Making Phannie Our Own–New TVs

After five years with Homer, Sandy and I had become intimately familiar with our fifth wheel and all of its furnishings and systems.  While it was by no means a top-of-the-line RV, it was comfortable, and we pretty much knew where everything was and how it all worked.


Then, along came Phannie!  Well, the differences are staggering!  It will take us quite a while to get comfortable in this behemoth.  Before we even took delivery, we decided there were certain things about Phannie that would have to change.  Perhaps the most ambitious of these was scrapping the old (2006) television sets and replacing them with new Samsung high-definition LCDs—one for the main lounge and another for the bedroom.  We also replaced the old DVD players with new Samsung Blu-Rays.  This required some modification to the cabinetry, which was expertly done by Motorhomes of Texas in Nacogdoches.  To get the hi-def signal into the coach, we had the dealer install a new Winegard automatic hi-def satellite antenna.

Why all the fuss and expense?  Well, we have gotten used to our hi-def TVs at home and, frankly, we now find it hard to watch the old non-high definition blurry screens. Since Phannie will be our home away from home, we don’t think our entertainment experience should be diminished.  Fortunately, the factory-installed surround sound system seemed fine, so we kept that in place.

Pop in a DVD and Julie Andrews sings, "The Hills are Alive..." on the main lounge TV

New bedroom TV

With all the fancy new electronics, I decided it would be a good idea to install a Surge Guard electrical power monitor.  If you do much RVing, it’s only a matter of time until you hook up to shore power that has voltage or polarity problems, and the Surge Guard will only allow power it likes into the coach.  It has already shown its worth by rejecting a hookup at the dealership, where a 50-amp receptacle had a loose wire and sporadic electricity flow. 

Surge Guard Electric Power Monitor

I mentioned in the last post that I had decided on a frequency for blogging.  I've come to accept that, until I retire, I  just can't be as prolific a writer as many of the daily bloggers I read.  On the other hand, six months between posts is a little difficult to explain.  (I thought my excuses in the last post were pretty good, though.)  Lord willing, I’m going to try to update this rag about once a week if at all possible.


We’ve a lot more to tell you about getting to know Phannie, and that will continue in the next installment.