Well, you might be able to tell it's a bit chilling outside because I'm busy updating my project thread. At last check that temperature in central DE is 13 degrees with about a 15 to 20 mph wind! Brrrrrr!!! Good thing we have the fireplace cranking and enjoying a libation (or so).
This project I'll call
When the Walls Come Tumbling Down... Almost.
Back in June 2016, I was getting the coach ready for a cross country trip to begin in early July. I was cleaning up the basement and the inside of the coach.
During one of many trips in and out of the coach a light caught my eye. On the passenger side of the coach I notice a light coming from between the floor and the wall. I investigated and when I pulled the carpet back a bit more I could see the driveway! I had the basement doors open and was looking from inside the coach, through the basement bay, to the driveway.
Being the relatively bright person I am, I immediately thought, "This doesn't look right and I'm sure this wasn't standard equipment or an option from the factory."
All kidding aside, what I was looking at was the bottom of the exterior wall pulling away from the floor. So, I started to investigate.
In this photo, you see the gap between the wall and floor. The floor is on the bottom of the photo and the light part of the photo is the wall.
Here's a second photo of the gap with my finger in it to show you how large is the gap. This gap ran from the front door to just before the rear wheels. About 25 feet. It was widest behind the couch and then tappered back to being closed up to the floor on either end.
Well, as I said, this isn't good. Guess over the years before we purchased the coach, the maintenance on keeping things sealed was not done very well. So, what to do?
I scanned iRV2 but didn't come up with anything like my problem. Did a call with American Coach but they didn't understand my issue. They thought it was just the beltline moulding pulling loose (which they implied was not uncommon) and to tighten the screws.
I wasn't sure how the wall was attached to the floor so I asked for that info from AC customer service. They sent me this diagram.
They also sent me the beltline moulding diagram.
Helped a bit but guess I'll need to start taking things apart to see what's going on and how to correct.
The first step was to remove the nearly 35 foot piece of vinyl trim. In this photo, I'm removing it.
I also put witness marks on the vinyl moulding to aid in reinstallation. Reason for this is that vinyl stuff seems to shrink a bit and you have to pull it out to get it to fill the space.
After removing the vinyl trim, I saw the most of the screws that hold on the beltline metal trim were very rusty.
Here are what the screws look like:
Once I remove the screws it was time to remove the beltline moulding. Adhesive was used in some areas. I suspect this was not the first time repairs had been done to the beltline area. There were many extra screws holes without screws.
Once the beltline moulding was removed, this exposed the hinge for the basement doors.
Another view of the hinge.
Next I needed to remove the basement doors and then the hinges so I could get to the wall screws. Here is the first door removed.
Here the second door was removed. I removed all 4 doors between the entry door and the rear wheels.
The front fender needs to come off but first I need to disconnect the fuel fill opening.
Pop rivets were used to secure the spout to the fender. Had to drill them out.
After removing all that stuff, the fender finally comes off.
With the fender off, you can see 2 of the screws that hold the wall to the frame. These screws are next to the entry door.
Closer view of the loose screw. The screws had rusted causing everything to get loose.
Here's where I don't have photos. Guess I failed to upload them before deleting them. Anyway, here's the summary of what I did to fix the wall.
- The wall and floor are constructed of 1.5 inch square steel tubing.
- The wall is attached to the floor with ¼ self drilling screws. The screws go through the wall tubing and then into the floor frame tube.
- These screws are on about 10 inch intervals.
- All the screws had rusted and the threaded part where in contact with the steel frame had eroded.
- However, for the most part the steel frame was in decent shape. Good for me.
I decided to fix the wall to floor attachment this way:
- I determined I could drill through the wall frame and floor frame.
- I would use ¼ x 4 inch in length stainless steel bolts.
- I used stainless washers and a stop nut.
- To get to the stop nut, I had to drill access holes in the floor.
- As I added each bolt, the wall closed up very well.
Here's a photo of the holes I drilled in the floor inside the coach. This is directly above the steer wheels on the passenger side. Note the evidence of water that was throw up by the tires.
I drilled holes either from the inside or from the basement. When I was working on the wheel well area, I chose to drill from inside so I wouldn't have new penetrations where water might sneak in.
When I was in the basement area, I drill the hole in the ceiling like below and then carved out the foam insulation so I could get the washers and stop nut on the bolt.
Here's a out of focus shot showing the wrench holding the stop nut as I tightened the bolts from the outside.
All together, I installed 30 bolts to secure the wall to the floor. I also replace 6 screws in each basement bay frame that holds that frame to the coach.
This picture may help show what I'm talking about. This photo also shows the frame after I applied some POR15 to areas that were showing corrosion. The black arrow points to one of the screws that I replaced. As mentioned, there are 3 screws on each side.
Once this was done, I resealed the areas between the basement and floor and the front wheel wheel and the floor. Think I used nearly 3 tubes of Geocel.
Time to put things back together
Now that the wall is bolted back the floor, it's time to reverse the disassembly process.
- Frames were put back in the basement area.
- The basement door hinge was reinstalled. I had to replace all the screws. Used stainless, went a size bigger, and drill and tapped new screws holes.
- Next was the beltline moulding. I choose to run a thin bead of sealant along the top edge only on the backside of the moulding. Bottom was not sealed. Thought is if water does get behind, it will wick out the bottom. American Coach told me this the proper way to do it.
- Basement doors were installed.
- New 3M automotive moulding tape was applied.
This photo shows all the stuff back on and the 3M tape applied to the coach. The white strip on the driveway is the 35 or so foot vinyl trim.
Here's a photo of me doing final prep of the trim.
My really good friend helped me install the vinyl trim (actually he helped me with most of this and the floor project). We started in the middle and worked our way to either end. We had to pull a bit to stretch the vinyl so it would fit.
Next was to apply sealant on the upper edge of the beltline moulding. This is in addition to the sealant on the back side of the moulding. Here I applied tape to keep things looking good with the sealant. I used Geocel and that stuff is sticky and starts to dry very quickly! I had to move fast.
Another view.
After this was finished, my bride and I left for a month long trip and we covered over 6,000 miles. We noticed these things:
- The coach was quieter driving down the road.
- No longer had this unexplained draft.
- The coach stays much cleaner now that we are better sealed from road dust.
Sorry about some photos missing. But don't worry too much. I checked the driver's after this was done and I see where the wall is just beginning to pull away from the floor. So, I'll have another opportunity to take photos of the repair.
Final note. This project caused me to do the floor replacement project that I documented above. In order to get to where I needed to reattach the wall, I had to cut out some of the carpet as it was in the way.
Take care!
Linear Mode
