• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
Hourless Life Logo

Hourless Life

Love. Explore. Study. Share.

  • Overlanding
    • South America
    • North America
    • Gear and Build
    • Resources
  • RV Travel
    • RV Life With Kids
  • Off-Roading
    • Off-Roading Trails
    • Jeep Life
    • Go Prepared
  • Travel Tips
  • Family Travel
  • About
    • Map of Travel Content
    • Press
    • Gear Sponsors
    • Contact
  • Store
    • Cart
    • Returns
  • Show Search
Hide Search
RV Odometer Issue

That Time We Plugged in a Wire and Our RV Odometer Plummeted

RV Odometer Issue

It wasn’t long after we hit the Natchez Trace Parkway in 2014, at the beginning of our full-time RV life, that we noticed something was wrong with our odometer. The numbers didn’t add up. We knew exactly how far we were driving every day, and the odometer was counting way more miles than that.

Some time later, I was driving Meriwether and noticed a little dot on our odometer next to a “K.” There was also an “M”…with no dot beside it. In my infinite wisdom, I told Eric about this later. “Do you think the ‘K’ stands for kilometers, and that’s what the dial has actually been counting all this time?” The switch below the speedometer/odometer didn’t do anything when we pressed it, so we were left wondering.

Eventually, we talked to our friend, Tiffin Marketing Manager Mark Richardson, to see whether he had any insight. He told us there was a wire in our dashboard console that could be unplugged, causing the odometer to read improperly, and disabling the toggle switch.

We bided our time until last month, when we visited our go-to mechanic shop in San Antonio, Iron Horse RV. In the course of our services (which I need to write a separate article about), we had our tech find and connect the dashboard wire.

Ta-da! Our odometer suddenly dropped from 125,285 (kilometers) to 77,849 (miles). When 1 kilometer equals 0.6 miles, it kinda makes a difference.

All that to say that our 2004 rig has less than 78,000 miles on it after our two and half years of ownership and full-time travel, when we bought it thinking it had something like 100,000 miles. That’s actually only 62,000 miles–a huge disparity!

Quite frankly, I don’t see it as any big advantage that our rig only has 78,000 miles. Diesel RVs should be run regularly, so there’s no harm in packing the miles on provided proper maintenance is taking place. I’m just glad we finally got to the bottom of this odd situation. It only took us two and a half years to figure out.

-B

Written by:
BrittanyHighland
Published on:
November 5, 2016
Thoughts:
7 Comments

Categories: RV TravelTags: maintenance

Patreon is our community where we transparently share the wins and challenges of this unconventional lifestyle. When we must leave friends and family to continue our drive around the world, our patrons consistently offer support and encouragement. We invite you to join us on this journey of a lifetime!
Become a patron at Patreon!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Jennifer Thompson DiTommaso

    November 7, 2016 at 3:13 am

    We just started our adventure on the first of November. We lived up near the Canadian border, so frequently traveled across and got to know KM/h and M/h quite well!! We are traveling down Highway 101 along the coast to begin with. Glad I found your blog. Here’s ours – would love any input, comments or feedback as we begin the worlds of traveling and blogging!!

    https://www.thevagabonds.net/

    Thanks
    Jennifer

    Reply
    • Brittany Highland

      November 7, 2016 at 10:34 pm

      Excited for your new adventure, @jenniferthompsonditommaso:disqus! Happy trails and thank you for reading.

      Reply
  2. Don

    November 10, 2016 at 11:33 pm

    Who’d have thunk it? 🙂 I’m surprised that the odometer was reading in kilometers, yet the speedometer was in mph. Or will you be covering more miles in the same length of time now?

    Reply
    • Brittany Highland

      November 11, 2016 at 9:39 pm

      @disqus_AxtKrchoJc:disqus, you can see from the photo that the speedometer reads in miles and kilometers at the same time–big white numbers are miles, with little orange numbers representing kilometers. It’s all perspective. 🙂

      Reply
      • Don

        November 12, 2016 at 3:37 am

        Of course! By the time I reached the end of the article, I’d forgotten about the picture of the speedometer up top.

        Reply
  3. Ann Hunt

    January 17, 2017 at 7:07 pm

    We are new at this! In fact, our fifth wheel is not scheduled for delivery until the end of Feb., 2017. At this time we are searching for the best insurance company and are so confused! We do want coverage for Alaska and Canada included. Anyone out there with helpful advice or recommendations. I will check back on this site.

    Reply
    • Brittany Highland

      January 17, 2017 at 11:03 pm

      Congratulations on beginning your adventure, @disqus_9Bj1rluJIR:disqus. We were insured by Blue Sky in 2014 (and I think 2015), and switched to Miller for 2016 because we were quoted a much better rate for slightly better coverage. We’re still with Miller for 2017: https://www.millerrvinsurance.com/. Both companies have a great reputations among full-time RVers. I’m not sure about details for Alaska or Canada–you would need to ask them.

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Hourless Life mark

Footer

Hourless Life

902 Ayers St. #331522
Crp. Christi, TX 78404

Copyright © 2023 · Privacy Policy · Legal

Join the Journey

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Reddit
  • TikTok
  • Twitter
  • YouTube