Intermittment Bedroom Slide

[Smitty]

Was getting ready today to take the Camper out to a seasonal site we rented and the bedroom slide acted up again. We had a single incident last fall with it not going out but had no problems after that until this spring when we got the camper out of storage a couple of weeks ago. When putting the slide out it stopped mid way. We then waited a couple of seconds and it continued out the rest of the way. When I was putting the slide in today, it stopped again. This time it ony had a couple of inches to go. Again, waited maybe a half a minute and it went in the rest of the way. I thought I'd better wait to take it out to the campground and try and see if I could solve the problem. I took the mattress off of the platform, unscrewed four screws holding the plywood and exposed the mechanism. I then continued trying the slide and again it would stop and go after waiting a few seconds. There's a pigtail connection coming from the slide motor with three positive and negative wires which were each capped off and then taped together with electrical tape. After the motor ran, the wires were so hot, you could hardlly touch them. I unwrapped the electrical tape and noticed right away that the caps seemed to small and there were wires exposed out of the negative side. I uncapped both + and - wires and recapped with a larger cap, taped each set individually, which they were not before and then taped the two sets of three together like they were intially. I tried the slide after this fix and it worked perfectly. Slid it in and out at least three times, worked fine each time. The wires no longer got hot. They were definately making contact with each other. I then waited until after supper and tried the slide again and it works fine. Think it's fixed, "yay"!!!

[hankaye]

Smitty, Howdy;

Sounds as though you have your problem solved ....... That be a happy event !


That a nice thing you have done. Givin' us all a Heads-up should we encounter the same type of problem.
Might save a non-mechanically inclined camper some coin by eliminating some costly "troubleshooting time" and perhaps a handy neighbor could help them out...

hankaye

[JRTJH]

The wires may not have been making contact with each other, if they were, you most likely would have blown a fuse or tripped a circuit breaker. Most likely, the wires were not making good contact within some of (or all of) the wire nuts that were screwed onto each connection. There have been several posts here about corrosion on slide connections inside the wire nuts. I'd suggest that you get some of the self sealing wire nuts, remove what's on your connections, cut off the ends so you're starting fresh, connect the wires, install the self sealing wire nuts, then tape each one individually and then tape them all together to keep them from being pulled individually. I'd also check your brake connections at the axle while you're at it. We had a big problem with wire nuts and add on splice connectors on most of our vehicles that were exposed to salt (corrosion) in the UP when I was in the Air Force up there. We finally stopped splicing under vehicles and solved the problem. But, the self sealing wire nuts will prevent any future problems for you.

[chuck&gail]

Sounds like you fixed it, but just in case.....

What you describe will ALSO happen if your battery is low. Since it is a motor, low voltage gives high current. Motor overload trips, slide stops, battery voltage goes up a bit, overload resets, and process starts over.

I mention it as you said you just got it out of storage, maybe battery was low, but charged up while you were working on wiring.

[Smitty]

Thanks for your answers. I'm hooking it up today and putting it in the campground. Tried the slide again last night and it worked fine. Don,t think I mentioned this but when the slide would stop and I'd click the switch or remote ( I tried both to make sure it wasn't just the wall switch), I would hear a click under the floor almost like a solenoid switch clicking but couldn't locate it. Should get A good test today hauling it out where I'll be on just battery time. I'll leave it on 12volt when I try it at the campground and update tonight. Thanks

[Smitty]

Curious. Does anyone out there know where the fuses/circuit breakers are for the slides? I just took out every 12 volt fuse and shut off every 120 volt circuit that's behind the circuit door and all the slides still work. I cannot find any other's any where else.