New RV owner: The things to get right first

The ones that cost money

Each of these is a maker's own instruction, quoted from the manual that came with the coach, with the reason attached. None of them is difficult. All of them are the kind of thing that turns a first season into a repair bill.

1. Never travel with the waste tanks full

Jayco's manual is blunt about it: Never travel with full black or grey water holding tanks. A full tank is weight moving at the worst possible place in the coach, and the structure and the tank mounts were not built for the load shifting. It is also the reason the dump station is the last stop before the road rather than the first stop after it.

2. Close the dump valves when the tanks are empty, and never leave the black valve open

The dump procedure in the manual is a sequence, and the order matters: Always drain the black water holding tank first so the grey tank wastewater can help rinse any solids or debris from the dump outlet and sewer hose. Open the black valve, close it when the tank is empty, then open the grey, then close that. Leaving the black valve open at a full-hookup site is the mistake: the liquid drains away and the solids stay behind, which is how a tank becomes a pile. And the tank wants water in it from the start, not just what the flushes add: the same manual says to add enough water to prevent solid waste buildup, and gives the recipe as one to two quarts in the bowl, the chemical your toilet maker specifies, then a flush that puts at least two gallons into the tank.

3. Never plug into a pedestal you have not tested

This is the instruction that protects the most expensive thing in the coach, and the manual gives it in three parts. First: Always test the external power source with a ground monitor before connecting your power cord to it. If the ground monitor indicates reverse polarity or an open ground, DO NOT connect the power cord. Then the specific cases: DO NOT plug the shore power cord into a campsite receptacle that has reverse polarity, with non-functioning ground circuits, or that shows outward signs of heat damage. And the consequence, in the manual's own words: Doing so may result in property damage or serious injury. A ground monitor, or a surge protector with one built in, is the cheapest thing you will ever buy for a coach, and it is the only thing standing between a bad pedestal and your converter. The outlets and GFCI guide covers what to do when the damage is already done.

4. Fill the water heater before you switch it on

Every year, somebody fires an empty water heater and buys a tank. Suburban states the rule as an imperative: It is imperative that the water heater tank be filled with water before operating the water heater. Operation of the water heater without water in the tank may result in damage to the tank and/or controls. This type of damage is not covered by the limited warranty. The practical version: fill the system, open a hot tap until water runs steadily with no spitting, and only then switch the heater on. On a heater that has been drained for storage, that hot tap is the confirmation, and it costs a minute.

5. Never move the coach with the slide motors disconnected

This is the sentence a new owner has never read and the one that matters most when a slide will not retract and somebody has pushed the room in by hand. In capitals, in the manual: DO NOT MOVE THE RV UNLESS THE MOTORS ARE PLUGGED IN TO THE CONTROLLER AND THERE IS BATTERY POWER TO THE RV. THIS SETS THE BRAKES ON THE SLIDEOUTS TO PREVENT THEM FROM MOVING DURING TRANSIT. A room pushed in with its motors out is held by nothing, and the slide-out guide has the overrides and the re-engagement step in full.

6. Never test for a propane leak with a flame

Also capitals, and worth reading twice: Never use an open flame to test for a propane leak. Do not check for leaks using products that contain ammonia or chlorine; these products can cause cracks to form on the metal tubing and brass fittings. Soapy water is the test, and the ammonia and chlorine warning rules out a surprising number of household cleaners. The same section gives the operating habit worth copying: close every burner valve first, then open the main valve in the propane tank slowly to avoid a rush of propane vapor.

7. Never fit a bigger fuse

Never use a higher rated replacement fuse; doing so may cause a fire by overheating the RV wiring. The fuse is sized to protect the wire, not the gadget on the end of the circuit, so a bigger fuse moves the failure into the wall where nobody can see it. The fuse guide is about finding the fault instead of replacing the fuse.

8. Do not reverse the battery cables

Do not reverse the positive and negative battery cables. Doing so will blow the reverse polarity fuses that protect the power converter. If the coach is dead on 12 volts after a battery change, those fuses are the first thing to check, and they are why the converter is often blamed for a mistake made at the terminals.

9. Never leave the coach while filling the fresh water tank

Never leave the motor home unattended while filling the fresh water system, and do not overfill it: the manual warns that overfilling can pressurise the tank, cause leakage and water damage, and void the warranty. It also says not to cap, block or modify the tank's overflow tubes, because the pressure has to have somewhere to go.

10. Do not remove or plug the water heater's relief valve

Two instructions in one line, both absolute: Do not place a valve between the pressure and temperature (P&T) valve and the tank. Do not remove or plug the relief valve under any circumstances. The valve is what opens if the tank reaches 210 degrees F or 150 pounds of pressure, and it is the reason a heater that is misbehaving vents water rather than becoming a projectile. Suburban publish both figures for their own valves, and 210 is the one that matters: 120 F is a thermostat setting on some models, not a relief temperature.

11. Never blow the water lines out with a valve closed

When the plumbing gets winterised with air rather than antifreeze: Never apply air pressure to the water system with any valves in the closed position. Pressure against a closed faucet, valve or low-point drain damages the seals and produces leaks you will find in spring. Jayco's own manual caps its system at 30 PSI maximum, and warns that anything higher can rupture line couplings and void the warranty. Other makers publish a higher ceiling, so the figure is the plumbing's rather than one number for every RV. The winterising guide works that job in order.

12. Do not let the leveling system hold the coach while you work under it

A leveling system is a leveling system. Lippert's own manual prohibits using one to provide service for any reason under the trailer such as changing tires, and states the consequence as damage to the trailer and/or cause death or serious injury. A jack that holds a coach level is not a jack stand, and stabilisers are not jacks at all: they steady, they do not lift. The leveling guide has the overrides and the fluid checks.

Your first night plugged in

1. Level and chock before anything else. The slides, the water system and an absorption fridge all want the coach level, and the fridge has a published limit: Norcold builds its absorption units to run within 3 degrees off level side to side and 6 front to back, and past that the cooling system can be damaged.
2. Look at the pedestal, then test it. Breaker off, look for scorching or a loose fit, and use a ground monitor before the cord goes in.
3. Connect, then switch the pedestal breaker on, so nothing is arcing while you hold the plug.
4. Check the coach's own breaker panel for anything tripped, and switch the converter on if it has its own switch.
5. Confirm the battery is charging by watching its voltage rise over a few minutes. The battery guide gives the numbers to expect.
6. Water next, on city water with a pressure regulator, or off the tank and the pump. Open a tap and let it run, and do not walk away from a filling tank.
7. Water heater last, and only once a hot tap runs without spitting.
8. Propane after that, opening the main valve slowly, and if you smell it, shut it off and find out why before anything is lit.

What you bought: The systems, and what each one is for

Once the first trip is over, this is the map. Knowing what a system does when it is working is what lets you read a symptom later, and it is the one thing a fault guide cannot supply, because a fault guide starts from something that has already broken.

The order to learn them, and why

The order below is not alphabetical and it is not the order a maker's manual lists them in. It runs from the system that can injure you, through the one that imitates all the others, to the ones you can safely leave until you have slept in the coach a few nights.

First: shore power, because it is the one that hurts

The 120-volt side is the only part of a coach that can kill you, and it is also the first thing you connect, so it gets learned first. What to know before your first hookup: the pedestal is somebody else's wiring, a breaker on the pedestal is what you switch rather than the plug, and a coach with a wiring fault can put voltage on its own skin. The outlets and GFCI guide covers the chain from the pedestal inward, including why a GFCI will not reset and what hot skin is.

Second: 12 volts, because it imitates everything else

Half the coach runs on 12 volts, and a battery that is low makes the pump weak, the furnace fan slow and the fridge's board unhappy, so a voltage problem gets misread as three different faults. Learning this system second means you stop chasing the wrong part before you start. The 12-volt guide has the layout and the voltage drop test, and the battery guide works out which of the four charging sources has failed when the battery will not hold charge.

Third: water in, then water out

Two systems that share a set of pipes and a set of habits. Water in is city water or the tank and its pump, and water out is two tanks and a valve. Learn them in that order because the fresh side is where you will first notice a leak, and because every fault on the waste side is a smell or a reading rather than a flood. The winterising guide doubles as the map of where the water actually sits, and the toilet guide covers the three faults that sound alike at the other end of it.

Fourth: propane, heat and the fridge

Propane is the one fuel you can learn by smell, and the furnace and the fridge are its two biggest consumers. Two things are worth knowing before the first cold night: how the furnace proves itself safe to light, and that an absorption fridge needs the coach close to level to work at all. The furnace guide carries the carbon monoxide hard stop, and the fridge guide explains why level matters.

Fifth: the extras, and what can wait

Solar, a generator and an inverter are all ways of making or moving power, and none of them is needed to spend a first weekend at a hookup. When one of them stops working, solar and the generator both have their own guide, and both begin by checking two things before anything is tested.

Where the two electrical halves meet

Two systems share one battery and one ground, and almost every confusing electrical symptom comes from that arrangement. 120 volts arrives at the pedestal and goes to the outlets, the air conditioner and any heating element. The converter turns some of that into 12 volts to charge the battery. Everything else runs off the battery at 12 volts.

Several components touch both halves, and that is where a fault crosses from one to the other: the converter, which turns 120 into 12; an inverter, if one is fitted, which turns 12 back into 120; and every appliance with a 120-volt element and a 12-volt board, which is the fridge in its electric mode, a dual-fuel water heater, and the air conditioner's controls.

The manual you got, and the manual you need

The manual in the drawer covers the coach. It rarely covers the appliances inside it well, because those are other makers' equipment, and it often covers several model years at once. Every appliance maker publishes its own document, and that is the one with the wiring diagram, the fault codes and the part numbers: find the label inside or behind each appliance for its model number, then open it in the manuals section, which links each document at the maker rather than rehosting it. If you do not know who made something, the brand list covers 44 coach makers and how far back each one's archive reaches.

What is safe to ignore for now

• The inverter, if you mostly camp with hookups. It matters when you start running 120-volt equipment off the battery.
• The solar controller's settings, until you have watched a full sunny day of charging and know what normal looks like.
• Tank sensor calibration. The sensors read conductivity rather than depth, so a reading that disagrees with the tank is normal rather than urgent.
• Seals, slide wipers and roof caulking. Servicing them is an annual job rather than a first-week one, and looking at them is not: a wiper seal that has folded inward on a slide room runs water into the room instead of off it, and it takes a glance while the room goes out.
• The weight math, once your combination is matched. It comes back into play the day you change a truck, a trailer or how you load it.

Go deeper

Each system above has its own document set in the manuals section, and the fault guides are organised the same way: one page per symptom, each one citing the documents it rests on, and each one starting with the checks that cost nothing. The guide index is the whole set in one place, including the weight and towing material and the winter set.