Synchronizing kitchen slide

[Rick and Mindy]

Let's see if I can explain this in such a way that everyone can understand. I recently was in the process of lubing my slide seals when I noticed that the front upper corner of my kitchen slide does not close against the bulb seal. It does touch at the bottom but as you run your finger up the slide fascia the gap gets larger. On the other end of the slide, the seal is actually too tight causing the bulb seal to split. I will have to adjust that some so it is not as tight. Back to the end not sealing. The only way I can adjust that end is to synchronize the slide. You do that by loosening the bolt on the top end of the passive ram and pushing the slide in or out so the distance between the rv exterior wall and the slide fascia is equal on both ends. A friend and I attempted to do just that. Could not move the slide at all. While under the slide loosening the head assembly bolt, I noticed the head assembly is bent and not flush against the end of the ram. Time to pick someones brain on this dilemma. I went to local RV dealer and talked to a tech who seemed familiar with slide adjustments. He showed me SOB with the same Lippert system and it was exactly like the one I have and it too was somewhat bent. He stated that the newer RV's where coming with an adjustable head assembly that is attached to the top of the ram with 2 bolts instead of just one which is a much sturdier system. He told me the only way I could probably move the slide to synch it is to use a jack and a 2x4 or4x4 standing upright. Jack the slide up just enough to take the pressure off of the ram and then it should move easily. The bent head assembly appears to be from the factory that way as there is rust behind the flat part indicating to me that it has been this way for awhile. Has any one else experienced this problem and do any of the owners of the newer models know if their head assembly on the ram is the newer 2 bolt head? Has any one tried to synch their slide?

[sinder]

Sorry I'm not near our RV until the end of this month, so a visual inspection of our rams is not possible. However I did make several successful adjustments to both my hydraulic slides a few months ago. I had a similar problem to your kitchen slide-out with a gap at the top and the seal toward the front had a big gap and the rear seal was very tight. I do remember the ram attachments were not cleanly attached to the bottom of the slide rail. I remember I had a couple of washers used as shims from the factory. Messy at best. I was able to make the adjustments by using the procedures in my previous posting. I would make the adjustments in small increments and then bring the slide in and out. I repeated the steps several times until I was able to get the slide closing on the seals all the way around. The slide-outs are very heavy so there is no easy way to make any other adjustments without taking the weight off the slide-out. You can try just making the ram adjustment and see if it helps. Anything beyond that you will probably have to take your unit into a dealer. Here is a link to my previous post: http://www.redwoodowners.com/forums/...ents-3649.html

[Rick and Mindy]

So Dean, your telling me that the nut adjustment on the active ram corrected the seal on the passive side of the slideout? My mind is having a hard time understanding how that could work since the passive ram simply does what the hydraulic ram tells it to. I'm thinking that if I adjust the active side so there is less pressure than my problem (passive) side will be away from the seal even more. You never had to adjust the passive slide bracket? I'll be going back today to try and make those adjustments the same way you did and hope for the best. I will be taking my son and a jack and some wood in case I need to try to take pressure off of the passive ram to push that side in about 1/4 to 1/2 inch for synchronization. Do you know how many turns you made to the proper nut to notice a change in the slide? Thanks for your help, wish me luck. I'll post later my results.

[Rick and Mindy]

Just back from the Redwood after making adjustments in the street(Kitchen) slide. My son and I were able to lift the weight off of the adjustable ram head to push the side in to get a better seal in the closed position. We also made an adjustment on the other end so it was not crushing the "D" seal quite as bad. I am posting a pic of the bracket and how it is bent in relation to the ram. You can see that with only 1 bolt through the top it is very difficult for the bracket to stay straight. You can see where there is a hole on the ram and the new bracket would have 2 bolts. When I receive the new bracket my son and I are thinking about welding piece of steel plate at an angle across the 90 degree to prevent any possibility of bending the bracket when adjustments are made with the long bottom bolt. Really a bad design! We also noticed that the slide needs to be moved some to the left so the slide is more centered in the frame allowing for better blade seal movement. One side, the wiper blade won't curl all the way out when extended and on the other side, the wiper blade is not as snug. We figured we would adjust that when the new bracket comes in.

[atom ant]

Thanks for posting pics! I need to go look at mine.

[sinder]

Sorry about the late reply. I did not adjust the bracket at the end of the ram. But looking at your picture, mine looked very similar. I was able to pull in the front of the slide by tighting the nuts on the front rod and loosening of the nuts on the rear rod, which pushed out the slide in the rear. I do not remember how many turns on the nuts.

[Rick and Mindy]

The more I thought about how the kitchen slide was not centered in the opening, the more I wanted to correct it, so my son and I set out to attempt to adjust the horizontal in the slide. Not an easy task but with a jack we were able to take the weight off of the rams which allowed us to push the slide sideways. It took several small adjustments but in the end we probably moved it close to a 1/2 inch. We now have it adjusted as good as it can be for the wiper seals to work right. All in all, we learned a lot about how these slides work and how they are adjusted. We also made adjustments to lessen pressure against the bulb seals when the slides are closed. I never was happy with the way they were from the factory. They have been adjusted some from warranty work but still not that great. I think we have them as perfect as possible right now.