Self Closing / Soft Close Bay doors

[redbaron73]

Why don't we have self closing/latching bay doors?


My BMW has auto close/soft close doors where you pull the door to the first latch, and then the door will automatically close all the way.


Caddilac has had auto closing trunks for a very long time, based on the same concept.


Anyone interested in "think tanking" a mod to bring this to our bay doors?

[CoreyinWP]

Don’t the KA doors have that feature?

[DS15]

Originally Posted by CoreyinWP

Don’t the KA doors have that feature?

Yes, the King Air has that feature on all bay doors. It is pretty cool, but you really pay for it in the KA price. There are no door latches on the exterior to open, just press a backlit blue LED button and the door opens, soft close to the first latch and the door closes tight by itself. I guess that you could go look at a KA, get the company name and part number off of the latch and contact the company directly - don’t call Newmar for the price of a latch - if you do, might as well buy a KA! Newmar has already done it so why try reinventing something all over again? I watched the mechanism work and like I said it’s really cool, but it does look expensive!

[redbaron73]

I didn't realize they had the soft close on KA. Guess I need to figure out how they did it.

[Stuart W]

Yep and no handles on the outside just a button that lights up, very clean looking

[hohenwald48]

You can have anything you want. As long as you're willing to pay the price.

[Jtrving]

My single favorite feature on the KA, hands down.

Can’t really add it aftermarket because the door latches are still going to be there. You would have to replace every door to have the same appearance. The blue buttons are located at the top of the door, so I guess you could just add them there and leave the existing latches inoperable.

[redbaron73]

The door latches are ok.

The mechanism moves from the door to the inside of the bay. The u bolt get located to the door

The latch would act as the push button trigger. It would be a very clean setup if the parts can be found.

I just need to source the mechanism. I believe PTL supplies it to newmar. I will find out on Monday.

[wishalls]

I am following this mod closely.

[Dav L]

How about using linear actuators to not just keep the door closed, but also to open the door. About $100 / motor / door. The problem would be if the motor broke, on how to manually open the door. And it would only work if battery power was available.

On mine, I can remove all goods from the non broken door, and crawl into the underbelly and "unlink" the bad actuator to open that door.

Teasing the idea a little more...what if the door side of the actuator somehow used the old mechanical latch as it's anchor. So, if actuator fails, just use the door handle to open.

I like the actuator idea to close the doors when opening the slides automatically...

[Dutch Star Don]

The actuators would be nice, but the doors aren't sturdy enough. If you put them where they would need to be, middle of the door, they would be in the way.

Actually, you would just need a bunch of the trunk latch closers like a lot of SUV's use. Mount the striker to the back of the latch and install the electric lock to the door frame.

[NealC]

My biggest concern with KA "power" doors is I just don't trust them (Newmar/RV industry). The other minor issue is the blue lit buttons just invite kids to walk by and push buttons.

[redbaron73]

Look at a picture of the kingaire.

They just swap the loop and actuator. The actuator is fixed. The doors wont be a problem doing it this way, and seems very simple to retrofit.

The issue is how do you access when it fails.

I would not do this on all doors, only those that have a secondary access method. Sadly, this means the wetbay is out, as is electric bay. Both of those are used often.

[Dutch Star Don]

If you get really serious about doing it, just cut an access panel on the outside of the wet bay to access the latch from the wheel well. Cut a second access panel inside the wet bay to access the electrical. Just use the white paneling as a cover.