Main Slide leaks water into carpet when pulling on wet roads

Our Elkridge 34QSRL seeps water into the carpet when we are pulling in the rain or on wet pavement. Upon examination I found that the two offside slides have a 1 inch by 1 1/4 inch rubber gasket mounted on the outboard slide support bar (the 2" steel bar that runs the full length of the slide). The main slide does not have a gasket mounted on it and, obviously, has never had a gasket mounted on it. The gaskets on the other slides closes and compresses to the main body when slides are closed. There is another 4 inch wide flat rubber piece below the body side that I would call a 'shedder' or a closeout, and all three slides have that component.
My question is, shouldn't there be a compression gasket on the main slide? Presumably HL just forgot to install it? I am thinking that the main slide is no different than the others, especially since it encompasses the wheel well with all the water sling and pressure that that involves.
I presume we are still in warranty since we have not had our rig a year yet, but confirmation that the slide is indeed missing a necessary gasket would be appreciated.
Thanks
Randy Zimmerman

By main slide I am guessing that you are refering to the door side slide.
I looked at my Bighorn and that slide does not have a rubber bulb on the bottom like the off door slide. Don't know why not but it looks like that's the way they build em.
However, there is one important thing that you should look for. Well actually two.
You need to look under there on the coach part itself. On each corner there should be a foam rubber block or wedge. You should be able to recognize it as it is about 4-5 inches wide and about 1 inch thick and is screwed on. Those are important.
Also you will want to check that the slide is closed properly, making all the seals.

Peace
Dave

Yes it is the door side slide. And the other gaskets you mention are in place. I guess I find it difficult to comprehend why there is not a gasket on that support bar when that slide is identical to the other slides in all other respects?? Just doesn't make sense, especially so, since we have water issues at the floor/slide closure joint.
I hope someone else chimes in on this...as to whether all doorside slides are gasketless.

Iluv2fish said:

I hope someone else chimes in on this...as to whether all doorside slides are gasketless.

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No bulb seal on our doorside slide only the rubber wipe and the corner blocks.

Iluv2fish said:

Yes it is the door side slide. And the other gaskets you mention are in place. I guess I find it difficult to comprehend why there is not a gasket on that support bar when that slide is identical to the other slides in all other respects?? Just doesn't make sense, especially so, since we have water issues at the floor/slide closure joint.
I hope someone else chimes in on this...as to whether all doorside slides are gasketless.

Click to expand...

We had this same exact issue the first time we towed our 32QBSS travel trailer. I called Heartland while on road and didn't get a lot of satisfaction.

I did an emergency "fix" which I'd read about online. I stuffed some of those 4 ft long pool tubes (look like the 3' long split insulation pieces that you can put over plumbing lines) into the "gap" after closing the slideout before traveling.

We took it to our dealer who looked at it. They ended up installing huge NAPA truck mudflaps which so far has cured the problem.

I too posted a thread and folks talked about the missing seal. The dealer checked all seals -- all are in place.

This is an issue that Heartland did not satisfy me with and the dealer did with the mudflaps.

We ran a new and used car dealership for 42 years, and I rarely found 'the factory' as responsive as they should have been. we usually ended up fixing an issue by ourselves. This issue of no seal on the main slide really bugs me in view of the fact that HL saw fit to install them on the other slides. I know there are automotive style gaskets of the approximate size, and feel that will solve the water problem. So, I guess I will go it alone, as usual.
Thanks to the responders, I appreciate it.
Randy

Iluv2fish said:

We ran a new and used car dealership for 42 years, and I rarely found 'the factory' as responsive as they should have been. we usually ended up fixing an issue by ourselves. This issue of no seal on the main slide really bugs me in view of the fact that HL saw fit to install them on the other slides. I know there are automotive style gaskets of the approximate size, and feel that will solve the water problem. So, I guess I will go it alone, as usual.
Thanks to the responders, I appreciate it.
Randy

Click to expand...

Randy, I'm a bit confused by your post. Unless I missed something, it looks like you're expecting a formal response from Heartland by way of this forum. The forum has a lot of great info and helpful people, and sometimes factory people do respond to questions. But all of this is not a substitute for taking your RV to an authorized repair location for diagnosis and repair under warranty. Support from the factory comes primarily by way of authorized sales and service locations.

But if you want to discuss this directly with Heartland, call Customer Service at 877-262-8032 and have your VIN # handy.

If you're confident that your diagnosis is correct, and that you can fix the problem yourself, you might be able to convince Customer Service to send you the seal. I'm not sure that's a good idea - if you're wrong, and did the work yourself, you might not get warranty coverage for the same problem twice. If a dealer tech tries and fails, I'm sure either the dealer or Heartland would cover additional work to resolve the problem.

I'd suggest getting on this right away, before you find yourself in a discussion about being out of warranty.