My primary goals in this blog

My primary goals in this blog are to talk about my life and projects:

My 1995 Lance Camper

Various ham radio things

Probably some solar and battery things too!

The Lance Camper:

This is my favorite picture of my 1995 Lance Squire 4000 on my 1999 Dodge Ram 2500 Cummins Turbo Diesel Quad Cab Long Bed. They were called “Quad Cab” then, even though they were the suicide doors, not full doors. The camper BARELY fits on the Dodge, but to me it’s perfect! I’m fixing up the camper, I got it from my friend Joe after his insurance company totaled it for relatively minor damage to the right rear. I should have it fixed shortly.

I volunteer at rallies (the kind where people race cars in the woods!!!!!!). Because the rallies require a lot of miles of closed off/dirt/gravel roads, they need to be remote. For this and other reasons, they need ham radio operators like myself to do communications. When I bought the truck, one of the reasons I bought it was to use it on the rallies. I have a 2014 RAV4 that works fine for rallies, BUT, the stages are sometimes PRETTY torn up. The RAV4 isn’t as tolerant of ruts.

I encourage everyone who can to volunteer at rallies, it’s a lot of fun and you get the best view, BUT, rally hotels are no frills. Once, at a fairly remote rally, we drove to the hotel, my ex looked at me and said “You’re punking me, right? There’s another hotel we’re REALLY going to drive to?????”. Note: There wasn’t. Volunteering also can cost a little bit of money, as you generally have to pay for the hotels if you don’t camp somewhere. The camper will allow me to drop it at the rally HQ, and use the Dodge to work the rally for the weekend!

The camper is a PERFECT fit for me. It’s pretty small inside, but has ample room for me to be in. The bed slept me and the Dodge’s rather large tailgate crossing the country with no problem. It has a gas stove and oven. The fridge needs a touch up, it stopped working on gas, but I’ll figure that out soon. The shower works great and gives plenty of hot water! This solution not only saves me money but also keeps me close to the rally!