Awning Protection

Protecting it while it is at home is at least a start.

Plastic rain gutter and zip-ties work just like the slit pipe and are orders of magnitude cheaper.

Covering it while at home is a good idea. Short of that, keep it clean and wipe the exposed section with a UV protectant should help.

Allworth wrote:
Protecting it while it is at home is at least a start.

Plastic rain gutter and zip-ties work just like the slit pipe and are orders of magnitude cheaper.

Allworth-I should have mentioned that I cannot use the old rain gutter I once used on the old 5er because I no longer have a gutter above the awning to hook onto. This means that the fabric that is attached to the RV will be exposed and would probably fail first.

wildtoad wrote:
Covering it while at home is a good idea. Short of that, keep it clean and wipe the exposed section with a UV protectant should help.

Wildtoad-I too thought of rubbing the awning down with 303 Protectant but began to wonder if a tape might do a better job-hence my question. Thanks for your suggestion.

Well... our awning (A&E) which has the metal cover when up, is 16 years old. It is NOT vinyl which probably helps, but the only wear that is evident, is the short piece of fabric that connects the mounting strip to the cover. We do keep it clean, not put up wet, etc.

Jim

I've seen more than one awning that rotted at the top fixed be cutting off the bad part and sewing on a fresh strip of material. It =does= require that the rest of the awning be in good shape.

Lyle

laknox wrote:
I've seen more than one awning that rotted at the top fixed be cutting off the bad part and sewing on a fresh strip of material. It =does= require that the rest of the awning be in good shape.

Lyle

So I'm wondering if I can avoid that type of damage, or delay it, by proactively putting some sort of tape over that area while it is still "new". The tape would take the abuse and save the awning.

Part of my problem is that I don't know if the tape might react with the awning material and make it brittle or somehow compromise it's life prematurely. I've looked at some of the product reviews and some people report that the tape itself degraded but there is no mention of the awning fabric itself. I'm thinking the fabric would be OK but my thinking has been known to cause problems in the past so I'm looking for folks with experience with these products,

If you are going to go the tape route, go to a marine supply and get some sail repair tape. I don't know how much sun or UV protection it would add. My awning is over 10 yrs old and is showing damage where it is exposed constantly at the top of the roll. I used sail repair tape until I get around to replacing it. The stuff is ideal.

I tried awning tape. It's junk! I saved mine by
using Bus Kote.

TakingThe5th wrote:

laknox wrote:
I've seen more than one awning that rotted at the top fixed be cutting off the bad part and sewing on a fresh strip of material. It =does= require that the rest of the awning be in good shape.

Lyle

So I'm wondering if I can avoid that type of damage, or delay it, by proactively putting some sort of tape over that area while it is still "new". The tape would take the abuse and save the awning.

Part of my problem is that I don't know if the tape might react with the awning material and make it brittle or somehow compromise it's life prematurely. I've looked at some of the product reviews and some people report that the tape itself degraded but there is no mention of the awning fabric itself. I'm thinking the fabric would be OK but my thinking has been known to cause problems in the past so I'm looking for folks with experience with these products,

I seriously thought about getting one of the slatted aluminum ones, but the cost at the time didn't work in the budget.

Lyle