How should I fix this?

[GaryS1953]

Hi All,

Every year for the past several years I've opened the camper at the beginning of the season and found debris in the light fixture above the bathroom sink as well as in the sink itself. I've sealed everything obvious with Dicor and moved on each year, but am continuing to have the same problem. This year when I checked I found Ice in the fixture and the sink. Old light fixture needed replacing anyway, so I went ahead and removed it, checked the wood underneath and it was dry and showed no signs of rotting. Again, I went back on the roof to check things out. What I found is that when snow melts it puddles around the bathroom vent cap. I actually knew that already, but thought just resealing with Dicor should have taken care of it. When I removed the old deteriorated vent cap this is what I found..


Click For Full-Size Image.

The roof is aluminum. I have a new vent cap. Should I just let it dry as best I can, then replace with the new cap and seal? Doing that still leaves me with the problem of water pooling around the cap as the roof is a little concave there.


Click For Full-Size Image.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

[blofgren]

This is one of the reasons why I pony up and pay to store the fiver indoors for the winter. There is just too much that can go wrong over 6 months of nasty weather, and the freeze/thaw cycle just amplifies it.

Please let us know how you make out.

[GaryS1953]

donn0128 wrote:
I would clean all the crud and then work some wedges under the aluminum skin trying to make it move convex. Then instal the new vent cap.

This is what I ended up doing. I already had the wood shims, and I already had a new vent cap, and plenty of Dicor, so it seemed the thing to do, plus it gave me the added advantage of giving me some good wood for the screws to bite into. I was able to push several shims in quite a ways in around the pipe, so it raised the level substantially. We'll see how well it works.

Thanks donn0128, and to everyone else that chipped in ideas. This forum is great!!

[brianosaur]

This Video

[drsteve]

I agree with shimming the roof up to eliminate the pooling. Once that is accomplished, Dicor and a standard RV vent cap should work just fine.

[bdpreece]

Once you get it dried out and a new vent cap seal the whole unit to the roof with Eternabond tape.

[ScottG]

You don't need to use anything but the correct vet cap . Something like this. Then use lots of dicor self leveling sealant.

[WillyB]

X2 on the rubber house vent flashing, though you may have to extend the vent up a bit. The flashings tend to be taller than your pipe seems to be.

[Boon_Docker]

Lots of Dicor around the ABS pipe and aluminum when re-install a new vent cap.

[fj12ryder]

How wet is the wood and does it feel soft? If so I'd try to figure out a way to see how far out the softness goes. The flashing around the pipe certainly sounds like the way to go.

[bid_time]

Get some flashing made for roof stacks on a house. It will go up around the stack and flare out down to the roof.

[donn0128]

I would clean all the crud and then work some wedges under the aluminum skin trying to make it move convex. Then instal the new vent cap.