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Friday, February 20, 2015

Sometimes Ya’ Have To Know When To Quit

As many of you know, I like to do as many of my own repairs to our Journey as possible.  Recently, we had a minor issue with our bedroom slide.  Extending it I heard a “Crack” and wondered what happened.  When bringing the slide in, the bed lifted up a bit before the slide started to move.

I checked under the bed to look at the slide mechanism and found on the slide rail, two bolts had broken on the guide rail.

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The broken part of the bolts were still in the slide guide.

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I got an Easy Out to drill and remove the broken portion of the bolts.

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Using a center punch, I hammered a dimple in the broken bolt so the drill bit would be centered.

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Once I drilled a hole and used the easy out to remove the broken bolts, I saw why the bolts broke.  There is a misalignment in the track and the slide stops are out of adjustment.

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Looking at the stop bolts, they have a yellow line painted on the bolt showing that the adjustment was in place right from the factory and never moved.

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Because the slide adjustments are crucial to where the slide stops going in and out, they need to be readjusted before the new bolts can be installed, or the new bolts will just break too.  Misadjusting the slide stops could cause catastrophic (expensive) damage with the hydraulic pressures on the mechanism.

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I can’t find any place in my owners manual that pertains to adjusting the slide, and I don’t want to monkey with it because I can really damage the slide, so I decided to quit and let the factory do it when we go up there next spring.  The slide is still operational, I just have to push down on the bed when bringing in the slide.

Sometimes certain things have to be left up to the experts.  I know I could adjust it if I just knew how.  I’ll gladly let the factory tech do it, but you can be sure I’ll pick his brain to learn how to do a slide adjustment if it ever happens again.  It will be money well spent.

Some people will point to this and say they’re glad they don’t have slides.  For the extra space they afford, we’re glad to have them and consider a slide repair no different than any other part of an RV that breaks, be it a fan belt or a water heater.  Just the cost of doing business.

Thanks for visiting and feel free to leave a comment.

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12 comments:

  1. A smart man knows when to say "let the pros do it ". Glad you can still get the slide in!

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  2. Seems a lot of us are doing RV repairs these days... and you are so right... a person has to be comfortable with what they do. It's good you can still use your rig until all is well again.

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  3. With you all the way on knowing when to leave it to the factory and that slides are worth the aggravation. For us it's mostly the hydraulics but you can bet we'll be checking this. Thanks.

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  4. Maybe Marti will loan you out if we can ever catch up to you. I'm sure we'll have a list of things needing repair by then.

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  5. "Sometimes certain things have to be left up to the experts"

    Couldn't agree with you more & that's why at our house Kelly is the one who changes the light bulbs..........

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  6. Its great that you got as much done as you did! And like you said, leave the final adjustments to the techs who are familiar with that particular device. I know we fiddled with my mom's for quite a bit before we got it working right (she got a throw rug caught in their mechanism and it was a mess! )

    KarenInTheWoods and Steveio
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    (Blog) RVing: The USA Is Our Big Backyard
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  7. It takes a big man to call in the experts...good for you! I'll bet you read directions too! :)

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  8. It takes a big man to call in the experts...good for you! I'll bet you read directions too! :)

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  9. You are so right, sometimes it is well worth it to let the experts do it.

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  10. Next thing you know you will be asking for directions... or the curse of being a man...

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  11. Here's hoping those experts at the factory don't let you down. Everything they fixed for us in 2011 is still intact except for the slide topper anti-flap bracket which is off again. I am hoping a call to them will elicit what they would do this time since what they did last time did not hold. Maybe 3-4 years is all you can expect from filling in the holes then gluing and screwing back into the fill material. Good luck!

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