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garysol's avatar
garysol
Explorer
Oct 10, 2017

Slide wall construction and damage question

Hopefully I can articulate my question properly.....lol. We have our camper on a seasonal site this year. It is a 2012 Thor 5th wheel and it has 3 slides. The front and rear facing OUTER slide walls on all 3 slides have some give to them. In other words if I push on the outer wall it will push in a little before contacting what I assume is the inner luan wall. If not for the fact that all 6 walls in question have some "give" to them I would think I have a delamination problem but I have a hard time believing that every slide wall would be effected. My front facing master bedroom slide wall that faces forward is horribly misshapen but there is no water marking or any signs of moisture inside at all. That wall is in direct sunlight but not sure that has anything to do with what is happening. It will be a few weeks until I can get the rig to a RV center to have them look at it but I would love some educated opinions on this. Again all 6 of my front/rear facing slide walls have "give" but the front one is by far the
  • DownTheAvenue wrote:
    It is very possible that the side walls of the slide are not laminate walls, but luan with a fiberglass or some other material skin. In fact, since all of them are like that, I bet they were constructed that way. The one with the most wave, and in the sun as the OP indicated, is just responding to the extreme heat. My money says there is no problem.


    I had a Open Range that was exactly the same. That is the way it was constructed. No problems with it but I hated the look of it.
  • It is very possible that the side walls of the slide are not laminate walls, but luan with a fiberglass or some other material skin. In fact, since all of them are like that, I bet they were constructed that way. The one with the most wave, and in the sun as the OP indicated, is just responding to the extreme heat. My money says there is no problem.
  • Darryl&Rita wrote:
    As a guess, I'd guess a bad pail of glue during construction, or a new employee. Given the value of the unit, vs the repair costs at a shop, I think I'd be tempted to do the work myself.


    Which would explain why all of the walls show evidence of some sort of delam.......
  • Your photo shows classic delamination. It doesn't have to be caused by water intrusion, but that is the most common. As a guess, I'd guess a bad pail of glue during construction, or a new employee. Given the value of the unit, vs the repair costs at a shop, I think I'd be tempted to do the work myself.