We had a leisurely breakfast after which I did an inspection of the electrics of another motorhome which had some anomalous behaviour.
The problem is this. Turning a 12V fluorescent light on causes the fridge to stop and turning a 12V incandescent light on causes the fridge to start up again.
The cause of this strange behaviour lies in the electronic control of the fridge. The starting transient from the fluoro triggers a stop condition in the fridge controller and turning on the incandescent changes the 12V supply condition just enough to trigger a on condition.
I reassured Ed that there was no dangerous circumstances in this behaviour and that if they wanted to live with it that was OK. Fixing the problem would require adding appropriate filtering to either the fridge or the fluoros and that would be relatively hard to do and would cost something.
We drove back to the caravan park in Brisbane and had a late lunch with Big Al at Cafe Zanetti. The Marretts are still at Armidale but are returning tonight.
The Little Motley was booked in for a further warranty service to try once again to fix the rear window which, on occasion, was jamming when being closed. They say they've fixed it, we'll see.
We had lunch at Cafe Zanetti and dinner at Patricks Road.
Alain had gone to Sydney to pick up his remaining belongings and had chosen to drive straight back. Unfortunately, he had a coming together with a bridge near Kew and immobilised the car temporarily. He discovered that he could get back to Brisbane on the XPT train which stopped nearby at 10.30 at night.
We were up before dawn to go into town to meet Alain from the train after which we didn't feel like doing a lot.
In the afternoon, I found a suitable wooden three drawer filing cabinet for the Motley to house the extra computer equipment and the Chapter files. It is or order and is due for delivery in two weeks. It will allow us to move the TV to a more convenient height so I have to work out what to do with the space where the TV presently sits.
The Motley was booked in for routine service so we were out and about after breakfast.
We spent the day at Patricks Rd. I spent most of the day trying to fix some minor software (hardware?) problems with the iBook.
We returned to Aspley for me to pick up the Motley and for Jean to go to the podiatrist.
We went shopping with Sarah and Alain to buy birthday presents and other stuff.
Al was baby sitting in the evening and also cooking for the family so we had green tuna rice, Ross's favourite, for dinner.
I spent the best part of the day trying to mend Sarah's dishwashing machine. It still remains a mystery but I guess I'll keep on trying. I have another line of attack I'll try when I get some more time.
We celebrated Jean's birthday. She wanted an old fashioned roast dinner so we decided to do Sunday lunch. A big piece of topside beef from Lindsay, the butcher, and lots of vegetables prepared by Sarah topped off with Yorkshire Pudding with gravy. For dessert, a large bowl of junket. Two bottles of Andrew Garret Shiraz and some Baileys Irish Cream with coffee made for a great traditional Chalmers Sunday lunch.
Jean seemed to enjoy her delayed birthday celebrations. She got lots of presents including a little Christmas Tree for the Motley and a new scrabble whizbang board as well a several new books.
Jean had an appointment with the optometrist at Aspley in the morning so it was a relatively early start for us.
I had to mend the jockey wheel mounting bracket I had bent when I inadvertently backed into the trailer after it was uncoupled. This required that I take the Motley and trailer to the caravan repair shop in Virginia.
I took the opportunity while I was out in the Motley to buy a new ladder.
Al and I drove to Kew and back to pickup his stuff which he had left in the car. We left just after six in the morning and got back at eleven in the evening so it was a particularly long day but we did what we had to do.