Water issue with slide out SE model

jakebrake · 08-18-2012, 05:11 AM

Well, I was able to re-adjust the stop points on the slide the other day. When I was fixing this issue I ran into a little bit bigger problem. From years of neglect and the stops being out of adjustment, the outside wall seperated I found some water damage.

My question is:
Does any know how the smooth sides are assembled?
Can you actually take the exterior skin off these campers?

henryj · 08-18-2012, 03:26 PM

There are various pros and cons for Al or fiberglass, but when it comes to ease of repair, Al wins hands down. How big a piece of Filon are you planning on replacing? If it's just the front of the slide, that's just a small piece. Home Depot sells something that's at least very similar--look for FRP--fiberglass reinforced plastic. RVs are built from the inside out. When the basic structure is completed Al siding is stapled onto the studs or Filon is glued to the studs. I don't know what kind of glue was used, but doubt it would be contact cement as the sheets of Filon are unwieldy and would have to be positioned. I suspect a small outfit, like Sunline that did not build many with Filon, may even have trimmed out the edges and openings with a router after attaching the panel.

Filon is fairly easy to find. Google "buy Filon" for a number of hits including Factory RV Surplus. If you are reasonably handy and thinking this is a job you could handle yourself--it will take at least twice as long as you think so plan for a covered building--but aren't sure exactly what's involved... I would suggest visiting an RV factory to see what they do. A large fully Filon company like Rockwood may be more automated than Sunline was or you will be. Jon may be able to suggest a more small scale company to see what's involved in handling a roll of Filon. You may then also be able to figure out if this stuff can be peeled off and reused. Any contractor that has used FRP may be able to help you as well.

I don't recall anyone here rebuilding a Filon Sunline so take lots of pictures and keep this thread updated.

Henry

jakebrake · 08-18-2012, 08:31 PM

Well, with hearing this information I may have to rethink my game plan. From what I have found its the bottom 8" and from the front of the slide it's about 3' long. I wonder if this can be fixed from the inside? The couch is on this part of the slide out, which means there is an access door directly in the affected area. If you count the area of the access door most of the problem is below the floor. I will take some more pics and post them for you the experts to brain storm on.

**JohnB** · 08-18-2012, 08:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jakebrake

years of neglect and the stops being out of adjustment, the outside wall seperated I found some water damage.

My question is:
Does any know how the smooth sides are assembled?
Can you actually take the exterior skin off these campers?

Jake,

Which skin do you want to open up? The end of the slide that is in your pic OR the long front to back outside of the slide?

Reason I ask this is I had to remove both on my slide to correct the floor rot. Yes, I have aluminum siding, however I suspect the ends of the slide are made similar to a Filon unit.

See here on mine. The large flat sheet of white aluminum was glued to a piece of 1/8" luan board then glued to the studs. You can see me sliding my home made drip edge behind it.

Once you take the corner off you can peel back the luan and the siding stays with it. This is only the case on the ends of my slide to hold the large sheet of flat siding. On the corragated sides they where stapled on each piece of siding.

See there an inside shot from EMD_Driver and Kitty's salvage camper they bought for parts. You can see the luan sheet on the ends. This is a 2004 model camper you are looking at in these pic's

I would "suspect" that Sunline glued the large end filon sheet to a piece of 1/8" luan on the ends of your slide just like mine and like the 2004 T299SR EMD_Driver took apart.

This way you are not dealing with the filon at all. The actual long end of the slide may be made the same.

Pictures from my thread here may be helpfull even if the siding is different.
http://www.sunlineclub.com/forums/f7...age-10695.html

Hope this helps and please try and take some pic's of the process. Like Henry stated, we have not had any one yet post repair pics of a filon sided camper and these pics and repairs are priceless for those coming behind us fixing theirs.

Good luck

John

jakebrake · 08-19-2012, 08:17 AM

Thanks for the research thread. After studying the pics of your project John, I see how the sides are built. My issue is with the Darco wrapped board at the bottom.

The lower right side of your slide shows the Darco wrapped board. How is that fastened to the slide?

**JohnB** · 08-19-2012, 05:36 PM

Jake

The fender board is screwed to the side of the slide floor just below the wall sill.

I went back to my pile of pics and found some more to show this area. These are new to my photo site as of today in case you had looked before.

Here is the joint itself

Now the screwed on fender board

Now closer

And here you can see one of the square bit flat head screws at the far left in the pic. They are about 2 to 2 1/2" lg.

Here is the fender board removed

And here is under the Darco exposing the slide floor. The floor is 2 pieces of 1/2 " OSB board glued together on my generation floor. Your plastic coated floor may be 1 single piece of pressed board 1" thick

Let me know if you need more. I have a bunch more not up on the photo server.

John

jakebrake · 11-22-2012, 02:37 PM

I just wanted to post an update. Shortly after posting this thread,I spoke with Gennene from Kitsmiller RV. She was very concerned with the situation and wanted to have a look. I was very impressed with her interest with the matter. They looked it over and was willing to help me resolve the issue. When I picked it up and looked it over, I noticed they went over and above with the repair. They replaced the board and the Darco wrap, then they used a special under coating over the wrap.

One more repair I made was the foam seal on the bottom of the Slideout. I was having a hard time finding a replacement seal. With a little research I found the Foam Factory store carries out door grade foam. I was able to find foam seconds and ripped them to size on my bandsaw and glue them in place. The total repair cost around $20.00 which included the spray adhesive.

ihsolutions · 11-22-2012, 03:29 PM

jakebrake, if you are in Michigan and went to Foam Factory then you weren't too far from Palco RV down in Roseville, which carries the foam strips you were looking for.

They sell it by the foot, and I had to buy a whole roll when I bought my new (5 year old) Sunline fifth wheel in 2009. It was missing the foam strips entirely, though you could tell they were there at one point. The end result is that water sprays up inside the camper when you are driving in the wet.

Palco is a great place to get cheap RV stuff. If I lived closer I would probably be there more often.

jakebrake · 11-22-2012, 04:31 PM

I didn't know about that place, I'm not far at all from there. I will have to remember that for future reference. I did alter how I applied the foam though. I actually installed it onto the aluminum angle backing plate which is mounted to the bottom of the slide out instead of mounting it to the frame of the camper. This helped in two ways; one a wider piece of foam can be used to seal the opening, and two there is a better bond on the ends where it is angled. It appeared to originally be adheared over the two rubber seals at each end.