Lippert Hydraulics

[Old Bookkeeper]

Hi from England. Just bought a 2005 Georgetown 375XL triple slide. Does anyone know of a reported fault with the hydraulics? The bedroom slide seems to have a mind of it's own.
Go through the sequence:- Main slide in, kitchen slide in, bedroom slide in, uncouple shore power, start engine, operate retract all jacks (non-auto levelling) until the green light shows all up. Then look in your rear view mirror and the bedroom slide has gone out!!!!. Go back to the power centre, bring in the bedroom slide and drive off.
How crazy is that? Oh and by the way, when you start the sequence with the main slide, the bedroom slide comes in first!!!
The strange thing is that the dealers insist that of all the red knobs on the valve block, the one furthest from the motor must be set in the opposite position to all the others. If I put it the same, the whole system miss-behaves.
How peculiar.

All the best, Tony

[Iggy]

Hi Tony and welcome.
You need to do a complete inspection of all the hoses.
Have you verified that the tank is full of automatic transmission fluid?
Sometime a low level may cause that to happen because of a leak,
Then inspect all of the system looking for leaking hoses or fitting.
You may need to have an RV dealer that is familiar with Lippert hydraalics.

Good luck

[VinceU]

Originally Posted by Old Bookkeeper

Hi from England. Just bought a 2005 Georgetown 375XL triple slide. Does anyone know of a reported fault with the hydraulics? The bedroom slide seems to have a mind of it's own.
Go through the sequence:- Main slide in, kitchen slide in, bedroom slide in, uncouple shore power, start engine, operate retract all jacks (non-auto levelling) until the green light shows all up. Then look in your rear view mirror and the bedroom slide has gone out!!!!. Go back to the power centre, bring in the bedroom slide and drive off.
How crazy is that? Oh and by the way, when you start the sequence with the main slide, the bedroom slide comes in first!!!
The strange thing is that the dealers insist that of all the red knobs on the valve block, the one furthest from the motor must be set in the opposite position to all the others. If I put it the same, the whole system miss-behaves.
How peculiar.

All the best, Tony

Check in your book for individual valve overrides. Usually the electric control valve for each jack and slide will have a way to bypass the auto control. Sounds like bedroom valve is cracked open, whenever system pressure is applied it wants to "creep". Mine are hex wrench operated.

[seaviper]

Hi,

We have a 2006 FR Georgetown 350DS. I also have a slide with a mind of it's own.

Today I downloaded the ELECTRONIC/HYDRAULIC LEVELING AND SLIDEOUT SYSTEM OPERATION AND SERVICE MANUAL from Lippert. Before I found this discussion thread I had a suspicion it might be the manual override. Now I am even more inclined to believe this may be the culprit.

My question is did the original poster ever fix his issue? Also, can someone tell me where to look for the control valves on the 350? I plan on attempting to fix this issue in the next few days.

Patrick

[Old Bookkeeper]

Originally Posted by seaviper

Hi,

We have a 2006 FR Georgetown 350DS. I also have a slide with a mind of it's own.

Today I downloaded the ELECTRONIC/HYDRAULIC LEVELING AND SLIDEOUT SYSTEM OPERATION AND SERVICE MANUAL from Lippert. Before I found this discussion thread I had a suspicion it might be the manual override. Now I am even more inclined to believe this may be the culprit.

My question is did the original poster ever fix his issue? Also, can someone tell me where to look for the control valves on the 350? I plan on attempting to fix this issue in the next few days.

Patrick

Hi Patrick,

You found the manual I had failed to find! We still have the bedroom slide doing it's own thing. The dealers fitted a new pump motor and we seem to have a major oil leak, so the RV is going to the dealers in 2 weeks. At least with the new pump, we do have reliable operation.

The only instruction sheet we have is very poor and also contradicts itself! It makes no mention of the slide out and jack position for checking the oil level.

Tony.

[Iggy]

Originally Posted by seaviper

Hi,

We have a 2006 FR Georgetown 350DS. I also have a slide with a mind of it's own.

Today I downloaded the ELECTRONIC/HYDRAULIC LEVELING AND SLIDEOUT SYSTEM OPERATION AND SERVICE MANUAL from Lippert. Before I found this discussion thread I had a suspicion it might be the manual override. Now I am even more inclined to believe this may be the culprit.

My question is did the original poster ever fix his issue? Also, can someone tell me where to look for the control valves on the 350? I plan on attempting to fix this issue in the next few days.

Patrick

Make sure your levle is full when everything is in and normal.
The next thing I would do is make sure all the vavles are fully closed by using the allen wrench. All you have to do is see if they turn any more.
Check manual but I think normal condition is they are fully counter clockwise. This is oposite from normal valve. so check that out on all of them. If it still gives you a problem just in that one slide it may have a piston seal bypassing and making go out when it suppose to go in.

The system should bleed out any air automatically if you have the tank full to the proper level.

Let us know what you find.
Iggy

[seaviper]

Well, my problem with the living room slide going in and out with the jacks and or the bedroom slide has been solved. Two of the manual bypass valves were slightly open. Don't know why.

Anyway, I used a 1/8" allen wrench and checked all the valves to make sure they were fully counter clockwise. Sure enough, two of them were partially open. I also filled the system with fluid. It was sold to me about half full. Go figure.


In the photo above, the fluid level shows about half because all the slides were out.

After adjusting the two open valves, I went inside and verified that there was no interplay between the various hydraulic items by cycling the jacks and the room slides. All good.

Wonder what that would have cost me at the dealer? $$$$

[VinceU]

Originally Posted by seaviper

Well, my problem with the living room slide going in and out with the jacks and or the bedroom slide has been solved. Two of the manual bypass valves were slightly open. Don't know why.

Anyway, I used a 1/8" allen wrench and checked all the valves to make sure they were fully counter clockwise. Sure enough, two of them were partially open. I also filled the system with fluid. It was sold to me about half full. Go figure.

In the photo above, the fluid level shows about half because all the slides were out.

After adjusting the two open valves, I went inside and verified that there was no interplay between the various hydraulic items by cycling the jacks and the room slides. All good.

Wonder what that would have cost me at the dealer? $$$$

You're right, the first thing most will want to do is change the pump for $1350 or more plus installation! Glad you found it

[Old Bookkeeper]

RESULT !!

Finally the Lippert hydraulics failed completely leaving the bedroom slide out and the jacks down – not good for travelling !!

Followed the telephone instructions from a man at Lippert - which involved using a battery drill to retract everything with all the valves open. After three times as long as advised, the bedroom slide was still fully out.

Got under the bed and eventually found that the ram for the bedroom was as tight as a drum and fully retracted into itself. After thinking / coffee time it suddenly dawned on me that the bedroom ram worked in the opposite direction to the other slides. The main and kitchen slide are PUSHED OUT and PULLED IN – whereas the bedroom slide has the mechanism built into the bed base and is PUSHED IN and PULLED OUT. So back to the drill and the valves – closed all the valves except the bedroom and REVERSED the drill - BANG all the pressure came off the ram and the bedroom started to move in.

My dearly beloved was inserted into the bed base (I’m far too old and fat!!) and instructed in the gentle art of hydraulic plumbing. The pipes feeding the ram were successfully reversed (and it then became evident that a UK mechanic had changed them over in the distant past). This then meant that the hydraulic pump now worked all the rams and jacks in the correct order and that revolving the drill in one direction had the desired effect on ALL the units.

BEAR IN MIND - when using a drill to operate the pump – there is NO electrical control of pressure – hence the stretched ram under the bed.

It is absolute joy to finally, after THREE AND A HALF YEARS, have a system that works as it should, and doesn’t suddenly push the bedroom out when you lift the jacks with all the slides in.

WHAT WENT WRONG?? The total failure was tracked down to the trombetta relay which had been burnt out by loose connections on the heavy duty sides. Luckily, Lippert were on back order for the motor, so I took the unit to an electrical rewind company and he tested the motor to be OK (it was).