Surprise, surprise…

After two month of extreme heatwave and devastating fires, what do we get? We get flooded! Not as bad as the 2011 flood, yet, but enough to create damage and disruption to an already battered country. At least now, most farms have water and feed for their animals, and we got to be very thankful for that..

This flood did cost me a bit of money as, it did managed to damaged few of my possession. But after seeing what’s left of my neighbours home, I can’t really complain. Gigi, other than constantly having to be raise of the ground by adding more and more planks of wood under the rams, did extremely well and kept me dry and comfortable, even during those blackouts. I didn’t think about that when I was building it, but having your own power supply, make a massive difference when the main is interrupted for days due to rain and falling trees.

I was also extremely luck when the mini cyclone (it was listed on BOM as a “Bomb storm” or bombogenesis) hit us three weeks ago and all the flying debris, including plenty of roof panels and my own workbench table and the compound saw attached to it, ended up hitting the container parked just next to Gigi… Without that container, there would be no more Gigi! I did however take few shot, including one taken from the bedroom window just after lunch in the middle of the Bombstorm..

Where was I, while all this was happening? It just happens, that because of some health issue (read a very unhealthy and prolonged pregnancy), I was relegated to few weeks of absolute rest. So, yes, I was relaxing, while there was a world of destruction unfolding around me..

I can say that when Gigi was moved from side to side, I didn’t panic. But when the forces of nature are at work, there is no much we can do. In the end, all I could do, was to put a clean new pair of underwear and assess the damage… Like I said, I was very lucky!

I still managed to go through my list of job to do, and few more modifications were completed..

Having the fridge and the Oven in the same cabinet did create a bit of an issue especially when the outside temperature managed to hit the 40° C. I did have floor and ceiling opening for a clear airflow, but it was obviously not enough. So two new 120 mm fan were installed under the floor grille to force air up behind the fridge and out of the roof vent. There two fan are also assisted by the massive centrifugal 3 speed floor fan that came with the coach. As per chapter 31, I did already had a 90 mm fan pushing above the oven towards the roof vent, but is all this could be still not enough, I will add another two 120 mm fans right under the roof vent grille.

You probably think that they are too many and that it will be a massive power drainage, but not so. They are all temperature controlled (they all come on only if the temperature reach 35° C, and they all are 200 mA each (less than 1 Amp all combined). Ok, the OEM fan is actually 100 Watt (4 Amp), but because they all come on mainly due in the day, the solar panel does take care of this with ease, having in excess of 75 Amp hour available…

Thing is, I want to be able to travel anywhere in Australia and not having to worry about the temperature, so it just seems logic to provide as much cooling aids as possible, without compromise the system.. I’m using exclusively Maglev Sunon fans, that while a bit more expensive, do last a lot longer and do run a lot cooler..

The very high humidity of the past month, did also create a new problem with the Ikea cabinets in the bedroom. Being made of untreated pine, it did somehow reduce all the gaps between each drawer, and therefore I had to file few mm from each draw to make them work perfectly again. Not a big deal really.

Hopefully next month normal activity will be resumed and the log will go back to the usual format..