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Stehlin's avatar
Stehlin
Explorer
Aug 03, 2013

Rotting floor???

I was wondering if anyone else has had a problem with the floor on their slide out rotting and delaminating. We have a 2010 Heartland North Country and after only two years we noticed the floor was delaminating on the outside edges. Due to the fact that we only had a one year manufacturer warranty, Heartland will not fix it. Anyone else have this problem?
  • This happened to mine on the bunk house slide. I had it fixed and it was expensive because they have to remove the slide and basically rebuild the floor back into it. I had a long discussion with the service people at Tom Johnson's in Marion NC about it before we did the work. Here is what was explained to me: The problem is that on many slides, the floor sits on rollers. That means the entire weight of the slide is on the floor as it rolls out until it's supported by the wall of the trailer. If the flooring is compromised and starting to rot, then every time it rolls out, it can start weakening further and delaminating/chipping away more at the flooring. Eventually it breaks through. When it breaks through, it puts the brakes on the whole process of movement while the motor is pushing the slide. This can actually make the motor pull free from whatever it is mounted to, which often times is the wall of the trailer. This can pull a hole in the wall as the motor pulls it apart. This is a BIG problem as you might imagine. It could total the TT. In mine, it hadn't gone that far, but it was almost there. The floor was spitting out bits of wood on the ground every time I opened the slide, and the slide was starting to look a bit tilted when it was opened. The rollers had already started cutting grooves in the wood flooring. I think you should ask the dealer about this even if the water intrusion has been stopped, because it can still cause very serious problems if your slides are built the way I just described.
  • Welcome Stehlin to RV.NET

    Does the slide still work OK and the floor seem solid?

    Since most RV construction is built from floor up it can be a chore to replace only the base floor.

    The main concern I would have is WHY this occurred. Water often comes from above and when that is the case damage can be occurring along the way. IF that is the case getting the water source fixed can often stop new damage. Finding how the water is getting to the floor can be very hard and in a new RV often is from a factory defect in workmanship. If you can prove this then take your issue to the top of the maker's chain of command before you stop.

    Best of luck. While 100% of RV's can leak at some point it is bad if they ship leaking.