Desiccant Filter

[Fred Brooks]

   Greetings fellow Beaver Owners, My name is Fred Brooks and recently purchased a "barn find" 2000 Marquis "Jasper" with 2 slides, C-12, vin#170988. I have a few questions concerning the Air System coming from the reciever/dryer to the air tanks. 1- I can't find any info stating when I should change the Haldex Desiccant filter mounted on top of the Midland reciever dryer and 2- On the dash board, the air guage has a red needle (rear brakes) and a green needle (front brakes and accessories, IE: suspension), my question is why is the red needle following the green one when traveling and the brakes are not being applied. My understanding is that the green needle should cycle between 90psi and 120psi because of the air ride suspension but the red needle should only go down when brakes are applied. Possible leaking "pressure protection valve" between the 2 tanks? Thanks in advance for any assistance or insight. Regards Fred

[Gerald Farris]

Fred,
From your description, I can not tell if you really have a problem with your air tank system or not.

The service schedule that is given for the air dryer is based on a commercial application that the vast majority of them are used in, and in my opinion it is far to aggressive. With the irregular and limited use that most coaches receive, I prefer to use the efficiency test as an indicator for change intervals. Drain your air tanks at the bleeders in your LR service bay every week or two when the coach is being driven, and if you get any water from the tank drains, you need to service the air dryer. If you never get any amount of water at the tank drains, the dryer is doing it's job as designed, so save the time and money to fix something that is needed.

Gerald       

[Fred Brooks]

Hello Gerald, Thanks for the quick reply, I will try your advice and advise as to the out come. Regards Fred

[Keith Moffett]

Hi Fred and welcome to the club.  Congratulations on the new coach, sounds like an interesting story.
Did the manuals come with the coach?  There may be more info in there.
We are on our second Beaver and we only had the newest one serviced.  There is a service kit available which includes an internal heater and so on as well as the dessicant filter.  For us this was more preventative maintenance and made very little difference. 
Save the money if you can and if not the kit info is available from the parts dept. At Beaver Coach Sales in Bend Or.
Hope to see you down the road.

[Fred Brooks]

Hi Keith, Thanks for the info and the warm welcome. I've been looking for about 6 years and my bride was the one who found this sweet coach. Ironically, all the original equiptment works inside and out. My only concern is there are no maintenance records so I am playing catch up. I have all original manuals if anyone needs a copy. Looking forward to meet all you passionate Beaver owners. "Every day is a gift" an absolute Present. Fred