It's always something!

Carl often says, "It's always something!" -- usually in regard to things that break on the rig. 

In the past few weeks, we've had some really strong rain storms come through the areas where we are camped. We started having water dripping into the rig through a light fixture right over the driver's seat. We heard the dripping and were able to put a pan under it, but it is obviously something that needs taking care of.

We went up on the roof on Wednesday and found that some of the tape that covers a seam between the front cap and the roof had been pulled loose. We had had a problem with this a few years ago (documented here: https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/09/back-through-west-virginia.html and here: https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/10/some-tasks-around-campground.html) and we replaced part of the tape. Note: this is one of the really nice things about having our blog; I can search for terms in the "creator" part of the blog interface and find out when things happened and how we fixed it. In this case, we had recalled (inaccurately) that we replaced *most* of the tape, but from the pictures, it appears we only replaced the part on the driver's side between the left horn and the edge.

We knew that we had fixed it then, and that, theoretically, we could fix it again, but... getting up on the roof is more challenging now than it was 5 years ago, and we thought that maybe we should see if a mobile RV technician could come to do the fix.

Carl went to the office in the campground and got information about two mobile techs; I also found one on Google maps... unfortunately, the one I found is scheduled for back surgery and not doing any work, and the one whose information we got from the office first told us that Newmars don't have tape on the roof (well, ours does) and then said that he might be able to work us in on the third week of September... uh, no, we'll be gone by then.

Because we've gotten water inside the rig, and because we know that there are some soft spots on the roof, we have come to the conclusion that we will need to get work done on our roof, probably a roof replacement with repair to the wood underneath. But, we need to be "somewhere" for a period of time to get that done. We decided that we would wait until getting to Mesa to pursue that further, and for right now, to just get it covered "good enough" to seal until we get to Arizona, and, even though we didn't want to, that we would try to accomplish that patch ourselves.

Tape missing near the left most horn, but this time it is toward the center of the roof from the horn. Note, I had already cut off the loose part of the tape. This part of the tape coming up appears to have occurred more recently as the tape residue was still comparatively clean (other than there being a Japanese beetle stuck to it!). This is probably the area that is producing the leak over the driver's seat, though water can enter at one point on the roof and then travel horizontally to a low spot to drip, so we're not sure.

The other missing tape is on the right side of the right horn, toward the radius at the side of the rig. You can see that it is much dirtier, so this piece of tape has been missing for a longer time. 

We thought that it was going to be a pretty labor intensive job to get the tape residue off, but Mineral Spirits and a plastic scraper did a pretty good job. This was part of the way through cleaning the larger part on the right side of the right horn.

Remember that I indicated above that one of the mobile techs said that a Newmar shouldn't have tape between the front cap and the roof? Do you see just beyond the taped area, there is a big splotch of caulking material, and then another black thing going off around the radius over the side of the rig? That is a flexible material that we think was originally installed in the groove between the front cap and the roof -- it curves over the radius and covers the connection between the front cap and the rig to the top of the door on the passenger side and the top of the window on the driver's side. It turns out that the sealant between it and the sidewall of the coach has also cracked -- and in the last rains, we also had rain coming in above the entry door -- we're thinking from that (though it could have come in from the roof and just run down to the top of the door).

Carl had originally planned to help, but I suggested that maybe I could do it, and he let me start. But after I had done the cleaning, he decided that he may need to help with the application of the new tape and caulking. 

Carl is cleaning the area next to the left horn. He also squared up the tape remnant so we'd have a smoother area to overlay the new tape.

Carl getting ready to apply the tape. No pictures of the actual taping process as we needed all four of our hands to pull the backing off of the very, very sticky tape, hold it so it didn't stick to itself, get it straight over the area where we wanted to stick it, stick it in place, then press down over the whole length to make sure that it was well and truly stuck (the manufacturer recommends using a steel roller device, but we don't have that, so we just rolled over it with our knuckles).

Remember that I indicated that the sealant on the edge of that flexible material on the side had dried and cracked -- Carl used silicone to re-seal that area while we were up on the roof too.

I forgot to get a "finished" picture. We didn't get the caulking done during this work session... both of us were getting tired and a little shaky, so we decided that maybe it could do without caulk. After getting on the ground, we've thought more and think that we should caulk it, but will do that another day.

"It's always something!"