Newell Gurus

howdy, any hits or pictures of the work?

tom

I have pics, not sure how your site operates as far as posting them goes.

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These 2 pics show before and after restretching the body. What it did for the extreme warpage at the top aft corner of the number 4 slide room. The panel was bent so bad that even after it layed down we had to drill and Rivet it in place.

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You can also see in those 2 pics that the gap for the slide room opened back up too.

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You can see in this picture there are about 64 rivets installed in the area on the passenger side of the coach. 32 of which are new hole locations. Per Newell they recommend double the amount originally installed.

In order to pull the upper and lower skins back into Allignment again I had to use 2 20 ton bottle jacks in a strategic location and lift the coach about 6 inches in order to pull the panels. You have to be extremely carefull while doing this so you don’t flex he coach took much cracking grout lines and/or pop tiles. Also cracking the windshield is a area of concern.

I think it is important when the skin around the perimeter has pulled loose, or the trim at the bottom of the perimeter has pulled loose, that some sealant is applied. In my experience, once that bond is broken, it is a prime area for water intrusion.

If you have unexplained water in your basement, take careful look at the perimeter of the slide to ensure it has not broken loose from the frame.

Just my .02

Chris, first thanks for being a Florida local resource for this repair. It's a long way from here to OK. Second, your experience with the bottle jacks is exactly what I have done to bring the skins back into alignment. It helps a lot IF you can put the side you are working on in the sun, with the jacks in place, and just wait a couple of hours. However, given our weather this week, I know the sun was MIA. And third, I completely buy into the rivets along the vertical skins to hold them fast against the frame. Not beautiful, but it works.

Well alittle birdy once explained to me how it’s done sooo,,, I listened. Thank you

thanks for the pictures. i did reorient them so they would be upright.

tom

Thanks Tom, don’t know why they did that.