We've sprung a leak!

[SwampFoxWPB]

Hey y'all,

We just bought a 2007 Wildcat 29BHS. It's parked on a friends property while we work on it and get it ready for full-timing. We just got out to it to discover that after a week of very heavy South Florida rain, we have mold and some softness in the back outside corner of the master bedroom cabinet. It appears to line up with the gutter/joint on the roof/sidewall where the body ends and the front cap starts. We believe some repair work has been done on that spot in the past though the previous owner assured us up and down it had never ever leaked.

I've read up on how to seal the problem on the outside, but what to do inside? I can handle the mold on the cabinets with a little water and bleach, but should we pry out the wallboard in the cabinets and see what's behind there? If so, how do we go about doing that?

Paying a dealer for repairs is not an option for us at this point, so any and all help is greatly appreciated. Sorry if I've posted "common sense" stuff here, we're newbies. Thank you guys!

Kris

[garbonz]

OH MY.


Two thing you will need to do.

First is to find the leak, and seal it. From your post it may be at that corner, but you need to locate it and seal it. If you are going to full time it, I would spend a little time, cleaning the roof and then,clean, prime and put eternabond tape on ALL the seams. Look it up on the web and search here for all the information on that.

Second is to remove that cabinet and pull a section of the wall skin and replace the moldy rotted material, That is a pretty difficult job depending on the extent of the leak and how long it has been happening, but it has to be done. To much to go into here, but you can remove the interior skin by cutting it with a trim saw set real shallow and then working your way to the outside skin in little sections till you have found and removed all the moldy material. Then just rebuild it with insulation and thin board and put wallcovering over the wall to blend the repair in.

These campers DO take some detailed and thoughtful maintenace to keep watertight and many people don't do that till they see aleak and then damage has already been done.

The precious owner did you a disservice but it happens all the time.

Just my thoughts, others may have other ideas.

[DDC]

If you have mould and soft spots it has been leaking for a long time.

[SwampFoxWPB]

And now we've discovered the back wall of the trunk behind the bunkhouse is completely soaked and rotted out. Ugh!!!

[garbonz]

Originally Posted by SwampFoxWPB

And now we've discovered the back wall of the trunk behind the bunkhouse is completely soaked and rotted out. Ugh!!!

Same answer as above. Also, if the roof is soft where it leaked, that will have to be replaced and the roof resealed.

Buyer beware. If even a 5 year old TT has seen little or no roof maintenance, this can easily happen; especially in the hot and humid Florida climate.

Hope you got a really good deal, as you have quite a project ahead of you. It certainly is doable, but will take awhile and require a fair amount of skill.

I would do a very thorough inspection to find EVERYTHING, so you know the magnitude of the repair work and whether it is worth doing, given your skill level, interest and time.

[SwampFoxWPB]

UPDATE: We're fixed! We took it to Palm Beach RV. Turns out the ladder was leaking. Damage was not as bad as we thought (untrained eye, lol) and they guys were able to rebuild the hatch and the sub wall in the bunkhouse. They also found a busted seal on the slide and fixed that as well. We had them touch up a few other details (new hot water heater cover, a few dings on the cap) while it was in and were out the door for a very reasonable price. We're going to make our move out date and the fiver looks great! Just wanted to say thanks for the advice.