3316 Miles, 12.3 MPG, and a list of repairs!

After 3316 miles and averaging 12.3 miles per gallon; our yearly trip to Wisconsin is complete. However, the results of the trip will be with us for a while! This trip was filled with more than a few surprises. None of them were what I would call major, since they did not involve any sort of trip interruption. They were for the most part just annoying things we had to live with while on the road.

Maybe the title of the blog post should have been “If you like fixing things, a travel trailer might be for you!”

As a result of the trip, I have a lot of fixing to do. If you are even reasonably handy, this probably won’t be an issue. However, if you are not a “do it yourself” sort of person you WILL at some point be paying someone to repair things on your travel trailer. This unfortunately is just a fact of life with every RV, no matter what type.

Trailers could be made stronger and much better but that’s probably a pipe dream now with so little competition compared to the number of companies that existed before 2000. Given the state of manufacturing right now, please invest in a independent certified inspector if you’re thinking of buying a new or used travel trailer. You do not want to start your RV adventure with a list of repairs, or worse yet, a lemon RV.

First, you will have your initial shake down period after you buy your trailer. During the first year you will hope to shake out all the problems so they can be fixed during your warranty period (if it is a new unit). After that it’s really maintenance and repair as needed. Make a note to yourself – “There will at some point be repairs”.

Our trip this year resulted in a number of things beyond simple maintenance. Here’s my list after our 3316 mile trip through the states of Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Texas.

1. Two windows need new external seals. I am noticing some pretty substantial shrinkage on the seals. This is not related to the trip, just an observation I made during my inspection.
2. Rebuild floor cabinet next to couch.
3. Re-attach a pantry shelf face-board, and reinforce the top two shelves.
4. Replace the control box on the brand new Lippert Recliner.
5. Replace the bathroom sink.
6. Replace both slide motors on the table/recliner slide.
7. Shower access panel cannot be screwed shut.

The cabinet near the couch collapsing was the result of a poor design by Grand Design. What I didn’t realize it that the cabinet was really just a two sided box with a couple of 3/4″x3/4″ boards stapled to the other two walls to set a shelf on. See picture below.

Not knowing how poorly the cabinet was created I’m sure that I put too much weight in it. I thought some six packs of home-brew would not be a problem – wrong! However, another person with the exact same model of trailer told me his collapsed with just a dust buster hand held vacuum in it. So what kind of weight can a two sided shelf hold? Not much!

This from the manufacturer that touts Amish craftsmanship – it’s not! While there is a large part of the Amish community that works in the RV industry, they are just assembling what they are given with staple guns or brad nailers according to the manufacturers design. No one in their right mind would construct a cabinet this way.

So as a result I created two plywood side panels. Wherever there are holes for wiring, the plywood is cutout so wires are not pinched. Each side has a bottom and top rail. The bottom has a piece of wood that joins the two sections together. The top rail holds a full size piece of plywood that has the original stained 1/16″ piece of plywood on top. This is now so strong it could easily support anything I put in there.

The Pantry is probably a prime example of the same sort of shoddy construction. I have now reinforced the top two shelves with a center brace. This would have taken under a minute per shelf at the factory to complete.

Also, looking underneath the face boards on each pantry shelf I can see that each front brace is not attached to one side of the cabinet. If this was a high school shop class, the student who built this would not get a passing grade.

The original bathroom sink cracked by the drain. I have no idea why this happened, other than it was cheap thin plastic. Since the sink is an odd size (14×17) I had to order the same Lippert sink. However, the sink is not the same as the original. It has a larger basin and the ABS plastic is thicker now; so I’m hopeful it will last longer.

On the negative side, the way the new sink attaches is not the same as the previous sink. Lippert Manufacturing includes the same brackets but with no hardware to insert in the plastic posts. Worse yet, they have no idea what to use. How can a manufacturer not know how to assemble their own product? They told me to call Grand Design and see what they were using on their line. I have no idea if Grand Design even uses this size sink anymore – I doubt it. However, I did reach out just in case that sink is still being installed on one of their rigs.

There has been no update from Grand Design after two weeks. So, in the meantime I hack sawed off the old threaded bolts from the old sink and screwed them into the new posts. Time will tell if that is a good solution. If Grand Design comes back with a recommendation, I will buy what they recommend and keep that in the camper, should my fix fail.

I have installed the new sink and water tested all the connections and the drain.

Now, on to the most involved repair:

Click hear to read my post on our schwintek slide issue in June. Now the slide motors on the opposite slide started sounding old and very tired. While retracting the slide you could hear the motors struggling to get to speed. We actually were on pins and needles wondering if we would get home before they completely stopped working. Tammy said that they sounded so bad that she wanted nothing to do with moving the slides in or out.

At our last stop I told Tammy “They only need to work two more times and we are good”. Had they failed on the road, I was prepared. I had two spare motors waiting inside the trailer in case it was necessary to make the change. However, no one really wants to spend their time in a campground messing with repairs.

So when I got home, I immediately replaced both of the tired motors. Now they sound brand new and operate great.

Now I only have one original motor left, and I’ve ordered a replacement for that one since it seems like the old motors have reached their expiration date.

So in conclusion – I have no idea what a dealership would have charged me for all the work I did…but it would have been a lot. Ball park labor rates are probably $125.00/hour. I would guess that they would have charged me at least eight hours of labor plus the parts (which would have had a mark-up) and not fixed things as well as I did. My guess is that I would have been pushing towards a 2000 dollar repair bill.

This is why it pays to do things yourself if possible. My cost was a total of 260 dollars in parts. Another benefit is that my trailer isn’t sitting on a dealers lot waiting for someone to repair it, which can take weeks and sometimes longer. If leaving your trailer in a dealers lot gives you separation anxiety – you are not alone!

Things are going to break; it is a fact of travel trailer ownership. It is much better if you can fix things yourself. You will be surprised how much you learn about your rig when you repair it yourself…good and bad.

Personally I enjoy fixing things, but you may not. That’s why RV repair facilities exist. If you are not comfortable with maintaining or repairing your RV you should definitely find a repair facility or Mobil RV repair person you can trust. I know there will be things I may not be comfortable fixing. In those cases I will need to rely on a repair facility.

Repairs can be somewhat minimized if you “get religion” around maintaining your travel trailer. Of course there will always be those things that break that have nothing to do with maintenance (just like the cabinet and sink issue above). So, in some cases the best you can do is become intimately familiar with your rig and stay on top of issues as they arise.

Safe Travels!