Check your hoses!

[Larry Fisk]

While driving through Canada last fall my wife asked me, "do you smell something?" I replied "No" and then looked in the review mirror. Smoke was pouring out of the back of the Beaver. I pulled over immediately as the coach began to fill with smoke. We had blown the hydraulic hose going to the cooling fan for the engine. The Beaver had to be loaded on a low boy trailer and hauled back to Grand Prairie for repairs. The shop that replaced the hose said we were very lucky. The hydraulic fluid could have easily started burning and destroyed our Beaver! Later I crawled under the RV and found a couple more hoses that were rubbing on the frame and had worn thru the rubber outer layer. I bought radiator hose and wrapped these hoses where they were worn. This is just a note of awareness to check your hoses. We almost lost our second home because I had not been doing this PM.

[LEAH DRAPER]

AMEN TO THAT.
I had an issue with my 2008 Contessa regarding the hose that Monaco in their "infinite wisdom" installed from the factory...
they used a marine hose for the coolant hose from the over flow to the engine.  Guess what, after less than 6000 miles and two years the hose cracked and sprung leaks on both end connectors requiring dumping the coolant, flushing and re-installing coolant.  

My personal opinion, Monaco never did BEAVERS any favors and I am not very impressed with Navistar either!

[Joel Ashley]

Welcome to the club, Leah.  Our Monterey was only 6 months old when the same thing happened to our overflow coolant hose.  The Harrisburg tech said the hose looked like it was off a much older coach, and it had several cracks in it.  Luckily we were on I-5 already headed to Harrisburg for other issues when we lost coolant, and only had to be towed 10 miles or so;  unluckily for the tow truck driver, it was a miserable rainy day.  The Monaco tech thought somewhere along the line someone had scavenged our new hose to repair another rig, than replaced ours with one off an older coach somewhere.  He said it not only looked old, but wasn't the best material for the use, and he replaced it with a custom fit higher quality hose he ordered locally;  then he retrofit some of the other hoses because he didn't like where they were rubbing on things.

Joel

[215]

Larry,  I had the same hose replaced when our coach was only I year old.  It felt soft and literally fell apart when my mechanic removed it.  Hard to believe a hose could fail that soon.  I now check them carefully each year when the coach is serviced.

[Larry Fisk]

Good job Dennis, I wish I would have been more proactive with this before the hose blew. Of course it happened on the Sunday of Labor day weekend. We were fortunate to find a place that could get us off the side of the road and take us to a safe place for the night.

[Gil_Johnson]

I just changed the coolant hose between the engine and coolant reservoir of my 2008 Contessa, 12K miles.  It wasn't leaking, but it had surface cracks everywhere.  The wire wound, cloth covered, marine hoses are not meant to take the bends needed for this hose.  After some research, I bought Goodyear Hi-Miler Blue heater hose.  At 1 1/4" and 6 feet long, you don't have many choices.  All the specs on the Goodyear hose suggests it should work fine.

Also took the time to reroute some wires in the same area and use a small piece of the left over hose to protect the air lines that rub on the body.  Somewhat related, I moved the curb side upper support bracket inward that's located on the genny slideout.  It was rubbing one of the engine driven air conditioner lines.

Gil