Simple RV Cover Repair

[CamJam1]

The cover on my 34' Dolphin caught on the roll out awning and caused a tear in the fabric about 12" long when I was removing the cover yesterday.

When I was investigating what I could use to repair it I remembered two years ago I had replaced the vinyl roof on one of my old cars using good old contact cement. When people mentioned contact cement I always thought of the stuff in tubes we used as kids to put plastic models together, but I'm talking about the stuff in cans that you find at hardware stores, used for gluing Formica countertops, etc. That's what they used to put vinyl roofs on cars back in the day, and it REALLY sticks.

I had some vinyl roof material from that project left over, but then remembered that my RV cover came in a bag that is made of the same material as the cover itself. I don't use the bag for storing the cover-- I have a plastic box for that-- so I decided to cut out some pieces from the bag and use them, as the fabric would be a perfect match.

The normal way to apply contact cement is to spread the glue on the two items that you wish to stick together, and then wait a few minutes for it to get tacky. The glue sticks particularly well to itself, but not so well otherwise, so this step is absolutely necessary.

I placed patches on both the inside and outside of the cover. Though I'm not sure this was absolutely necessary, since the rip happened at a sharp edge on the awning I figured it couldn't hurt to double up on the fabric there. I might put some rubberized tape on the metal edge of the awning too.

I neglected to take a picture of the tear, but here is the patch before and after gluing. Except for a little discoloration from the glue, you'd be hard pressed to know that it was ever repaired. The light gray is the roof part of the cover (polyester) and the dark gray is the polypropylene fabric used on the sides. The tear was in the polypropylene, starting near the seam and extending downward.

A new cover would have been $200+, while the can of contact cement was under $10. Hopefully the cement hasn't weakened the synthetic fabric. I guess only time will tell on that, but these polypropylene covers usually only last three or four years in the Arizona sun anyway.

[doc]

Don't own a cover, but I have repaired an awning snag with Eternabond tape and it worked very well. Looks like it would work to repair your tear also

[153stars]

I found you can repair a lot of things with Shoe goo or seals-all or other variants of this type clear flexible sealer. My RC buggies bodies and battery packs were always patched up with it.