Chasing Adventure

All that research in resilience for the dissertation has been put into play.

We knew this season wouldn’t be all puppies and rainbows, but we also knew it would be worth it since we were answering God’s call. In the transit from Tulsa to Chuckey, TN, our fridge decided to slowly stop working. We purchased the rig on September 6th, brand new. By September 11th, the light inside the fridge was mimicking a strobe light and by September 12th, it was no longer holding temperature. 6 days old.

When traveling, there are these large, plastic, screw-in parts that are “supposed” to hold the doors closed. Being new owners, we went through our checklist for traveling and triple checked that everything was secured. The first travel day was the longest and when we parked for the night, I found the fridge doors pushed open.

During the drive the shelves were not secured inside (design flaw) and slid forward. They got stuck in the shelves built into the fridge doors, hence pushing the doors open enough to break the seal that the plastic bit was supposed to keep closed. The opened seal then caused the compressor to run for hours on end to keep the fridge cold. Slightly frustrated at this (that’s a lie). The owners manual indicated we shouldn’t travel with heavy items in the fridge, so we went with a mostly empty fridge. Maybe weight would have held the shelves down??

I called Grand Design and got connected with a local authorized dealer for warranty work. We had to bring the rig into the dealership for an evaluation the following week (stayed in a hotel overnight), and they confirmed that the fridge was broken. They (the service tech) would have to work through the warranty department, who would work with Grand Design, who would work with Furrion (fridge manufacturer) and Lippert (other RV manufacturer)…

Are you still following this?

…and they all would exchange emails, pictures, questions, and answers. We were told on September 18th that it could take 6-8 weeks to get a new fridge. Wow.

Resilience is not just getting through the trial, but coming out of the other side with a positive attitude and more knowledge so the issue is not a issue in the future.

After living out of coolers (we had to go purchase, along with ice daily), we purchased what was essentially a beer fridge. The RV fridge was 20 cubic feet; the beer fridge is 1.6 cubic feet. This has taught me to be obsessive about meal planning since the beer fridge only fits a 1/2 gallon of milk, coffee creamer, a carton of eggs, and 3-4 other smaller items.

Now, it’s November 8th, and we are back in a hotel while Maverick is at the dealership getting a new fridge. I’ve done a ton of research on how to keep items from moving inside the fridge and pray we won’t be going through this issue again. I am grateful to the very sweet ladies at the dealership for working with us through this issue!

Nothing is ever perfect (outside of Jesus), and we are working through the little speed bumps as we go about this adventure!

11/7 UPDATE: New fridge works great! However, they scratched the floor taking out the old one and it will take weeks to get the new flooring in…sigh.