--- title: "Slide Out Fifth Wheels Repair in West Covina" description: "Slide mechanism, seal and opening repair on fifth wheels running Schwintek, Accu Slide, rack and pinion or hydraulic rooms." canonical: https://ocrv.xyz/vehicles/fifth-wheels/slide-out-fifth-wheels/ business: "OCRV Center" phone: "(949) 799-3387" address: "23281 La Palma Ave, Yorba Linda, CA 92887" market_served: "West Covina, California" --- # Slide Out Fifth Wheels Repair in West Covina Every slide room on a fifth wheel is a hole in the sidewall with a motor attached, and it fails in three places: the mechanism, the seals and the opening itself. OCRV Center diagnoses and repairs Schwintek, Accu Slide, rack and pinion and hydraulic rooms for West Covina owners at the Yorba Linda shop. ## Common damage - Schwintek rooms losing sync and racking in the opening - Stripped gear racks and worn drive gears after repeated forced cycles - Accu Slide cables fraying at the swage and losing take up tension - Hydraulic rams weeping at the rod seal and dropping a room overnight - Chafed hydraulic hose leaking where it crosses a frame member - Bulb seals taking a compression set and channeling water into the wall - Wiper seals hardened and torn at the corners of the opening - Slide floors sagging and changing room travel and seal contact - Slide topper fabric shredded, letting water pool on the room roof - Opening trim and fascia damaged where a racked room jammed ## Identify the mechanism before you diagnose the symptom Owners describe slide problems the same way regardless of what is under the room: it stopped, it is crooked, it will not seal. The cause differs completely by system, so identification comes first. Look at the outside of the room. Schwintek and Lippert In Wall systems drive from vertical rails visible in the side jambs of the room. Rack and pinion systems drive from horizontal gear racks under the floor. BAL Accu Slide uses cables and pulleys under the floor. Hydraulic rooms have rams, hoses and a pump, usually shared with the leveling system. Each has a signature failure. Schwintek loses sync between its two motors and racks the room. Rack and pinion rooms wear the gear and rack teeth and start to slip under load. Accu Slide stretches and frays cable, so the room stops pulling in square. Hydraulic rooms leak, lose prime or drop overnight when a rod seal passes fluid. The diagnosis matters because the wrong repair on the wrong system wastes money. Replacing a controller on a Schwintek room that is actually binding because the floor sagged fixes nothing. Adding fluid to a hydraulic system with a chafed hose just puts more fluid on the driveway. We identify the system, verify supply, then examine the room and the opening as a unit. - Vertical rails in the jambs: Schwintek or Lippert In Wall - Horizontal gear racks under the floor: rack and pinion - Cables and pulleys under the floor: BAL Accu Slide - Rams, hoses and a shared pump: hydraulic, often tied to leveling ## Why a room racks and why you should stop cycling it A racked room is a room whose two ends are not at the same point in their travel. On a Schwintek system, each side has its own motor and the controller keeps them synchronized by counting. When one side meets more resistance, loses a count or the rail binds, the controller loses the relationship, and the room walks out of square. The noise owners describe as grinding is gear teeth skipping over the rack. Every additional cycle after that point makes the repair larger. Skipping teeth removes material from both the gear and the rack, so what began as a sync problem becomes a parts replacement. A room that is out of square also jams against the opening, and once it jams, the trim, the fascia and sometimes the wall skin at the opening take damage. We have seen rooms forced far enough to crack the sidewall laminate. The correct response is to stop, note the position, and get it looked at. Manual retraction is possible on most systems and it protects the coach for a tow. At the shop the room gets squared, the rails and fasteners get checked for alignment, damaged racks and gear packs are replaced, the controller is resynchronized and the travel is set. Then the seals get addressed, because a room that has been running out of square has usually been wearing its seals unevenly. ## Seals: the part that causes the water damage Mechanisms strand you. Seals cost you a wall. The bulb seal is the compressible tube that the room presses against when it is retracted, and it is doing the actual weatherproofing. Rubber under constant compression takes a permanent set, and a bulb that has been squashed for two seasons no longer rebounds. Once it stops rebounding it stops sealing, and water that hits the top of the room runs down the wall cavity instead of shedding outside. Wiper seals are the flexible fins that ride against the room's side walls as it travels. They keep water and grit off the moving surfaces. They harden with ultraviolet exposure and tear at the corners of the opening first, because the corner is where the fin has to bend most. A torn wiper corner is a direct path for wind driven rain at towing speed. We replace seals as a set on a room. Putting one new strip against three tired ones just relocates the leak. Along with the seals we check the room's contact across its full height, because a room that seals at the top and gaps at the bottom is telling you the floor has sagged or the room is out of square. That is a mechanical correction, not a seal problem, and no amount of new rubber solves it. - Bulb seals take a compression set and stop rebounding after seasons parked - Wiper seals harden and tear at the opening corners first - Seals get replaced as a set, not one strip at a time - Uneven contact top to bottom is a mechanical problem, not a rubber problem ## Slide floors, openings and the structure that carries the room A slide room hangs off the side of the coach and its weight has to go somewhere. On through frame and rack and pinion systems, the room rides on rollers and the load transfers into the frame at the opening. On Schwintek rooms, the room's weight is carried by the vertical rails and the wall structure around them. Either way, the opening is a large hole cut in a structural wall, and the framing around it is doing real work. That is why slide problems and structural problems overlap. A sagging slide floor changes both travel and seal contact. Outrigger cracking under a full wall slide changes the geometry of the opening. A coach that has flexed at the pin box can put a bedroom slide out of square without anything being wrong with the slide at all. Our slide inspections include checking the opening for square and looking underneath at the outriggers and crossmembers supporting it. Slide floor repair is common on rooms that have taken water from a failed seal. The decking softens, the room deflects at the outer edge, and the deflection changes contact. Repair means opening the floor, removing failed material, reinforcing or replacing framing, bonding in new decking and resetting the room square in the opening. Doing the floor without resetting the room leaves the same seal contact problem in place. ## Slide work for West Covina owners at the Yorba Linda shop Slide repair takes space and it takes the room able to travel fully. That is why it happens in shop rather than anywhere else. We run the room, watch it under load, measure it, and pull it if the repair requires bench work. All work is performed at Yorba Linda. We do not offer mobile service. From West Covina it is about 22 miles and 30 to 45 minutes. Take the 10 or the 60 west to the 57 south, then the 91 east to Imperial Highway. When the 57 is heavy through Brea, Carbon Canyon Road to the 71 is the shortcut. Before you tow with a room stuck partially out, secure it. A room that moves on the highway will damage the opening and can catch on something. RV systems estimates covering slides, awnings, water, electrical and generator work carry a set diagnostic charge that is credited against an authorized repair. That charge buys real diagnostic time on the coach rather than a guess over the phone. Call (949) 799-3387 to schedule, and tell us which room, what it does, and whether it has been forced. ## Frequently asked questions ### Can I tow my fifth wheel with a slide stuck partway out? Only after it is secured, and even then it is a compromise. A room that can move at highway speed will damage the opening, tear seals and can catch on something in traffic. Most systems allow manual retraction with a hand crank or by releasing the drive, and that is the preferred approach. If the room cannot be brought in, it needs to be strapped and blocked so it cannot travel. Tell us the situation before you leave, because it changes how we receive the coach. ### How do I know if my slide problem is the motor or the seals? By what it does rather than by what it looks like. If the room moves but leaks, the mechanism is fine and the seals or the room's squareness are the issue. If the room hesitates, grinds, stops or comes in crooked, the mechanism or the alignment is involved. Water inside near the bottom of a room usually points at a bulb seal that has taken a set. Water high on the wall points at the top seal or a topper that has failed. Both get checked together on inspection. ### Why does my slide seal fine on one end and gap on the other? Because the room is not square in its opening or the slide floor has sagged. A seal cannot make up for geometry. When one end contacts and the other gaps, the room is sitting at an angle, and the cause is usually a sagging floor, worn rollers, a stripped gear on one side, or an opening that has moved because of frame flex. Replacing the seal alone leaves the gap. We measure the room and the opening, correct the geometry, then fit new seals against a true surface. ### Is a slide topper worth replacing when the fabric shreds? Yes, and sooner rather than later. The topper keeps leaves, needles and standing water off the roof of the slide room. Once the fabric goes, debris collects on the room and water pools against the top seal, which is exactly the joint you do not want holding water. Shredded fabric also lets the roller unwind and flail, which damages the arms and the mounting. Replacing fabric and restoring roller spring tension is a short job compared to repairing a wall that has taken water. ### My slide worked all season and failed on the first trip after storage. Why? Storage is hard on slides. Sitting retracted for months lets bulb seals take a compression set, lets grit settle into rails and tracks, dries out lubricant and lets batteries drop to a voltage where motors labor. The first cycle after a long sit is the one that binds, and a bind is what causes a Schwintek room to lose sync. Cycling the rooms periodically during storage and keeping the batteries maintained prevents a large share of the failures we see in the spring. --- OCRV Center, 23281 La Palma Ave, Yorba Linda, CA 92887. Phone (949) 799-3387. All work is performed in shop at the Yorba Linda facility. We do not run mobile, roadside or fleet route service. Ranges are planning figures, not a quote. Final numbers come from a written estimate on your vehicle.