Side Wing Wood Replacement

[bajaphile]

Hi All,
I've found that the passenger side wing of my camper is rotting out pretty bad. I'm assuming that the leak is coming in from above through an external screw, dripping down the aluminum frame and then pooling up on the wood. My plan was to pull the interior siding and see if I could find the leak first. Once sealed, go ahead and replace the side wing.

I found a set of videos on Youtube where a guy is replacing his entire wood base. He mentioned he had to "wrestle" it in there even though he had the entire sub frame removed (see pic below from his video). I was planning on trying to remove it by itself and replacing it. Has anyone had luck doing this?

Picture of wood piece I am referring to (Clipped from Youtube). My leak is propagating from the corner I think, so it gives me lots of fun options to figure out where the leak is originating!



Thanks for any tips/advice.

 

[bajaphile]

Here's a pic of what I'm dealing with. You can see I patched it prior and resealed the rear window thinking it was the issue. Well, I was wrong. I've since pulled off the interior panel and insulation. I tried spraying the camper with a hose and of course, no water was found coming in.

I'm assuming it is coming through a screw, inside of one of the vertical aluminum supports, then down to the horizontal support and saturating that wood. Any other ideas? Right now I just have a huge bucket of Damp Rid to try and dry it out. Then monitor during the next storm.

Not sure if there are any problem areas I should investigate? Any other advice? The wood is sopping wet!

 

[pvstoy]

Comming off the rear tires from below?

 

[bajaphile]

Hi @pvstoy, thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately I don't believe that is the cause for a number of reasons. Mainly due to the fact that the inside portion of the side wing is wetter / rotting faster than the outside. From what I can tell, it appears that the exterior trim that is held on by screws and has the black plastic bulb trim may be the issue. I am going to pull it off and seal it, along with all the screw holes.

A few additional questions if anyone knows:
1) Does anyone know how the Carefree awnings are secured to the camper? It appears it is held on by some large rivets, but I couldn't imagine that was it. On top of the awning, there is another trim/gutter metal piece that is held on by screws every 2 inches.
2) Any good links for RV/Camper insulation? While I'm at it, I am going to pull off the side window and interior trim to see if I can find any ingress. I'd like to reseal the side window and put in new insulation.

Thank you

 

[Vic Harder]

2) Any good links for RV/Camper insulation? While I'm at it, I am going to pull off the side window and interior trim to see if I can find any ingress. I'd like to reseal the side window and put in new insulation.

Thank you

Dunno if "good" links, but I redid my Puma with rigid insulation, standard pink batting stuffed into small holes, all taped up with Duct tape and then with Reflectix. It is pretty much air tight. Camping now in the PNW, that may not be the best, as it keeps the humidty higher....

 

[bajaphile]

Well, I guess I'll document my findings for anyone in the future. I pulled a bit of the interior wall off to see if I could find where water was coming in from. After a rain I saw that the corner main support rail was wet. I decided to pull the exterior corner trim off completely and inspect.

After pulling the exterior corner trim, the vertical square tube was obviously seeing water and was still wet about 2 days after the last rain. There was a foam like tape that was completely brittle and basically just powder. I cleaned up everything and filled the holes with 3M 4200 and then laid a pretty thick bead of Sikaflex between the gap of the sheet metal. Then I added one layer of butyl tape along the mounting surface of the trim where the screws go.

Today we had rain all day and I can happily say that the rear corner area is finally not getting any pooling inside. Unfortunately there is still some wetness under the side window. It is either the window seal itself or the trim that runs fore/aft on the bottom edge of the camper. I plan on pulling all the trim off and resealing it with a new side wing panel.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

Sounds like you’re making good progress, congrats! When you redo your window, ensure that the butt joint of the butyl sealant is at the bottom center of the window. Marty (ATC) told me that it’s possible to have a leak if it’s along the top.