Does it hurt to open the sliders without leveling ?

[jbucking]

Sometimes if we stop over night a Sam's Club / Walmart or a rest area I need to open a sliders for a short time to access a drawer, storage, etc. I am reluctant to put the level legs on my Phaeton down in "public lot", so to speak, for fear of damaging the parking lot, or causing concern. Will it hurt the coach or the sliders to open them up for a short time without the level legs down if the coach is aired up (if the sight is relatively level, like a parking lot) ? We always close the sliders as soon as possible out of courtesy to others in the parking lot.

[Skip426]

If the spot your parked is close to level , you should have no problems. I would be reluctant to run a slide out if the slide was on the down side on an off level spot, increased load on the slide drive trying to pull the weight up-hill.

[dpinvidic]

Your going to get all kinds of answers.
First, you can put you levelers down, it won't cause damage unless you raise the wheels (which you will not do).

The street in front of my house has the normal crown, and the front of the coach also slants down.
I always extend my bedroom slides about 8-10 inches at home to gain access WITHOUT leveling.
And I break the other rule about not stopping your slides 1/2 way out.
The instructions to sync the motors is to extend the slide a little, then retract it and hold the button for 3-4 seconds after it stops. I do this all the time.
So basically I resync my slides each time I use them.

The bedroom slides are fairly light, so I don't see any serious issues...but I always watch.

The thing to keep in mid is gravity is trying to pull the slide towards the lower direction. So the front to back leveling makes the slide box want to move towards the font of the coach and the Schwintek slides is holding it in place.

So my opinion is that you will be fine.....others will say differently.

Regards,

Dan

[62Morgan]

jbucking, Welcome to the forum. If you will add your year, model, etc, to your signature we can give 100% accurate reply to inquiry.

If reasonably level conditions, you should have no problem at all. I would say 6 inch or greater fall in either direction would be a problem.

I, too, regularly extend a mere foot and retract when finished without incident. I believe the manufacturer's direction is a more cover-your-arse [for warranty] measure than a thou-shall not...directive. Been doing this on two coaches now over a 20 year span. The short-travel does not place too much strain nor wear on the mechanism and it's not cantilevered significantly to induce any warpage because it's still predominantly located in the coach sidewall frame in lieu-of-hanging fully extended.