Leaky sllide at bottom, fix suggestions?

Question

I found my slide is leaking. I think I found the problem. I'm not sure I have a solution, short of ordering a new rubber wiper from the manufacturer.

I'm looking for short term suggestions. Duct tape fell off, but it was applied to a not very dry slide at the time. My short term fix may be gorilla tape after closing the slide. Any better ideas would be helpful. I have about 20 hours of driving coming up and there may be a lot of rain.

Longer term, I know (hope??) I can order a replacement rubber wiper from the manufacturer. Does anyone have a better long term solution?

For example, One I was thinking of was to screw and seal an aluminum angle to the slide floor and use a bulb type seal. Better yet would be some type of angle and seal where the seal can be slide into an an extruded piece of aluminum - like some door seals.

Below is a photo of the issue. You can see that the piece that supposed to keep the bottom of the slide from wearing has eaten away the rubber seal. to make things worse, this is right above one of the tires so water is forced up into the gap when driving.

The above photo is of the bottom front of the slide where it goes into the trailer. The slide is out.

john_wayne · Answer

How about cutting a piece of foam noodle in half and when closing the slide let it crush the noodle in that area. By foam noodle I mean the round colored foam tubes kids use to float in the pool. Or a piece of foam water pipe installation.

donn0128 · Answer

Something against getting the correct parts and fixing it right?

mrekim · Answer

John Wayne wrote:How about cutting a piece of foam noodle in half and when closing the slide let it crush the noodle in that area. By foam noodle I mean the round colored foam tubes kids use to float in the pool. Or a piece of foam water pipe installation.Maybe, It would have to go in between the slide floor and the trailer. I'd be worried of something falling apart and getting stuck between the floors and gumming up the works. BUT, maybe something as simple as stuffing part of a cut up inner tube in there could work. That won't come apart like the foam stuff.donn0128 wrote:Something against getting the correct parts and fixing it right?I need a "now" fix and a long term fix. The "now" fix is just to get me home. I've sent an email to the manufacturer. Just getting replacement parts is not fixing it right. The seal will just continue to wear after about 50 uses of the slides. Right now I need to replace the seal under two slides. It would be more cost effective to buy a 100' spool of the seal material vs buying them a couple times per year. Or getting a 10 pack for each side that will last 2 or 3 years....Ideally there would be another fix - like putting the seal on the slide so it's not getting ground off time the slide moves.

mlts22 · Answer

I wish I knew a better way. The slide seal shouldn't be directly sliced open after a number of times in use, and just replacing it over and over isn't exactly a true fix.

I think your idea of angle iron or metal which allows the rubber seal to slide in might just be the best fix... and I'm sure this is a solved problem, but not really sure where to go on this, other than maybe a good, savvy RV service place.

mrekim · Answer

I'll make an effort to work with the manufacturer to see if they have a better solution or at least see what their opinion or my angle iron fix is.

For the short term solution, I'm just going to clean the area up with alcohol and then put the slide in and use some gorilla tape in an effort to seal it up.

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Leaky sllide at bottom, fix suggestions?

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