Roll & Pitch, Y'all

In a previous blog Plan B (Not plan 9 from outer space), I talked about how our HWH leveling system failed while I was driving down Floyd Hill just west of Denver CO.  Already on edge after a change of plans, we did not need a piercing alarm screaming that our jacks were deploying while traveling down the freeway at 60 mph. Some days, traveling can be a bit frustrating. 

The system deploys hydraulic jacks in the four corners of our home on wheels when we are parked in a campsite. 

The rear jacks deployed, proudly displaying the HWH logo

The system first vents the air out of the the air bag "springs" in the suspension and then it eliminates the flex of our eight tires by bypassing them with the four jacks.  The tires are still taking most of the weight of our RV, the jacks just stabilize our apartment on wheels.

In my life I have found that if I plan for the worst and hope for the best, life falls somewhere in the middle. Prior to this incident I had downloaded and printed the service manual for our 625 series HWH system.  The manual covers all types of casualties and the adjustments you can make to the system. I broke out the manual and started reading. Regrettably it does not cover a complete system failure which is what we had.  

I checked for power input, which it had, and checked that it was also receiving the parking brake set signal from the Spartan Motors built chassis. Both were good and that completed all the troubleshooting I could do without assistance or more training. So I called HWH Corporate Headquarters with the expectation I would be able to talk to a technician. However, due to the Corona Virus Pandemic they were down to one technician. The kind lady who answered the phone put me in the queue to receive a callback.  I expected the call in a day or two.

When I did not receive a call back after a week, I explored alternative assistance.  I left an after working hours voice mail message at Stuart's Services, which is a shop in Elkhart Indiana (AKA the RV manufacturing capital) that specializes in repairing HWH leveling systems. According to HWH's website, "Stuart's Service is the only exclusive and oldest HWH OEM dealer installation and service center."  It shows.

The next morning at 08:34 I received a call from Chuck Stuart, and he is VERY knowledgeable!!!  Due to my maxed out frustration factor, I was prepared to purchase the $913.61 replacement brain for the leveling system. He refused to sell me anything before I conducted some guided diagnostics. Talk about a; customer focused business model.

Our generator is mounted on a hydraulically operated sliding tray that uses the fifth channel of the HWH system. The sliding tray was not operating since the HWH system was not working. Therefore, it was very difficult to access the HWH control box, tucked away next to the generator.

Where the control board is safely hidden. Access is limited with the tray retracted.

I unpacked my adjectives when trying to remove the power connectors that have not been disconnected since 2007, the year our bus was built.  It was a very small space I was accessing while lying on the ground under the front of the bus.

HWH control box, hydraulic pump, fluid tank and solenoid valves.

I removed the unit, hoping to see a blown fuse or other obvious issues.  When I jiggled the box, I saw component L2 was dancing around...  on close inspection, one of the leads was broken. We had hit one too many dips in the road. 

Thankfully in our downsizing from our home to our bus, I kept my soldering tools.  I removed the component and used my solder sucker to remove the old solder from the circuit board through holes which would facilitate installation of a replacement or repaired component.

Component removed from the circle labeled L2

I carefully removed the heat shrink wrapper and the Cambric insulating tape from the inductor and was pleasantly surprised that the broken lead was from the outside of the winding not the inside.  If it was the inside lead, I would have to manually unwind and rewind the coil of magnet wire.

According to Wikipedia: An inductor, also called a coil, choke, or reactor, is a passive two-terminal electrical component that stores energy in a magnetic field when electric current flows through it. An inductor typically consists of an insulated wire wound into a coil around a core.

Inductor with its guts exposed.

The longer lead you see is after I unwound the inductor one turn which hopefully would not take it out of the circuit's tolerance as it appears to have several hundred turns of wire.

As I did not have any heat shrink tubing that was large enough on hand, I wrapped the coil with 3M Super 88 electrical tape.  I sanded off the magnet wire insulation then reinstalled the component on the board.  To lower the chance of a lead breaking again, I placed some 3M 9760PC adhesive transfer tape on the bottom of the inductor's core to bond it to the circuit board. This way the leads are not taking the mechanical load.

The mad scientist hard at work

Once I had it all installed, I powered it up and it worked flawlessly.  I was able to extend the generator tray to access the level sensing unit.  After tweaking the adjustments, I called it good.

All total, it cost me several hours of my time and zero dollars.

I would like to thank Chuck for refusing to take my money.