Sealing a hole

[fidhleir]

A few months ago I discovered water soaking the carpet inside a linen closet in the bedroom of my fifth wheel. I dried it out and have since been through several heavy rains with no water intruding. No seams or anything on the outside but I think I've finally found it. I measured off the distance from a window to the wet closet inside and it aligns with the forward awning mount. As I've now found, the wiring for the awning motor comes out of a hole at the bottom of the bracket and runs up under a plastic race. There is a half inch hole where the wire comes out and it isn't sealed. From the timing, I think it happened when washing the trailer with a pressure hose.

So, after all that, which is surely more than anyone cares about, what is the best thing to seal the hole around the wires? I don't know if should worry about making sure there is some give for the wires or not.

Thanks.

[fidhleir]

You have no idea how many things I've had to deal with. It's only w years old and I think I know everyone at factory service personally.

It's not just an open hole as 4 wires come through it.

[Bill_Satellite]

A 1/2 inch unsealed hole? Wow! You are going to need more than a bit of caulk. You need to fill the majority of the hole with some material that will provide a good backing and then use something like Dicor caulk to seal things up. There's no excuse for the manufacturer to have left this kind of a hole and I would really suggest you contact them to find out WTF!
If that's not truly the source then I would suspect that your dog found a new place to relieve himself!

[fidhleir]

The motor is out in the awning roller so it does move but the wires run through the awning arms first (after running up the side of the trailer under the plastic race).

[DrewE]

I don't know if it's the best, but I'd use a glop of the favorite RV caulking goo. I usually use OSI Quad as it seems to works well, is not too expensive, and is readily available. The "Max" version is nicer to work with and is claimed to be even better.

Unless the awning power unit moves in operation, I see no reason to provide for more than a nominal amount of give in the wiring.