okay. Yeah, that one. You probably don't need a three inch valve. Maybe you need the part that attaches to the valve or the part that goes on the, on the sewer hose.

Uh, I don't know. The part that goes up and down, like, like releases it. Okay, so that'd be the valve, the waste valve. Yeah, yeah. Alright, so you need a 3 inch waste valve thingy. Sure. See, I turned the table there, thingy. Alright, so you see, it's a 3 inch waste valve. So, the sewer hose really doesn't have much to do with that.

I mean, it attaches not even directly to the valve, it's indirectly. But, see how we work there. Alright, Karen, number four. I need a trailer plug. A trailer plug. So is this to plug it into the truck that tows the trailer or is it to plug the trailer into shore power or your house? It's for the truck and the, for the truck and the trailer.

The truck and the trailer. Okay. So, so when you're towing the trailer, the lights work on the trailer. Yes. Okay. So you don't have a plug on there now? Maybe. Oh yeah. Yeah, we do. We, it's, it accidentally came out and dragged on the ground for like forever and we didn't know it till the cop brought us over and gave us a ticket.

All right. That's a seven way around trailer connector that's going to plug into the back of the truck. So that's the trailer end as it's called. So seven way around trailer connector. All right. Perfect. So we know what that is. All right. So that's for a free bag of licorice from licorice. com. All right, Lexus, number four.

Okay. So I need to seal something. Okay. You need to seal something. Is what you need to seal on the side of the RV? In the RV? On the roof of the RV? A toilet seal? I'm, I'm just having leaks in my RV. I don't really know where they're coming from. It's just leaking down the wall. Okay. Down the wall. Okay. So could it be a roof leak?

Have you been up on the roof? I haven't been up on the roof, no. So you're not really sure what's causing the problem? It seems like it's coming from the roof. I don't know. What do I need to seal it? . Okay. Well to seal the roof more than likely you have a rubber roof, so you would need a lap sealant to do that.

Okay. Well, I'm going to recommend you go up on the roof and look in that area on the roof to make sure there's some cracks in the sealant and you're not just guessing. Oh boy. Okay. I guess I can do that. I'm afraid of heights. All right. See the enthusiasm here? All right. So it was lap sealant, more than likely.

So she has to dig into that a little bit more rather than just being so generic and vague and not wanting to help me help her. All right. So question number five, Karen. I need a clearance light. A clearance light. That's a pretty straightforward question. Okay, so the clearance lights, let me show you over here in the store where they're at.

Here's the clearance lights. They're all hanging up. No, this, no. Does this look like any of them? No. No. I need, I need the thing that, the bulb that goes inside it. Oh, you need a bulb for the clearance light? Yes. Okay. Do you happen to know which bulb you have in there? If it's a push in twist in l e D? Uh, aren't they all standard?

There's different numbers and sizes. , yes, there is. No, I do not know. Alright, so what you probably need to do is go home or call somebody and see if they can shoot you a picture of the bulb or the number and then we can help you out. Unless you can recognize it, so let me show you where the bulbs are at.

No, there's no way I'm going to be able to recognize it. Alright, so there you go. Get out. Alright, so, pretty simple thing, clearance light, bulb, but we start off with a clearance light and then it dries down to a bulb. Alright, Alexis. Five, four, five. So, I, I need a switch. Okay, what kind of switch? Oh, it goes to the light up in the top.

Okay, so does the switch mount in the wall someplace? Or is it in a monitor panel? No, it's in the ceiling light. Yeah, it's in the ceiling light. Okay, do you know what the ceiling light looks like? It's... big. It's big, okay, that narrows it down to the big ceiling light section. Alright, so, pardon my sarcasm.

Okay, so the, a switch for a light... Is it a plastic light with a plastic switch? Yeah. The same color as the light, probably? That's the one, yeah. Okay, so that's probably brand specific. Do you know what brand lights you have? No. Alright, so we're gonna need to figure that out. A picture might help, or if you can tell me the brand.

Okay. And I can show you some switches, but... It'd be a guessing game. Right. What about the year, make, model of the motorhome? Year, make, model of the motorhome doesn't help. It's not like a car. We can't look it up that way. Smarty pants. Good question. Yeah. We've gone on with some questions here. And you know, these are real life questions and we don't keep track.

We don't have like this list going. So we just put these together the other day. So hopefully it helps everybody out there to appreciate when you go into the store, not just an RV store, any store. Get the terminology closer and not make it a guessing game and be willing to help. Quite often, you know, we just run into these roadblocks, the customer just doesn't want to help us find out what they're looking for, what standard, every RV has one, you know, and that's not always the case.

There's not a lot of standard things on RVs, not every RV has the same things. And there can be huge differences in them too. A switch for one light is on one brand. The other brand might have a completely different set of lights in it or brand of lights in it, and the switches aren't even closed. So they don't all buy their switches from the same company in China.

So we, we try to work this out. When you're going to the RV store, make it easier on yourself and the guy at the parts counter and have the terminology, maybe not exact, but close to it. And you can also take a picture of it and that just makes it crystal clear what you're looking for. Pictures, as they say, are worth a thousand words, something like that.

There you go. All right, so that's going to bring us to the end of staying on the road. All right, so that was our RV terminology game show. As I said, it brings us to the end of staying on the road. But before we move on to next stop, I want to mention that we do have coffee now campers choice It's a whole bean coffee three blends.

We got 406 which obviously represents Montana's area code 406 awesome flavor Snowed in perfect for those nice blustery fall and winter days and cowboy coffee Cowboy coffee is what RVer has to have, you know sitting around the fire campfire outside the RV or whatever. It's just great coffee. Alexis is addicted to it.

Oh yeah. And every day, where's the coffee? Where's the coffee? So check it out. You can, uh, we'll have that on our website soon enough. It's not there now, but we will get it there. Many things happening, but the coffee's awesome. All right. That brings us to the next stop. So we're going to go to the shady Dell RV park in Arizona.

Yes. I'm excited. So this RV park's just outside of Benson, correct? Uh, Bisbee, I mean. Yeah. Bisbee, not Benson. Bisbee. Bisbee. Alright, so if you've never been to Bisbee, Bisbee's a really cool place. Yeah. And so Alexis saw that and said, Oh, we got to talk about this. Absolutely. So Alexis, what can you tell us about the Shady Dell Vintage Trailer Court that's in Bisbee, Arizona?

I didn't stay there, but we ate at the diner, which is a 50 style diner right there. Find that mistake. And they also had a sailboat there or a boat. They do. It's called a yacht. Yeah. And ever since I've seen that, I've always thought about getting a sailboat, like a 32 footer and burying it in the yard.

He's so cool. Having a boat for like a little, um, getaway. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Neat. It's very cool. Very different. Very neat. Yeah. Bisbee's a pretty unique place. That whole area, you know, it's not too far. Well, yeah, Bisbee, you got Tombstone, which is nearby. Yeah. You got a lot of stuff there, but this, the Shady Dell Vintage RV Park, if even if you don't stay there, it's worth going by to take a look at it.

I agree. Yep. All right. So cool. Now, what is there to do in Bisbee, Arizona? Most people probably never even heard of Bisbee. Yeah. Well, there's a mining and a historical area, like you were saying, so you can definitely take tours through there. Um, it's just a really fun kind of experience. There's art galleries.

It's a very artsy area. Um, there's studios. Of course, there. Bisbee's Historic District is really neat, um, they have a lot of, like, European and Victorian style buildings downtown. They have antique shops, you gotta hit that, unique souvenirs. You looking for one? Yeah, I am. I have a copper license plate from there.

Oh, that's awesome. Oh, they have so much. They have, like, breweries, wine tasting. They have a cool art walk, actually, that they do. Not sure... Oh, look. Oh, so if you're in town the second Saturday of the month, that's when the art walk happens, after 5 o'clock. So you get to check out the art, meet the artists, enjoy live music, and just have a good time, really.

There's a lot there. A lot to do. Bisbee's a cool old town, you know, it's got a lot of that old rich flavor to it. Yes. And the mine is massive and it was a copper mine. Yeah. And we did the tour, I don't remember that much about the tour, but I remember everything there was really interesting and we bought that copper license plate, you know, for the front of the vehicle.

I think Arizona or something. That's cool. Yeah, it is. Yeah, there's a lot there a lot You know, I was just thinking tombstone. We don't have that listed on here, but it's nearby Yes, you could go there too. And you know in tombstone you go in some of those old buildings and there's one that's like You know where they did shows.

Yeah, and you see all these paintings along the top of the wall. None of them Look good. They look like they're black and white and when you take a picture of them the flash shows these vivid colors No way! I got out there, I'm looking at my pictures, like, holy smokes, these are just awesome. Oh, that's cool.

How fun. Yeah, it's cause it's just dark in there, and so you don't really see it. Wow. Pretty cool, but, yeah, Bisbee's a neat area. That entire area is pretty nice. It's amazing. Yeah, there's just a lot there. Mm hmm. So, of course, there's a place to stay in an RV, but is there a place to bring your RV? I think there is.

I didn't list any this time just because I wanted to feature the RV place, but you know there's gotta be RV parks around there. Alexis is turning on us. There are places here. Not for you. There are places listed to eat though. Because that's more important. Alright, so what do we got to eat at? Well there is that diner near the Shadydale.

I think that's called Dot's Diner. But also just in Bisbee in general. The Screaming Panchi Pizza, there's Cafe Roca, Bisbee Breakfast Club, and The Quarry. So there, there's tons of delicious places to eat. Right, yeah, there's a lot there. Yeah. A whole lot there. So yeah, you know, you got to check out Bisbee.

Bisbee is one of these places that you just, you'll remember it. It's just unique, you know, that old. Town feel. Yeah. Everybody's friendly. Nice place. Even though it's in the desert, it's still awesome. You know, so you got to pick the time of year to go. You're not going to want to go in the middle of the summer.

No. You know, so it's near, you know, like closest town near it'd be Benson, which is near Tucson. Just give you kind of an idea where it's at. And while you're there, also check out Karchner Caverns, which I think we've talked about that in the past just recently. You know, speaking of RV destinations, you know, check out RV Destinations magazine.

Great publication. You know, we mentioned it every episode because we just really liked the magazine and the people that are great. So go to their website, RV destination, magazines. com, sign up for a subscription. It's an awesome publication. Now that's going to bring us to RV envy. Today we're gonna talk about RV Deckels, huh?

As I said, that's for the Canadians. Americans are RV decals. Mm-hmm. . So we'll just go with RV decals. So RV decals direct.com is actually the website that we're gonna push you to here. But rv, you know, decals, come on. So many RVs. It's not just one or two. It's on a lot of RVs, depending on the quality of 'em, where the RV's at, sometimes they last for decades, sometimes they last for months.

And you might want to replace them. So it's hard to just find them. I mean, I've experienced where, you know, RVs are just months old and you can't get the decals for them anymore. You like, if it were to get an accident and all of a sudden they're, you know, they have to paint that back on, but RV decals direct might be the solution.

They might not have the exact decals for your RV. But they might have decals that will cover where they've been. You've got to go to their website. So these guys are the real deal They're the only ones I know of that really deal directly with RV decals. Quite an interesting business to have but it definitely has a place in the RV industry.

Because almost every RV has decals on it and like I said, they might last for months So they might last for decades, but if you got an RV sooner or later You're gonna need to replace the decals. A lot less expensive than painting too. Also, as a reminder, go to our YouTube channel, the Smart RVer, and you can see the videos we're doing.

We produce a new video every two weeks, so it's opposite weeks of the podcast. So we always have something coming out. These videos are all related to RVs, obviously, and they're going to help you with your RV. And, you know, to be honest with you, really, our videos are to help you cut through the minutiae that you see on YouTube and some of these other social networking platforms.

Where there's so much stuff out there that's hard to really tell. So we just get to the nitty gritty and the facts and it might not be 100 percent technical, but we're gonna get you the information you need to know about the job that you're gonna do or the product that you're looking at. And if you have any products or anything like that that you want us to, to do a video on or talk about on the show, send us a message.

I don't know what I'm going to buy with it. Maybe, uh, an African prince or something. Oh, no, that's right. They gave me the money. Forget. Oh, well, anyway, so we had a great show today and I want to thank everybody for coming by. This is Eric Stark with the smart RV or podcast. It's just been absolutely awesome hanging out with you today.

So if I don't see on the road, let's connect at the smart RVer. com