Paint or gel coating starting to spider/crack on side

That is called paint checking and it is a defect in the sidewall. Some paint shops have had success if they sand the area down before repainting but the checking may still come back. Dark areas in the sun get the checking the worst. The checking will not stop even if you cover it. I know this from experience. Do a search on "Paint checking" in this forum and you will get a lot of good information.

Welcome to my world! Good wax and shade to slow the "cancer" it will only get worse with time.

s N s wrote:
It's called checking/crazing. Keeping it out of the sun is about the only to stop it from spreading further. There is no fix except to replace the siding. Your in the years of the siding that had a defect from the factory in the manufacturing process. Can't remember the name of the company but they are out of business now. Ours is doing it as well and if you look at coaches in the 03 to about 08 build you'll see they all have it on certain manufactured units. The darker colors is where it's most apparent. The surface attracts more heat in those areas and the cracking/crazing begins. I'm not saying to not wax your coach but it will not stop it. Painting is an option but if the shop that knows anything about this problem is honest with you they will tell you that it will return. Most shops suggest a repaint and to use brighter colors in the scheme where heat is a little less apparent. I had a quote from Newmar on ours and it was $28K for a reside and paint. That's not happening. Well good luck with yours and hope you can live with it as there is no real cure.

Concur with everything above. After awhile the checking will get bad enough where the clear coat comes off. The problem is in the fiberglass, not the paint. At some point you can sand it down repaint and re-clear coat but it will come back over a 4 or 5 year period. As mentioned, painting it a lighter colour pretty much resolves the problem. We just keep painting but I do it myself and its pretty cheap.

Treefrog wrote:

creeper wrote:
Put a good synthetic wax on it. Easy to put on. Reapply every six months if the sun is that bad. The only reason it's cracking is because of the lack of wax and the clear coat is cracking. You could have it wet sanded and clear coated again.

My 2000 Country Coach clear coat is peeling. A vendor recommended wet sanding all the white colored panels in the effected area but wanted $ 10,000 (So. Calif.).

Does anybody have a fix for a couple of areas totaling 200 square feet?

The only fix is wet sanding the clear coat off and reapplying a new clear coat, it can be done yourself outside if your handy and have the right tools to do it correct, most any body shop will charge a lot of $$ to do the work, maybe find someone south of the border to do it at 1/2 the cost, however I will tell you its best to do the whole RV with new clear coat because the other areas will be doing the same as time goes by.

creeper wrote:
Put a good synthetic wax on it. Easy to put on. Reapply every six months if the sun is that bad. The only reason it's cracking is because of the lack of wax and the clear coat is cracking. You could have it wet sanded and clear coated again.

My 2000 Country Coach clear coat is peeling. A vendor recommended wet sanding all the white colored panels in the effected area but wanted $ 10,000 (So. Calif.).

Does anybody have a fix for a couple of areas totaling 200 square feet?

2gypsies wrote:

crasster wrote:
I've had a lot of conversations with RV owners through the years. It never made sense to me why so many are willing to spend $170k on a coach and allow it to rot outside. The smart move to me would be spending $140k on a coach, and buy a metal building (to store it in).

Well.... if you use your RV you can't store it. Also, many thousands of full-timers are out there daily in the elements.

Also, there are many communities where you can't erect one of the metal buildings or your lot doesn't have room for one.

X2

My building codes would not allow a building the size I needed to house RV, also the RV carports for my size to have slidouts out on both sides with 2 side walls to block sun was just to expensive as far as I was concerned,{quoted nearly $10,000} so I went with just a shade structure for $2500 and it keeps the brutal SW sun off my RV.

Op is the cracking in the actual paint of your rig or it sounds more like it might be in attached decals which will crack over time. Wax won't help with cracking or fading from the sun. Before I got an RV I had a boat that the top trim line all around it was black. I tried everything to keep the black as shiny as the rest of the boat sitting in the sun at the marina and reflecting water, including various types of black shoe polishes. Best thing to use is 303 Protectant. It has UV protection, is easy to apply which is basically spray on and wipe off which makes it quick to keep up the protection and shine throughout the season. Camping World will occasionally have it on sale for around $58.99 a gallon but you can probably find it cheaper online. I bought a gallon on Amazon last summer for $48 or so. Good luck.

crasster wrote:
I've had a lot of conversations with RV owners through the years. It never made sense to me why so many are willing to spend $170k on a coach and allow it to rot outside. The smart move to me would be spending $140k on a coach, and buy a metal building (to store it in).

Well.... if you use your RV you can't store it. Also, many thousands of full-timers are out there daily in the elements.

Also, there are many communities where you can't erect one of the metal buildings or your lot doesn't have room for one.

I've had a lot of conversations with RV owners through the years. It never made sense to me why so many are willing to spend $170k on a coach and allow it to rot outside. The smart move to me would be spending $140k on a coach, and buy a metal building (to store it in). For $30k, you could probably even get hookups in the building.

There are A LOT of longevity factors that will improve if you store indoors. Like roof problems will be NONE. Bugs won't live in your a/c unit. Tree crud won't fall over your paint or bird yuck. The paint will look good indefinitely. The curtains and inside of the coach will look far better and last way longer.

I also have an OPINION (my opinion only) that tires will last longer than 5 years as they aren't constantly in the elements heating, cooling, etc., as the sun heats the black rubber, dry rots, and elements...

It's a defect in the wall panels they used and waxing may make the cracks show even more. Here are some previous posts on this problem. Keeping the sun off of the dark areas is about all you can afford to do.