Door latch

This company has some very good locks from my experience

RV Locks And More

If your door is a "Tri-mark" and the striker bolt breaks.

Well I'd love to give you my opinion of that design but alas melting monitors is not good.

Take the broken striker bolt to a metal smith I've used 3 of 'em over the years (Same for basement latches) Runs 25-40 bucks (Cheaper than a new latch) to have 'em carve one out of steel.

First was a body shop (Basewment latch) 2nd was a welder (Door) 3rd was Seneca Engineering, Senect South Carolina, (Basement again) of the 3 the last did a fantastic job.

Steel is much harder to break than the pot metal Tri-Mark used.

We had a post sometime back about the owner slamming his door and some of us, including me, replied that we had never slammed the door and the latch has held up just fine. Could that be the root cause of the cheap latch problem?
I pull on the handle to retract the latch, close and hold the door closed, release the handle, and give the door a little push to be sure it latches completely. We apparently didn't do the very last instruction and the door opened enroute. Very embarrassing but nothing was lost.

Well Dick. I woulld say yes. Slamming a striker bolt is the act that breaks it.

But the root cause on the Tri-mark latches is the design of the Striker Bolt. The weakest spot on the bolt is also the highest stress point. a better design, or a different metal. no problewm.

On my Door the bolt is too small for me to do this but on the basemewnt latches
I'd machine a "Grove" in the back of the bolt (the long flat side) and then lay a small steel mending bar in there with some GOOP to hold it. Then drill and tap a pair of screw holes and machine down the excess screw length and make it all nice and flat.. Those never failed again But it's not an easy job to do. (WOrked for a time as a Machineist)

Tri-Mark simply uses the wrong blasted metal

I can't give you a review yet but I have one of these in a box to put in. The posted reviews are mostly good.

Electronic door lock with remote

My original Tri-Mark latch broke several years ago, trapping us inside the RV. The replacement looked just like the old one on the outside but the guts were completely different and it seems to be holding up better. My only reason for replacing it is the get the convenience of the digital keypad. The RVLock has 5*5 combinations, or 3125. I tried a combination lock years ago and was dismayed to find that it only had 4*4 combinations, or 256. Besides that it didn't do anything well. I ended up throwing it away. I recently saw an RVL in use that had obviously been there several years and the owner really liked it.

Have you taken it apart to see why it failed yet? If not I would do that first. I have had 4 failures in the Trimark latch in 16 years, the first was on a trip and I bought a broken one at a salvage yard and was able to fix the dead bolt that would not retract. The next one failure was the plastic cam which retracts the door latch and I replaced it with a part from the salvaged lock. The last two were the door latch itself. I bought a new door lock but it had the same Zinc alloy latch that is very weak and broke again in about 5 years. I certainly was not going to spend another $100 plus for the same latch with the same Zinc part that broke last time. I ended up just adding a steel backing plate that joined the broken pieces together and so far has lasted more than 5 years. If you decide you just want to replace it rather than repair it make sure the latch is not a cast zinc alloy, most of the replacement latches are that I have seen.

Same Problem, Best Solution!

After some research I purchased a Trimark Latch repair kit and I'm pleased with a complete and permanent fix for $49.

The kit includes a steel replacement piece, wrenches you'll need for the fix and a new spring, in case you lose yours like I did. This allows you to use your existing keys and it installs with no "modifications" needed which may not be the case if you just buy a brand new Trimark Lock.

To be fair, I have read that the new Trimark locks use a steel latch piece rather than the crummy pot metal ones that break.

Here are links to the Latch Fix website and the video showing how easy the fix is to do.

https://www.latchfix.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efW38pxwzZI

Cheers,

-Grouchy

GrouchyOldMan,

Thank you for that link. I just replaced my Trimark latch in April 2019 to the tune of $140 (it still had the pot metal bolt) and it started acting up today. (The latch was binding and wouldn't retract all the way or extend all the way.) When I disassembled it to see what was going on, I noticed that the pot metal bolt has a hairline crack on the bottom section of the slotted area. There was a small piece of plastic that apparently wedged itself between the bolt and the surrounding mechanism. I cleared that out of the way and the assembly seems to be working OK, for now.

I just ordered the replacement piece from your link and I'm going to baby the latch until it comes in. Oh...and I also made sure I can get in through the driver's door in case the bolt cracks when we exit the rig.

Anyway, thank you for posting that link. :)

~Rick

I installed the new metal bolt few months ago and it works great