Hydraulic slide out mechanism damage

[Bruce C]

I learned something the hard way last weekend. We had just arrived at an RV Park, I had checked for trees and other possible obstructions to the slideouts but totally neglected to see the two 4’ guard posts around the electrical box. A rear slide out hit the post and would not fully extend. When I tried to bring the slide out back in it wouldn’t budge in either direction. That got me looking under the slide out and I discovered that the 1” diameter solid steel hydraulic piston rod had bent to almost a 90 degree angle. A mobile RV tech was able to saw off the bent rod and manually close the slide out.

Here’s my question: I obviously need to replace the piston rod assembly with a new one. Is this something I can do myself and how would I find the proper part number from Lippert?

Thanks for your help!

Bruce Curley
San Jose, CA

[rohrmann]

This is the page to go to. Not knowing what rig you have makes it hard to help out much, but if your rig is new enough, your cylinders will be aluminum instead of steel. And yes, it can be done quite easily, you just have to drop the coroplast material down to access the inside end of the cylinder. It would also be good to give Lippert a call to make sure you gat the right length before you order, 574-537-8900 https://store.lci1.com/shop-by-depar...ware_type=3711

[1retired06]

Certainly a do it yourself fix. Thanks for sharing what happened, Murphy's Law hits all of us at one time or another.

[beeje]

Wow, that a lot of force to bend that rod 90 degrees. Yes it can be replaced dyi but its not going to be easy. Most of the rams I have seen are up above the coroplast covering with the rod going through the trailers frame. The corcoplast would have to be pulled down to get to it. I would not dought that there is other damage done up under there.

[MARK A]

I'm disappointed that there isn't a bypass on the system.


Mark