Darco bottom covering on large hydraulic slideouts

[ChuckS]

My 2014 Alpine large hydraulic slide outs started to get some fraying on the bottom outer edges..one slide more than the other.. after 7 years that wasn’t a bad run.. had to wait till now to attempt my repair..fraying got worse on last outing late Sep last year and then winter came so we waited.

Looked at many other repairs and decided I’d use a similar approach to my repair..I used 1/8 thick UHMW black color and bought a sheet 36”x 12” and then ripped these into four equal width pieces.. some folks used 1/4 thick white but I wanted black to blend in and felt 1/8 thick was adequate for the load stress.. also with 1/8 thick material I felt there would be no need to adjust slideout vertical adjustment.

36” length was prefect to be able to butt the leading edge of strip against outer slide wear bar and run the entire length of the edge with no waste..

Used chop saw and cut 37 degree angle on the end that would ride up onto the inside frame mounted wear bar ramp..

First holes at beveled edge spaced 1 1/2 inches from the bevel..can’t put any closer due RV frame being in the way and of course would not be able to screw those first two screws in

Decided to use #10 3/4 long stainless wood screws.. thought about #8 size but wanted more holding power

Holes were countersunk to get screw heads below surface of strip..applied a thin layer of Proflex on backside about 1/2 inch from edge of strip along all four edges to provide seal to prevent water from wicking under the strips..

Each screw was dipped with a tad of Proflex before installing to weather proof them and give a bit more screw retention to prevent backing out.

Outboard edge of UHMW placed as close to edge of Darco where it rolls over and upward to drip strip on slide wall.. I will apply a bead of black Proflex along the outer edge for additional water proofing...

Operational check of slide out is smooth..slight..very slight thump as the beveled edge of UHMW strip rides up onto the OEM wear bar.. slide moves evenly and side to side tracking is even and smooth...

I opted to NOT Jack up the bottom of slides and slip the strip onto the OEM wear bars because I wanted to make sure the leading edge cant snag something when it goes in..

This slide also rides on top of OEM carpet and there were no issues, no marks etc of the UHMW strip when to rode over the carpet

Ran slide in a and out about 15 times checking strip, wear bar and carpet for an6 evidence of issues.. none noted

Note..allow hyd pump motor to cool off for a while after about 5 cycles

Pic of frayed Darco and a few pics of beveled edge, install and bottom and out edge of UHMW strip..

Passing info along to folks here and maybe someone can gleem some info from this post and pics to aid in their repair attempts

I only addressed the outer edges on this slide out as that is the only wear that has occurred.. why the wear started .. who knows.. I check the slides a few times a year for proper adjustment as well as making sure nothing is under the slide OEM wear bars that could damage the Darco..

NOTE.. the third pic shows my initial attempt at beveling the leading edge with 4 inch wide bench belt sander..while it worked the bevel isn’t even and I wanted a repeatable bevel angle...hence the chop saw.. second pic shows bevel nice and even using the chop saw approach
Cheers..

[ChuckS]

A couple of pics I cropped from a video I shot of the UHMW strip I used to repair torn Darco on slide bottom

This slide has been cycled over 100 times with zero issues with motion of slide or proper seal compression when open or closed

No adjustment of slide out in vertical direction was needed

Also some asked if the gear pack teeth mesh would be affected by the UHMW strip..

No.. teeth are fully meshed at all times during motion

[chuckster57]

Nice job!!