One of our slides is stuck out. We had this problem in Yuma four years ago. I'm not the engineer/mechanic in the family, but the gist of it is that the bolts that hold the struts together get sheared with time and then they break. At least that is my limited understanding. Four years ago, I would have been in tears and panicked, but this time I managed to hold it together. I just kept affirming that Divine Intelligence would guide us on how and/or where to get it fixed. Kim had a good idea of how to fix it, and he jerry-rigged replacement bolts in place. But unfortunately, they were not strong enough and broke off every time we tried to put the slide in. The management at Heceta Beach RV gave us the name of an RV Repairman, Keith's RV Repair here in Florence. We gave him a call, and although he was working on another rig, he gave Kim some pointers. A quick trip to True Value Hardware for some heavy duty bolts, and some patience on Kim's part, accompanied by just a little bit of swearing, and it looks like we are good to go. Kim bought extra bolts to have on hand just in case. Hopefully, she will hold together at least until we get to San Juan Bautista, where we will be for about a week. Luckily for us, we have friends in the area who will put us up (and put up with us), if the rig needs more than a day's work done to her.
So now, we are off to Crescent City. Hope to be there before dark.
Hi. Kim here again.
ReplyDeleteThe slide issue seems to be common to this model/style.
Somebody had a brainfart when they designed the mechanism to extend/retract the room. It sits on two rails with two small gears that track in the matching teeth on the rails. The two gears are tied together with a shaft between them so as the room moves in or out the two gears move at the same time keeping the slide room going in/out evenly. Now for the lame engineering part. To drive the room in/out they used a hydraulic ram but put it by the rearmost gear (presumably to save money on the length of hydraulic hose needed to install it). This means all the force exerted to move the room is at one end relying on the above mentioned shaft to transmit the force to the forward gear. Well, if there is ANY resistance it breaks one or both of the small bolts holding the connecting shaft to the two gears. For the cost of about 6' of hydraulic hose the ram could have been centered on the slide room and eliminated the problem. Problem #2 with this design is that the front edge of the slide room doesn't close properly and leaves a gap which lets in water and water is not good. We now have some rotted wood flooring which is going to be expensive to repair. Yes, if I had been more informed and diligent I may have limited some of the damage, but if you go back and look at the title of this blog........