Things you can fix

It seems that we are in some kind of cycle of repairs. Over the past couple of months I've had to repair or replace a number of things on our rig that I wouldn't have expected. One of those was the lid to the dirty clothes hamper built into the top step as you go up to the bedroom area of our Montana fifth wheel. This is attached with a metal piano type hinge, and at least six screws. All but one of the screws had broken in two. I simply drilled new holes and added more screws.

The next repair was at the toilet. Ours is a Dometic Sealand model 210. The water valve located at the side and operated by the flush pedal was the culprit. I removed it and found that the neoprene seal inside had worn out. I knew I would never find a new seal but could possible buy a new valve. I found one at Tillamook RV in Tillamook Oregon. Across from the cheese factory. It cost me $30.90 but solved the problem. The next minor repair will be the little light in the switch that turns on the water pump. It decided to quite the other day. I'll look at it more closely when we stop traveling for a few days.

Sewer Valve Project

I'm just starting a sewer valve repair project. Actually I have two repairs to do. The valve on one of my gray tanks is leaking, and I have a crack in the top of the black tank to fix. Stay tuned for my notes about how this works out.

So far I have removed the membrane from the bottom of the trailer and confirmed the leaking valve. Water leaks from the hole where the push rod enters the valve to open and close the blade.

Tomorrow I'll flush the black tank as much as possible and prepare to remove it. When the black tank is out I'll have room to work on the gray valve as the glue dries on the crack repair. Hopefully all works out as planned. Check back to see what happens next.

Replacing a Vent Lid

I had to replace one of the vent lids on our old "93" Komfort fifth wheel today. It was a fairly simple process but required that I climb up on the trailer roof several times. The wind caught the old one during a little storm last weekend.

It was eleven oclock at night when the wind took the vent and I had to make an emergency repair to hold until I could get the parts and make the repair. I remembered that I had a roll of plastic stored in my rig that I could use if I could find a way to attach it to the vent. With everything being wet I knew none of the tape I had on hand would hold. I might need to travel quite a way before I could make the repair so whatever I came up with had to hold in windy conditions.

I keep a small spool of nylon string in my tool bag and I found that a couple of wraps tied tightly seemed to hold pretty well. It was difficult to put in place though as it was dark, raining, and blowing at the same time. The picture at left shows the plastic in place and moisture from condensation condensed inside. I had planned to put the pieces of broken vent on top to hold things in place as we traveled but I found that my temporary repair held really well with out it.

We stopped at Camping World as we were leaving Portland, Or. on Highway 84, but found that they didn't have the lid I needed. They told me that the store in Wilsonville had several of these in stock. After a quick trip to Wilsonville we were on our way again with all the parts needed to make my repairs. One part I had to get was the mechanical arm that lifts the vent. One small plastic part on the original had broken make it unusable. This part was about eight dollars while the vent lid was about twenty two dollars.

It was a little tricky to put the new lift arm parts in place because the holes didn't line up with the original ones. I was able to bolt the new parts in place successfully though and make the new parts work as well as the original ones. Putting the lid on the top was a snap. It simply slid on the original lit support with no problems. The only assembly required to the lid is to but the lift arm in place and it requires two screws included with the kit.


As I worked I bumped the old fan from time to time and found that it is so old that it kept crumbling apart whenever it was touched. I'll need to buy a new one next time I'm in a place where they sell them. Probably Wal-Mart.

This was a really easy fix. The hardest part being that I had to climb up on the roof a few times.

RV Vents

Well we're once again sitting out another Holiday storm here on the Oregon Coast. The wind is howling, trees are whipping around and every now and then buckets of rain begin dumping down on our rig. We're using our old 93 Komfort at the moment. We came over to the Oregon Coast to enjoy our 40 year class reunion and it was wonderful time. We had planned to be back to our other rig in NE Oregon by now but events, I call them "sequences" have prevented that for the time being.

Late last night as this storm hit I went out and began to "button things up" for the blow. I put the awning in, folded all the chairs and placed them under the fifth wheel overhang and generally checked to be sure all would be well. This trailer has a couple of leaks I am chasing so while I am concerned and looking for these, I will just need to hope for the best now. Not much needs to be done inside the rig. Just lower the two vents and the windows need to be closed.

We had both vents down when the storm hit but one of them was not quite all the way down tight. When the full force of the storm hit, it seemed to be mostly in the form of strong wind gusts and heavy showers of short duration. As I sat inside and listened to the storm I could hear the vent cover over the tub rattle so got up to check it out. I found that the vent was closed but that the crank that lifted it didn't work. I could turn the handle freely but the lid didn't move. It was about 11:00 oclock PM by then and I made a note to check it again in daylight, and went to bed. In less than five minutes a very strong gust of wind hit the trailer from the rear. It literally ripped the that lid off the vent and blew it away. I later found it in three pieces about 30 feet from the rig. The mechanism that lifts and lowers the lid is nowhere to be found.

As I grumbled and cussed my luck I began trying to figure out how I could temporarily patch this 16 inch hole in my roof and at least try to retain some of the heat inside the rig. Since the hole is over the shower tub, the rain coming in wouldn't really hurt anything while I worked on it.

The rim around the vent hole is not very condusive to tying things to and since everything is wet my duct tape won't work either. And I needed something to cover the hole with that I could somehow fasten in place. That's when I remembered that I had a roll of heavy plastic in a box in one of the storage compartments.

I don't recall where this plastic came from or how long I've had it. Every time I saw it as I was digging around for whatever, I wondered about it.

I used the one piece of the original lid I still had as a guide and I cut a piece of this plastic large enough to cover the vent hole. Then I remembered that I had a small spool of really strong nylon string in one of my tool bags. I carry a heavy nylon rain poncho behind the seat in my truck for emergencies like this too. I put this on, collected my plastic and my string and climbed up on the roof. The rain and wind had eased a little but I was careful not to let the wind grab my plastic. I couldn't hold my flashlight and use both hands for this project so I had to make do with the light coming up from inside the rig. It took me about 15 minutes to finally get the plastic tied in place so it would hold until morning.

I'll need to fix this well enough so I can travel and eventually replace it. My plan is to tape the three pieces of the original lid together then tape them in place over my plastic as a protective barrier to the wind. I don't know if it will work or not but it's all I can do for now. Today is Sunday of Labor Day weekend and I doubt that much outside help is available. I'll add photo's of this in my next post.