Front Bumper Box

As if I didn't have enough things hanging off the front of the van.

Still trying to justify why I did this. Storage is always good, but there are a few things that belong outside like the little portable propane bottles and dirty laundry. Another reason is because I can. What I mean is with the exit angle so poor at the rear and the entry angle good at the front there is some intensive to equalize them.

This is a box for the side of a pick up. It was only a couple of hundred bucks. The attachment comes up to almost half that. It took a couple of Swagman receivers and vice holders from Harbor Freight. To get the bike rack forward I bought an extension. The box is 70 by 12 by 12. It does not obstruct the radiator but it probably does screw up the air flow into it.

It is on there but there is much more to do. Inside I need to make some dividers for what ever ends up there. Outside I need little poles on the corners so I know where the corners are from the front seat.

Naked in Lassen National Park!

Well, not me, but the van is naked. In all my other posts the dirt bike, mountain bike, and kayaks are hanging all over the thing. So why go naked? First off, National Parks don't even let mountain bikes go free, let alone the dirt bike. The weather was too cold for kayaking.

So here is how I did the TV.

The 1996 Sportmobile has a cabinet for a 13 inch tube TV. I put in a 19 inch 12 volt Naxa on the front of the old cabinet. The Naxa seems to have the least power consumption. It has a DVD as well as a port for USB and SD card. The latter two can store days worth of video. And yet you can see an iPad draped over the thing. Well the iPad is the ultimate low power way to watch video and useless for anything else.

I didn't just mount to the front of the cabinet, but used a swinging angling mount on a post I put in. This makes the TV a big door to the cabinet where I pile up cords, inverter, chargers and all the other electrical junk of everyday life. It is really important to get the angle of the TV right for viewing because the Naxa does not have the widest viewing angles. It is really bad up and down.

However I am just kidding about watching TV. Sure the weather kept us inside a bunch, but National Parks are very cool. Maybe I am not a Granola Head, but I do like Granola. I just don't force others to eat it.

I mentioned the infrastructure of Mammoth in the last post. National Parks are super developed as well. Lassen is going through some major improvements. As soon as you cross into the park the pavement becomes perfect with brand new painted lines. As tempting as it is to race around this winding race track or go all super moto on the motorcycle, fair warning, we saw three park rangers in 11 miles checking our speed.

The first thing we did when coming in from the south was the visitors center. Watch a movie about the park, eat in a restaurant, what is not to like?

A little further is Sulphur Works. Parking lot, wheel chair accessible natural wonder. Too easy.

The one thing not to miss is walking a mile and a half to Bumpass Hell. Even the parking lot is cool.

After you get there there is a walkway over the dangerous area.

This first part is the original walkway but they are replacing it with Trex and the hangers are in for the rest of the handrails.

A few hundred yards up the road is the parking lot for hiking to the summit of Lassen Peak. Most of the hiking path was closed for construction so we did not venture up. You can see the parking lot is empty. I think they are installing an escalator so I will be back.

Stayed at Summit Lake Campground. It was nice and quiet. Water was already turned off so it was half price. I don't need no stinkin' water anyways. Here is the obligatory campground shot.

The first picture of this post was taken at the Devastated Area. This short stroll takes one from information sign to another sign. As you approach the signs the motion detector picks you up and the recorded message starts. I kept thinking there would be a test when we got back to the van.

Next was Manzanita Campground. We were really here on business. Francesca has a job supervising student teachers and one was teaching at this campground. She was put off because Manzanita campground is so big. It has a store and gas station. Big deal, it is September and the campground is a ghost town. Seemed fine to me. Nice little lake. Good hamburger.

Manzanita Lake is the north entrance to the Park. There is a museum and outside in it's own little hut is the old seismograph which is really interesting.

The deer in the Park crack me up.They just pose for the picture. A few hundred yards away hunting season is starting up. It is like they have a map of the Park.

Generally we were able to wonder as if we were the only ones in the world.

However I got burned at the Subway Cave. The parking lot was full and there were a ton of kids waiting to get in. I should have known, the school classes are why we were in Lassen, but this was the only place we ran head long into them.

I was going to Oregon spring of 2014 and did stop at the cave. This time there was nobody there. That is  my lonely Ru in the parking lot.

And some shots of the cave.

Drive home was pretty.

Mammoth

Lake Mary was the lake we camped at, but the area is Mammoth Lakes. There is a strange feeling when camping at a forest campground and there is a bus stop right across from you.

Throwing your bike on the free trolley is really a nice feature of this over civilized campground. The bike paths are way overdone as well. Miles of paved paths with even a center line painted and its own tunnels.

However camping on the lake is still not city living, even if the 10 space campground is called Pine City.

The lake is close enough to walk the boats down, which has become a feature I look for. It is nice to not have to load up each day. The lakes up here are rimmed with beautiful mountain views.

All the lakes are beautiful. Check out Twin Lake and Twin Lakes Falls

Then there is the bizarre Horseshoe Lake with Co2 killing the trees around it.

The Mammoth area is open enough for some great off road areas for the motorcycle. With the civilized theme there are roads well marked with signs like Mammoth to June and Mammoth Loop so one can easily go for miles with no GPS. As an old guy who rides alone it is nice to know there are other people on the trails.

There are enough free places to mountain bike that we had great fun. We did not venture in the Mammoth Ski Area. It was just overwhelmed being a holiday. However I look forward to trying this lift served bike trail someday.

We were able to get away. Even on a crazy weekend the Inyo Crater is only a short hike. We did have to take the 2 wheel drive Sportsmobile on a little dirt road, but all was fine.

Another place with no crowd was the Hot Springs. Older people may remember when we could soak in them, but it is all closed now.

I am getting a bit tired of having only one battery for the Sportsmobile. We idled for four hours just to have juice for the fridge and a couple of hours of tv. Otherwise all our equipment worked pretty well.

Saw a bunch of other Sportsmobiles, more than any other place we have been.

Battery and Box

The plastic battery box did not inspire confidence that it was air tight, but when I got the vent hose out for inspection I was shocked. From the panel wall to the van wall it was disintegrated. If gasses were venting it was going between the walls, not outside.

Converter has been doing more damage than good set at 13.5 volts. New set up is at 14 volts and then I have installed a smart charger to do the last two stages of charging. So it is really a weird 4 stage. The first is as I drive home at 14.7 from the alternator. We will see if the battery has been permanently damaged from never getting a full charge in the past.

sept 14. the "smart charger" was not so smart. it was holding the voltage above 14, so now converter is back to 13.5 and being used to maintain.

Wiring

I was in the 12 volt fuse box and found it installed upside down but wired right side up. So what is labeled one is actually six etc. Yea I figured it out, but really? Was this built on a Friday? How bad can the rest of it be?

So I crawled under the thing and traced the wiring looms. The wire from van battery was too close to the header and the protection melted off. No fuse, just straight from the van to the coach battery. Then no fuse at the battery between it and the loads, just 4 feet of wire to the fuse box.

All the Starcool wiring had the same problem. Not cool, pun intended. The harness protection melted down and the insulation of the individual wires crispy and discolored. Between the plumbing and wiring the Starcool is really a rats nest, but only near the header was there a problem.

Then there are the after market electricians. The brake controller guy opened up the Ford harness near the header, the worst place possible. Now a perfectly good harness has the wires exposed  to heat. The brake wire he used has crispy discolored insulation.

Not to forget the alarm guy. Mount the metal plate over two positive terminals and put electrical tape between them for insulation.

Silver Lake

I was just at Caples Lake, you would think I would have driven the couple of miles to do Silver Lake then. However Francesca wasn't interested. Now after reading a book she had to go to Silver Lake.

Pretty nice, no complaints from me. On the east end is a Forest Service Campground. The Sportsmobile or any class b is so cool because you can find all the short spurs with the tent campers and pretty much guarantee there won't be any generators.

However like Caples Lake we just moved to the lake for the day. We could park right next to the water which makes for a very nice day.

My only Sportsmobile issue is the coach battery is only lasting for one day. At the beginning of the summer it lasted three.

There is some pressure to use all the toys. I have to get over this because I have too many toys. The kayaking was great.

I really like this sailboat. I think they call this a gaft rig.

Great shoreline.

The mountain bike was a little disappointing, but I did find this neat slab of rock.

The motorcycle was great fun. I went to an area called Mud Lake road. There are even some single track for motorcycles.

On the way home Francesca was reading her book and got all excited about Bear Lake. Guess what? It is only a couple of miles down from Silver Lake.