From: John De Armond
Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.rv-travel
Subject: Re: Delaminating fiberglass
Date: Thu, 06 Oct 2005 21:54:00 -0400
Message-ID: <40lbk152cg60967v80er5i44convj8ioer@4ax.com>

On Thu, 06 Oct 2005 17:57:47 -0400, JQP
<jqpmailbox-newsgroups@yahoo.com> wrote:

>Near the corner of my 12 foot slide on my 5th wheel, a bubble has formed
>in the fiberglass siding.  Its about a foot long and maybe 3 inches
>across.  Its fairly close to the top corner of the slide.
>
>I'm windering the best way to get the bubble out.  Peel the whole area
>back and reglue?  Poke a small hole, inject glue, and roll it flat?
>
>Am I hosed, or is this a common fix?

Probably hosed.  The delam is usually caused by water infiltration.
The bubble is just the tip of the iceberg.

This happened to my mom's MH.  Fortunately she had a warranty that
paid for ripping out the wall and replacing all the rotted wood.
Unfortunately that didn't include getting rid of the bubble.

I called around and got pretty much the same story from several
sources.  Apparently the fiberglass is bonded to the substrate in a
heated press that contains the whole sheet of material for one side.
There isn't a practical field method for reattaching the fiberglass
once it delams.  The service method for those who have to have the
bubble removed is to remove the whole side of the RV and replace it.
We chose to live with the bubble.

If this had been my rig where I had time to piddle, I might have tried
to rig up some sort of large press to press the fiberglass back into
place while injected adhesive cured.  I reattached a ceiling delam in
my rig like that.  I don't know if it would work on the outside or
not.

John