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Old 04-20-2014, 03:44 PM   #1
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Newmar Owners Club
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Location: Valley City, OH
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Replacing Kwikee steps

I'm hoping someone can give me a little more detail about how to replace the Series 32 Kwikee steps on my 1999 DSDP. I found some old threads on the subject but nobody gave a good description of how the steps are mounted to the motorhome.

My old steps broke (we won't discuss how they broke, but I do now have a fancy label next to my store jacks switch that reads, "RETRACT STEPS" ).

The important thing is that I have brand new steps ready to install.

The electrical is disconnected and it looks like it will be plug and play to the new steps, but I can't figure out how to get the old steps off. They're secured by four bolts with nuts on the bottom. I got the nuts to loosen but now the bolts just spin. I can't see the tops of the bolts but they seem to go right through to the bottom inside step. I started peeling up the vinyl material on that step but don't see a bolt head where it should come through. I'm thinking I'll have to lift up the wooden board under the vinyl, but I can't see how it's attached. While poking around on that board I might have found a screw tip which would indicate that it was screwed in from the bottom. Is that possible? If so, I'm in trouble. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
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Old 04-20-2014, 04:15 PM   #2
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All my bolts were welded to frame steps mounted to, so no spin, but the new steps did not line up with the rear two bolts so had to drill and use self tapping lags.
I have never seen any instructions in the COM_NET link for this installation by Newmar , maybe a call to Newmar can get you the answer.
Here is the extent of a 99 coach. No instructions.
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Old 04-23-2014, 10:53 AM   #3
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I've decided to post my experience in case it's helpful to someone down the road. The bolts did, in fact, run through the floor. They were lag bolts set in floor board, then covered by a double layer of floor board with the vinyl stair material glued on top. First, I had to peel back the vinyl covering. It took some muscle but the adhesive was still tacky. I also had to remove the backing from the next stair up and pull out the carpeting on the left side to make room for the floor board to come up.

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The floor board was glued and secured with many, many staples. I appreciate Newmar's build quality, but I'm not sure where they thought this board was going to go. All those staples posed a real challenge because they were impossible to dig out individually and there was nowhere around the edge of the board to insert a pry bar. I ended up putting two screws in the top of the board, attaching a wire to the screws and using a long piece of metal as a lever to pry the board straight up.

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Here's a picture showing all the staples. There are at least 20 of them and they're much longer in person. When I put it back down, I'll secure it with screws in case (God forbid) I ever have to do this again.


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This exposed the underflooring with the lag bolts set into the wood.

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There was no way for me to get a hold of the tops of the lag bolts so, once I saw what I was up against, I used a grinder and a dremel to cut the four nuts off from the bottom.

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The wood is in decent shape but isn't strong enough anymore for new lag bolts to gain a purchase so I'm going to replace them with washers and hex head bolts.

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This is proof that the stairs really do come off!

Hopefully the reinstall goes easier. I'll post here if I run into any unusual challenges.
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