Bedroom Slide roller damage

It looks like several people have issues with the support rollers damaging the underside of the bedroom slide. Referencing to our 2010 Sundance 3000RK, I had noticed that two tracks had developed. Almost overnight the left side, as a look at the slide from the outside, degraded the plywood to the point that I believe the slide could drop to the frame work on that side. Is there a fix for this. I thought about inserting some 16 guage sheet metal to bridge the eroded plywood. Also thought since enough people have posted on similar problems, Heartland may have a fix. Any ideas.

I'm curious as well. My 2012 3300CK developed what appears to be a similar problem - rollers literally becoming detached from exterior wall. As a result I now have two nice grooves worn into the underside of the bedroom slide. I brought mine to a dealer who reattached the rollers in a different place on the side wall, but who knows if they will fall out too? What is particularly interesting is that when the slide rollers were reattached, the decals on the outside of the unit aren't straight. What does that tell you? The roller must have not been attached from day one. I assume the decals are applied on these trailers after the bedroom is installed. Now that the bedroom is sitting appropriately on the rollers, the room is level but the decals are not. Must have come from the factory like this. Very disappointing. Dealer had to order me new decals. Waiting to schedule appointment to have them reapplied.

Hi Jonc,

Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum. You'll find a lot of useful information here along with a great bunch of people who are willing to share their knowledge and experience.

Sorry you're having this problem, but it sounds like the dealer is taking care of correcting the cause and fixing the decal problem. You might want to speak about the wear directly with Heartland Customer Service at 877-262-8032. Have your vin # ready.

We've had our Greystone 32RL for two years now and the underside slowly had deteriorated too. During warranty had the dealer work on it at least twice and now I see that the rollers have actually cut through the underside. It all started with the bottom seal being pulled back on to the rollers when the room was moving in. This meant that the room was dragging and not rolling in. We cut away the sections of the seal that were being chewed up so that the room was not dragging on the non-rolling rollers. Now it appears that the roller. instead of riding on a support, rides on the 1/4" plywood underlayment. Now the fix will be on me and from what I've been told it will be an expensive proposition ans the entire slide bottom needs to be repaired and at $120 an hour I can not afford. Think it's time to bite the bullet and move on to SOB.

I've seen this happen on every make of RV not only Heartland. Parkland makes a kit to repair the under side of the slide. I have one in the grage left over from my last rig.

JJnLilly said:

We've had our Greystone 32RL for two years now and the underside slowly had deteriorated too. During warranty had the dealer work on it at least twice and now I see that the rollers have actually cut through the underside. It all started with the bottom seal being pulled back on to the rollers when the room was moving in. This meant that the room was dragging and not rolling in. We cut away the sections of the seal that were being chewed up so that the room was not dragging on the non-rolling rollers. Now it appears that the roller. instead of riding on a support, rides on the 1/4" plywood underlayment. Now the fix will be on me and from what I've been told it will be an expensive proposition ans the entire slide bottom needs to be repaired and at $120 an hour I can not afford. Think it's time to bite the bullet and move on to SOB.

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I am not entirely sure exactly what your slide looks like, but there may be an easy DIY fix.
If the rollers are causing damage to the bottom of the slide here is what I would do.
Get some galvanized sheet metal cut into strips about three inches wider than the rollers.
Then carefully jack up the slide about 1/4 inch.
Apply an adhesive to the sheet metal and place it into position centered on the roller.
The using some short stainless screws, attach the sheet metal along the edges to the bottom of the slide.
That should seal up the slide damage and prevent any future damage.
I can't guaranty that will work, but that is what I would do.

Peace
Dave

Cookie, that sounds like a good idea. I can see where the roller has actually cut through the thin plywood bottom of the slide. I would think that the roller should make contact with an area of the bottom that had a more substantial contact surface than the thin plywood bottom. That's a lot of weight to be born by just the underlayment.

Is there any way to 'adjust' the slide. Am thinking that if I do put a piece of metal to run the slide on that it may throw off the mechanism some.

I don't think that the thin sheet metal will cause a mis alignment.
And I think that the floor of the slide is 1 inch thick. It is not thin.

Peace
Dave

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

This is the lippert ram that drives the bedroom slide. The OSB that you see is dry inside, however outside on the right side, the OSB is saturated. The water seems to run down the side of the slide and then by capilary action wick back underneath through small tears in the underlayment. I have pictures of the outside/underside of the slide and will post them later. It seems that the roller gouging was amped up by the water damage to the OSB. My wife thinks its a design flaw and Heartland should fix it.

sundanceandbutch said:

It looks like several people have issues with the support rollers damaging the underside of the bedroom slide. Referencing to our 2010 Sundance 3000RK, I had noticed that two tracks had developed. Almost overnight the left side, as a look at the slide from the outside, degraded the plywood to the point that I believe the slide could drop to the frame work on that side. Is there a fix for this. I thought about inserting some 16 guage sheet metal to bridge the eroded plywood. Also thought since enough people have posted on similar problems, Heartland may have a fix. Any ideas.

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The roller on our 2011 Sundance 2800RL broke last fall the dealer placed two plates the length of the slide. These plates are 1/4" aluminum about 6" in width.

Tom

Regarding the alluminum plates, I assume that they were placed for the roller to track upon when opening and closing. Thats essentially what I am doing with the 16 guage sheet metal. However in my case in addition to the roller causing damage I also have an issue with water wicking back under the slide and degrading the OSB.
For all to see, this is the water damage I referenced to. In a followup post I will show how I fixed the roller problem (also something for members to consider as well as the factory) and how I dealt with the water damage issue. I still believe that the water damage was initialy due to the roller damage to the OSB floor.

I have the exact same issue with my 2009 3300BHS. I just noticed it last week and it is the reason I joined this forum. Your earlier comment mentioned a design flaw due to alot of owners having this problem. Did you have any conversatiosn with the manufacturer and if so, what was their response? Sounds like if you are fixing it yourself, Heartland isn't responsible for it. I'm interested to see what kind of winter project I am going to have.

Many manufacturers have been using Darco-wrapped OSB or plywood for slide floors for a long time. Some, incredibly, still do. I thought Heartland used Parkland laminated slide floors (the kind with the plastic bonded to the bottom of the plywood) but maybe they are still doing it the old way on Sundance?? It seems to me that they don't, or I wouldn't have even been considering Sundance two years ago.

That material just does not stand up to the repeated stress of slideout movement especially where the rollers make contact. I've seen some pretty bad damage on older rigs that have had this design, if from nothing other than a small screw hole in the black material along the bottom, where water can wick up, into the wood, and rot out a large area.

Mine is a Greystone - basically the same as the Sundance. The floor is OSB as the pieces and parts are coming out through the now completely cut wrap.

On my 08 the wrap on the OSB is still in good shape so I'm wondering if maybe they changed their supplier on the rollers and that is why they are cutting the fabric. Also I never roll the bed in or out with weight on it.

My reply from Heartland was "sorry you are out of warranty. I bridge the chewed up OSB with 8" wide strip of 16 guage steel and anchored throught the bottom layer (outside) to the inner floor under the bed. You have to remove the plywood that your mattress rest on. I attached some short pieces of 2/4 to the floor to secure the screws to.

With the slide extended, take a measurement 1/2 past the roller to the outside edge of the slideout. Dont go past the flange attachment screws as this could misaline the the slide. Counter sink your holes in the metal and then with 3 " screws secure the metal though to the inner floor. The right side of my slide was not damaged by water so I used 8" wide metal. The left side was pretty much mush so I spread the weight and used a piece metal 20" wide. I sealed the edged with water proofing and gorilla tape.

Hope everything works out for you.

Decided that it was just too big of a job for me so am taking it to a local RV repair shop (not a dealer at $120 per hour!). Have a couple of other minor issues that they will also handle while there. He plans on putting "plates" on the bottom of the room for the rollers to glide on and then look for the cause of the water leak. After seeing my pictures he agreed that two 2 1/2 inch rollers are not really enough to support the bed. Will let you know how it works out.

JJnLilly said:

Mine is a Greystone - basically the same as the Sundance. The floor is OSB as the pieces and parts are coming out through the now completely cut wrap.

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I have a 2011 Greystone 29MK, and my bedroon slide is 1 inch plywood with a heavy plastic laminate underneath. Absolutely no scratching or tearing. Are these made in different plants which might explain material differences?

Al

Just returned from the RV repair shop. What a mess. Seems as though the bed frame where is was attached to the slide mechanism came apart. There were a total of five (5) screws holding the frame 2X2s to the headboard and slide mechanism. Two of the three holding the bottom were broken off where they went through the metal plate and the two holding the frame to the headboard were pulled out. The rollers on which the slide was to glide, are too close to the interior frame and don't even turn, thus the room is dragged in and out. The second time I had the unit back to the dealer I mentioned that the bottom of the room went out 3 to 4 inches before the top started and then the top bent down and inward. I was told by the service writer that this was the was the room was designed to operate(?)

But that is only part of it. When the service guy working on it now began to remove screws around the outside of the bedroom slide he found them all rusted. The same thing for the screws holding the windows in. Apparently no caulk or sealer was used and now the interior walls below the windows are soft and the entire floor below under the slide is rotted. Tried to take a couple of photos but it was hard and I could not get them to upload to this post.

Oh yea, the awning was not rolling up properly so he checked and fixed that. Biggest problem with not rolling was that the awning had shrunk - a lot. And when he removed the two screws holding the awning to the rail - they went in the from the side - through the rail into the body and they too were covered with rust. Walls there are beginning to get soft too. Where was quality control.

It is going to cost me nearly $3000.00 to get the room fixed properly and in checking the other two slides - removing screws found lots of rust and no sealer. Way to go! I'll get it fixed and say farewell to Heartland!