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Originally Posted by 0rion
Thanks for your input. Anything that has really impressed you with it or anything you wish was different?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Blueswede
We bought a new 368MBI in January. Really love the layout. Cooling the middle room has not been an issue for us, but we also live in So California. There is a product out there called the RV Air Flow that has gotten lots of good reviews. It can increase the cold air flow thru your ducts by up to 40%. I intend on installing one as soon as my knee heals. You may want to check it out. For us, the 368 is what we have been looking for in a 5th wheel.
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I also have a 2021 Cougar 368 MBI, our first trip was a dry run to a local RV Park for 2 nights to make sure everything was good before heading off for 3 weeks to the SW, Utah, Arizona and Colorado. I can tell you it hit 115 in downtown Moab, UT while we were there, 113 up at the RV Park. Both AC were running full time and couldn't keep up , the inside was able to keep around 85-87 degrees, mid bunk was about 10 degrees warmer, it only has the one 3" tube coming down from the ceiling into the mid bunk. After having a day of that kind of heat I found some foil tape and started to fix the AC Duct and not so great installation of the AC units into this RV. There were multiple leaks into the area between the ceiling and roof. After fixing that the system was able to keep the indoor temp under 80 degrees, so not too bad considering the outside temps were above 110. But the mid bunk doesn't get a lot of flow and will be 5-10 degrees hotter, but with the door open the temp was fairly even. This is not an issue with heat in the cooler climates as we hit the north shore this fall, and heating worked well in that room. In the South West at night the outside temps really came down so it wasn't a temp issue in the evening or morning, or for that matter sleeping. It was just the mid day heat that was fun.
Overall I am fairly happy with the trailer, it is very roomy with the 4 slides, our kid sleeps in the upper bunk over the mid room and we use the mid bunk as a den, so I can work on the road if necessary. Didn't have to for this trip through
I think the only big surprise we had was with the residential fridge, battery capacity and the truck's crappy 7 pin wiring that really doesn't help charge the battery at all. I purchased 2 x 6V Golf Cart Batteries, knowing I would need something for this trip, and overall they worked as expected, we were able to overnight at a rest area with no issues. The problem was the second night as we found out the truck was not really charging the battery while we drove. Jumper cables and high idle on the truck put back enough power for the second night. The fridge only draws around 50watts when running, so it doesn't draw a lot of power, that's a 4 amp draw.
Digging into the charging issue after the trip I found that there is tremendous voltage drop in the 12V auxiliary pin that is suppose to be capable of charging the battery. Testing at home with a 10 amp draw with my DC load, the voltage would drop to 9.8V not really helpful in charging the battery in the RV. it could trickle charge at about 1amp but that was about it. Since then I found they use 16awg wire from the front to back of the truck. I replaced it with 8awg wire for the 12V aux and also GND, now there is very little voltage drop, but since the Golf Cart batteries were temporary, i.e. I purchased some LiFePO4 batteries, but with supply shortages didn't have them in time for the trip. I have also purchased a DC/DC charger to ensure that it can properly charge the new LiFePO4 batteries since with the 8awg wire it could draw a lot more current than the Alternator could handle, the DC/DC charger will isolate and limit current along with charging at the correct voltage levels for LiFePO4 batteries. They worked well for our North shore trip which included some boon docking. Very happy with the new Li batteries with a combined 412 Ah rating.