Day #2 - From a Chassis to a Beast!

Monday, August 10, 2015: the day our new motorhome entered Tiffin’s main production facility.  It went in a chassis on August 10th and it will come out a real motorhome on Friday, August 14th.  It will still need its exterior painted, but it will most definitely be a fully-functioning motorhome.

The main production facility at Tiffin is a massive building that is divided into several production lines with stations placed periodically along each line.  Each station is responsible for building or installing specific parts of each motorhome that comes through.  For example, on the line our motorhome will travel down, station #7 installs the roof.

Each line sees four new coaches every day and the organization on display in the factory is really impressive.  But it has to be in order to produce 12 coaches per day.

Monday (August 10th), after spending the morning in the welding shop (for more work on the frame), our chassis was ready at 12:30 PM for the main production facility and Station #1.  It was now sporting some goodies it didn’t have before.  And wires.  Lots of wires.  And hoses.  And tubes.  Lots and lots of wires and hoses and tubes.

Whoa...it looks like the innards of some diabolical beast ready to devour Red Bay, Alabama!  Help, help!

They’re everywhere, sprouting from every square inch of the chassis!  Isn’t there anyone out there who can help us?

Never fear, Lisa is here!  Lisa has been working at the Tiffin factory for 10 years and has never met a wire she couldn’t tame.

Below is the answer for those motorhoming folks who do not wish to always be tethered to electric power: the humble 3,000 watt inverter.

Dale, who has been with Tiffin for 12 years, helps wrangle some of that tenacious wiring.

Now this is teamwork.  Lisa and Dale have been working together at Station #1 for 10 years.

Lisa was fearless, jumping right into the middle of the beast in order to tame it.

Two of my newest friends - a central vacuuming system (sigh...) and the AquaHot “hot water on demand” system (double sigh...).

John adding more hoses, as if there were not enough already.  But it’s okay...these are the hot and cold water hoses.

 Ah, the true innards of this beast: the fresh water, the gray (waste water) and the black (sewage) tanks.

Our sliding pass-thru basement storage tray...the perfect solution for aging backs.

 Lisa corralling even more wires and hoses and tubes before sending the chassis on to Station #2...where it will get a floor!

Many thanks to the good men and women of Station #1...because of you, Art and I (and our chassis) had a great first day in the Tiffin production facility.

Now it's on to Station #2!


To be continued...