Lynnmor, exactly where are the washers that you refer to on the elevating shaft?
I purhased this camper 2nd hand but in "new" condition. The ONLY thing wrong with is was that there were bubbles in the ceiling paper aft of the TV antennae crank. For a while we chalked this up to poor sealing of the paper at install. Since I have not been able to stop this leak, I'm starting to think that this antennae has been a problem since the trailer was built. Now that you say yours was missing parts, I'm really feeling that way.
It sounds like I just need to pull the entire thing off and reinstall it completely to ensure it is done right.
I went through ALL your pictures and got some great ideas for improvements. I also got a little scared by some of the problems you've had to address. What year is your camper? Mine is 2010, not that that makes any difference.
We've been very happy with ours and have had no trouble, other than this antennae. I changed out the plastic******drawer slides to steel and a few other minor things.