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Old 11-23-2022, 11:12 AM   #1
Wavery
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Default Roofs hard to latch

I just had an interesting experience and I thought that I would share.

I recently adjusted the torque rods for the roof lifts because I added solar panels (additional weight). This morning, I tried closing the roofs and they would not latch, no matter how hard I tried. They had always latched fairly easy before the roof adjustment.

I crawled under the trailer and found that the lag bolts that hold the torque rods to the outer roof frame, where the center latches are, were ALL loose (4 on each side of the trailer).

Fearing the wood-rot devil, I unscrewed each bolt (one at a time) and checked them all. All of the bolts were clean and no wood came out with the bolts.

Moral to this story is, if your TM is 10+ years old, you may want to check those bolts to be sure they are tight. (9/16" socket and short extension). Especially if you are having issues latching your roofs.
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Old 11-23-2022, 11:18 AM   #2
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Wavery, I'm having a hard time figuring out which lag bolts you are referring to. Got a pic? or diagram?
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Old 11-23-2022, 12:37 PM   #3
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I'm not sure either - the mention of lag bolts and torsion rods has me a bit confused. Maybe this?

On each side of the trailer, under the edge of the floor, there is a metal bracket which the torsion bars pass through. The bracket holds the torsion bar ends in place, specifically up against the floor of the trailer. If these brackets come loose, the torsion bars drop down, which means the shell drops. These brackets are each held in place with four sturdy upward-pointing fasteners, which go up into the wood floor frame, so wood rot is a first thought. But the fasteners turn out to be machine-threaded bolts, not lag screws. The fact that they are bolts implies that they go through the wood, and into nuts somewhere above the floor frame - but inaccessible inside the wall.

Some of our members - including me - have been surprised to discover those brackets very loose, and in my case, several of the bolts had actually dropped out and gone missing. Thinking that the nuts had come off the ends of the bolts, and were now bouncing around inside the wall, I panicked, wondering how to get access the upper end of the area, so that I could re-thread the nuts and washers onto the bolts.

Turns out that the nuts were apparently secured somehow to the top surface of the wood. I was able to simply push the bolts upward against the nuts, which didn't move. I could start turning each bolt by hand until I felt it catch the threads in the nut. Then I torqued them down quite hard with a socket wrench, and there was no sign that the nut was sinking into the surface of the wood. I assume this means there was a big flat washer, and presumably a lock washer, up there. Big relief!

This was my experience in my nearly new-at-the-time 2020 TM. Perhaps older models used lag screws into the wood, rather than bolts and nuts. If so, the changeover to bolts and nuts was a good idea.

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Old 11-23-2022, 01:22 PM   #4
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I think he’s talking about the lag bolts that hold the torsion rod brackets into the floor?

Also if you pull those bolts and they come out clean, a bead of wood glue works pretty good as a form of Loc-Tite to keep them from backing out.

Bill- They use “T-nuts” now instead of just screwing the bolts in place. They drill a hole into the wood frame, insert the T-nut, and then drive the bolt through the nut.
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Old 11-27-2022, 05:21 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill View Post
I'm not sure either - the mention of lag bolts and torsion rods has me a bit confused. Maybe this?

On each side of the trailer, under the edge of the floor, there is a metal bracket which the torsion bars pass through. The bracket holds the torsion bar ends in place, specifically up against the floor of the trailer. If these brackets come loose, the torsion bars drop down, which means the shell drops. These brackets are each held in place with four sturdy upward-pointing fasteners, which go up into the wood floor frame, so wood rot is a first thought. But the fasteners turn out to be machine-threaded bolts, not lag screws. The fact that they are bolts implies that they go through the wood, and into nuts somewhere above the floor frame - but inaccessible inside the wall.

Some of our members - including me - have been surprised to discover those brackets very loose, and in my case, several of the bolts had actually dropped out and gone missing. Thinking that the nuts had come off the ends of the bolts, and were now bouncing around inside the wall, I panicked, wondering how to get access the upper end of the area, so that I could re-thread the nuts and washers onto the bolts.

Turns out that the nuts were apparently secured somehow to the top surface of the wood. I was able to simply push the bolts upward against the nuts, which didn't move. I could start turning each bolt by hand until I felt it catch the threads in the nut. Then I torqued them down quite hard with a socket wrench, and there was no sign that the nut was sinking into the surface of the wood. I assume this means there was a big flat washer, and presumably a lock washer, up there. Big relief!

This was my experience in my nearly new-at-the-time 2020 TM. Perhaps older models used lag screws into the wood, rather than bolts and nuts. If so, the changeover to bolts and nuts was a good idea.

Bill
Thanks Bill, those are the bolts that I was talking about. I said, "Torque rods" and should have said, "Torsion bars"....... tomatoes/tomatoes........

Shane is probably correct on our 2009 model. It did seem like there are nuts of some sort in there because I was able to torque those bolts down pretty good.

If I ever have that happen again, I will add some wood glue. Good suggestion Shane.
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Old 11-29-2022, 12:21 PM   #6
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Thank you for this valuable insight. I checked my recently acquired 2922KD and found a bolt missing on one side, and two missing on the other. If someone could enlighten me to the bolt size it would save me the trouble of backing out one of the existing bolts.
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Old 11-29-2022, 01:57 PM   #7
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Thanks for posting. Heading out to check the 2001.
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Old 11-29-2022, 02:25 PM   #8
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On our 2001 2619, none were missing or exactly loose, but I was able to tighten them a quarter turn or so. So thanks again for the heads-up. Will add checking these to the annual maintenance list.
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Old 11-29-2022, 02:48 PM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Boulder Lion View Post
Thank you for this valuable insight. I checked my recently acquired 2922KD and found a bolt missing on one side, and two missing on the other. If someone could enlighten me to the bolt size it would save me the trouble of backing out one of the existing bolts.
It depends on the year. You might call TM with your year/model. I'm sure that they would be happy to help.
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Old 12-02-2022, 06:45 AM   #10
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Wavery,
About 2 months ago we were adjusting our roof shell heights and tension rods torque. We found the same thing. Almost all were loose to some degree. Several were missing and closer inspection showed that several (5 total) of the bolts/heads had been twisted off...I guess by someone overtightening. One by one I removed the "lag" bolts, applied 5 minute epoxy and reset the bolts.

Shane,
Since I had "lag" bolts and not threaded/machine bolts, I guess my 2010 was before the change to the T-nuts. Good to know about that change. Thanks!
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