Journey coming unglued

[Wolfs]

Literally...

Various places that are glued are now coming apart. For instance the hinges for the front access panel (in front of the fuse boxes and the generator), the grill in the rear, the panels on the right rear surounding the basement AC, the rear wheel surounds and several other places.

Two questions: Is this common, and whats the best fix? 2005 Journey 36

Thanks!

[David49]

I recently had a problem with the front access panel separating from the frame on one end. Called Winne and they agreed with my proposed solution to reattach with marine epoxy and clamp overnight. So far, so good.

[jimmccreary]

Wolfs,
Unfortunately it seems to be common for the older Winnebagos (I can really only speak for my 04 Journey). In 2009 My rear grill came unglued. It was reglued by the shop and came unglued 6 months later. Then I realized the front hood, rear end cap, and rear grills were all coming unglued. Others have found satisfactory results with glues but I felt that a more permanent solution would be fiberglass epoxy. If you are not a perfectionist, I cannot say for sure that you will find this approach worth the substantial effort. If you are comfortable working with fiberglass, it is a modest effort.

I removed all grills and rear end cap, including fog lamps and also removed the brackets that glued them to the chasis. I removed the previous glue. I ground the fiberglass clean with a grinder so that the raw fiber glass was exposed. Then I used fiberglass and epoxy to overlap the brackets into the various components. Then I bolted or screwed the brackets to the chasis.
After inspection 9 months later the fiberglass overlap joints of the brackets to the components are still strong.

It was a lot of work. Care has to be taken when working with epoxy resin as this is difficult to remove when dry.

The upside--I think this approach is permanent and will only have to be done once.
The downside--lots of work, but the engineer inside of me would do it again but would work smarter based upon what I learned about working with fiberglass resin.

hope this helps

jim & debbie, 04 Journey 34H

[skigramp]

Check out this thread

Fixing glue failures

[Catpowered]

I have had the same unglueing problems with my 04 Meridian. From what I understand is that Larry, Darrel and his other brother Darrel were working in the day/night shade department. Because they drilled all the cord holes in the wrong direction (causing a burr which trashed the cords) and put the plastic inserts in backwards, they were reassigned to the glueing division. Here they made sure that the metal parts were all painted with high-gloss paint before attempting to secure the fiberglass parts to them with epoxy. Rumor has it they have been retired with a huge union pension.

[Gary - K7GLD]

Originally Posted by Catpowered

I have had the same unglueing problems with my 04 Meridian. From what I understand is that Larry, Darrel and his other brother Darrel were working in the day/night shade department. Because they drilled all the cord holes in the wrong direction (causing a burr which trashed the cords) and put the plastic inserts in backwards, they were reassigned to the glueing division. Here they made sure that the metal parts were all painted with high-gloss paint before attempting to secure the fiberglass parts to them with epoxy. Rumor has it they have been retired with a huge union pension.

I thought I heard they were deeply involved in the development and production of that new Ford diesel engine...

More seriously, the more scattered issues I hear happening with some of the newer RVs, the happier I am with my old stuff - maybe not fancy, but VERY solid and reliable!

[Midniteoyl]

More seriously, the more scattered issues I hear happening with some of the newer RVs, the happier I am with my old stuff - maybe not fancy, but VERY solid and reliable!

And no bank note