Adventurer ceiling construction

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John Stephens

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 27, 2015
Posts
1,000
Location
Cape Coral, FL
I lost part of my roof during our last trip out west and after getting it home and putting it in storage, realized that due to weather, rain and wind, the damage has extended to the ceiling, causing considerable water staining and mold. This tells me the ceiling and its luan will also have to be replaced.

When Winnebago makes a roof, they make the entire thing from top to bottom as one piece and then place it on the walls of the coach. My selection of repairmen in this area have all told me that there is no way to do this after the fact without lifting the entire roof off and replacing it. Instead, they are talking about removing the remainder of the filon on top along with the veneer, or luan, underneath it, and replacing both from up top. Then remove the ceiling fabric and the luan it is glued onto, and replace both of them.

Here is my question: what is the inside luan glued to? Is it glued to a solid core insulation panel, or to the aluminum substructure? If it is glued to the substructure, it shouldn't be difficult to remove and replace. But if it is glued to a solid core styrofoam insulation, it will probably be destroyed when the luan is removed and will have to be replaced also. If that is the case, it will make this repair so expensive, my insurance company will probably consider the coach a total loss and refuse to pay for the repair.

Thanks in advance to anyone who knows how a Winnebago ceiling is constructed and how to repair it.
 
I think on my 2001 Brave the inside ceiling Luan was glued directly to the foam core but I would need to pull a vent to be sure.

Pulling a vent is 4 screws and it will give you the inside cross section look you need and in multiple places if you have more than one vent. I am not sure if pulling the vent will give you a roof side look without removing the roof side of the vent from the roof.
 
I think on my 2001 Brave the inside ceiling Luan was glued directly to the foam core but I would need to pull a vent to be sure.

Pulling a vent is 4 screws and it will give you the inside cross section look you need and in multiple places if you have more than one vent. I am not sure if pulling the vent will give you a roof side look without removing the roof side of the vent from the roof.
Henry, thanks for the info, but I think if I pull a vent, all I am going to see is the inside of the venting. It would be a little more work but probably yield better results if I pull a light from the ceiling. I'm hoping someone on this forum has run into the same problem and can tell me how they went about replacing the top and bottom of the roof. When this occurred in June while on the road, I called Winnebago and asked if they could make the repair on my way home. They told me no, they were booked out until October, but if I wanted to make an appointment, they would build me a complete new roof at a cost of around $35,000. I made the appointment and a week later received an email from them stating they can no longer do the repair because they no longer have the tooling to make the roof. I have no idea what they are talking about but am guessing they may be speaking of the styrofoam insulation and how it is cut out and grooved to hold all the electrical wiring and a/c ventilation, and probably the aluminum substructure. If the luan is glued directly to it and it is destroyed when taking the luan off, I'm not sure who would be able to fabricate a new core of insulation for the coach if Winnebago can't do it.
 
Pretty certain Henry is correct - Filon glued to the foam. Maybe Winnebago could make a roof blank and have a shop cut the openings.
John, I'm afraid that when WBO told me they no longer have the tooling to make a roof for my coach, they may have been referring to the foam and its cutouts. They might be able to fabricate a blank for me, but how will I get it down to Florida?

I spoke to my insurance estimator today who suggested that whoever does the work on the roof and ceiling find someone who can spray insulating foam that hardens into any spots that may have become damaged when the luan is removed. I spoke to the man that will do the work and he said he can do that himself so unless there is major damage done to the foam, he thinks we won't have a problem. However, he wants to find out how much that roof weighs so he can buy enough equipment to be able to lift it off the coach a few inches so he can remove all the luan since the water damage is right there at the side of the roof. He's going to call WBO and see what they can tell him. If the foam becomes damaged beyond usage, the insurance company said they will pay for whatever work has been done to that point and then total out the coach.
 
Winnebago can crate and ship the roof blank via truck. This repair scenario you have described sounds very unworkable to me. You have a guy that wants to work solo and he needs to fab or purchase something to lift the roof? And then spray foam here and there? This would be something like I would expect in a 3rd world country.

This is a perfect setup for failure.
 
I cannot imagine that a quality rv repair facility cannot remove the roof and build a new setup. There are custom coach outlets that do conversions on a daily basis. If its wood, it can be replaced. And you can use close cell foam sheets sandwiched at the very least with 4 mm plywood to deal with reduced weight and any crown that's built into the original build.
 
Winnebago roofs of that era slip the Filon roof edges in the roof-sidewall aluminum extrusion. Reproducing that wouldn't be impossible but certainly a challenge, custom shops might not want to go there. By far, the best option is starting with a Winnebago roof blank.
 
My bro-in-law had 1/2 the roof fly off his Adventurer during a wind storm in Texas. The shop pulled the rest of the fiberglass roof off, repaired the damaged luan and ceiling and installed an EDPM roof. I've seen it and you can't tell it from my coach that came with an EDPM roof from the factory.
 
John, I can't argue with your logic regarding the viability of this project. However, Winnebago has already told me they no longer have the tooling to make this roof. That means we have to work with what we have and fabricate what we don't have. They might be able to ship me a roof blank, but it will still have to be cut out to accommodate the wiring, ductwork, and substructure. To have someone attempt to make those cuts that has never done it before sounds like a failure waiting to happen. I am hoping the luan comes off the interior of the foam as easily as it does on the outside underneath the filon. The spray foam the insurance adjuster mentioned is to be used only in emergencies where the luan has torn the foam off enough to warrant the repair. Given the fact that the glue holding it in place is 16 years old, I'm hoping it won't be a problem.

Because Winnebago can't make a new complete roof, we are going to have to piece what is there back together the best we can, using new filon, luan, and ceiling fabric, and hope the foam remains intact. If the foam has to be replaced with a blank from Winnebago that then has to be cut out, the cost will probably exceed what the insurance is willing to pay. I can't go to a custom shop because of the cost. LaMesa RV is the Winnebago dealer here in the area and has said their estimate to do a new roof, top to bottom, would be so high, the insurance company wouldn't accept it and would total the coach. If I want to keep my coach, I have no choice but to use lesser expensive workmen and hope the quality of their work is good enough. There is a strong chance the ceiling won't look the same because the ceiling fabric used on my coach is no longer made. I'll probably have to go to a non-foam-backed vinyl that won't look nearly as good as what I now have. The insurance adjuster stated that unless I want this coach to be considered a total loss, I will most likely have to settle with a repair leaving the coach looking different than it did originally. At this point, I am more concerned about the quality of workmanship than appearance and have decided to have my original choice of repairmen do the job, even though he won't be able to begin working on it until October. He has offered me indoor storage until then to avoid our hurricane season down here and says he will be able to work on getting the slide-out hydraulics repaired while waiting on the materials for the roof to arrive. And, he has a 3-ton crane to lift the roof and has done this work on numerous other coaches. If he can completely repair the hydraulics, I won't have to drive the coach to HWH next June.

My insurance estimator also has told me he will pay for at least some of the cost to get the roof sprayed with the product that is supposedly guaranteed for the life of the coach. He said out of the $7,000 cost, I might have to pay $1-2,000. Considering it costs $500 down here to have a competent repairman clean and caulk the side rails every few years, my cost of this product will pay for itself during the time remaining that I have the coach. I have done patch repairs on the side rails and know how much trouble it is to do a good job.

Wish me luck on this project. It's either do it this way or lose the coach, and I'm not ready to do that.
 
Cannot find it now, but I used to have a pic of the cross section of the Winnebago View roof at the edge. It is clearly a huge chunk of hard foam with luan bonded to the bottom and the top and the fiberglass sheet that is formed to match the curvature, bonded on top of the luan. The AC ducts are carved out of the foam before the ceiling luan is bonded.

Charles
 
Take this with a grain of salt since I am relatively new, have never worked on a roof, and never owned a Winnebago.

I have however gone from the inside panel to the filon on an aluminum frame RV in multiple spots including the floor of a cab overhang.

The filon is glued to luan which is in turn glued to closed-cell foam. What keeps all of that fixed and rigid is that the interior paneling is glued to the other side of the same foam. The aluminum frame is trapped between these layers of filon luan and foam. Unless the luan is delaminated from water damage it will be one hell of a tedious job to separate the inner or outer luan from the foam and a little less tedious job to separate the luan from the filon. It will be less tedious if you are throwing the filon away and replacing it.

I have not watched these videos the whole way through but I have watched many of his videos and this guy is good. If you watch his four-part video (about 7 minutes each) I am sure you will have a lot better understanding of what is needed to proceed.
He is replacing the filon and outside luan roof on a Winnebago.
 
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Wow John, you're in a very difficult situation. Unless you have an emotional attachment to the RV I think I would bail out at this point if your insurance would adequately compensate you. I see this project dragging on and on and on and the results I suspect wouldn't be stellar.

Large projects like this will be on the back burner and worked on when the shop has slack time.
 
Take this with a grain of salt since I am relatively new, have never worked on a roof, and never owned a Winnebago.

I have however gone from the inside panel to the filon on an aluminum frame RV in multiple spots including the floor of a cab overhang.

The filon is glued to luan which is in turn glued to closed-cell foam. What keeps all of that fixed and rigid is that the interior paneling is glued to the other side of the same foam. The aluminum frame is trapped between these layers of filon luan and foam. Unless the luan is delaminated from water damage it will be one hell of a tedious job to separate the inner or outer luan from the foam and a little less tedious job to separate the luan from the filon. It will be less tedious if you are throwing the filon away and replacing it.

I have not watched these videos the whole way through but I have watched many of his videos and this guy is good. If you watch his four-part video (about 7 minutes each) I am sure you will have a lot better understanding of what is needed to proceed.
He is replacing the filon and outside luan roof on a Winnebago.
I have watched all of this man's videos and sent their links to my coach guy planning on doing this repair. When he saw how this guy got the luan off the foam on the outside, he said he doesn't think this will be that difficult. Of course, the outside will always come off easier than the inside because of weathering and UV exposure. That's the big question mark right now - how much trouble will the inside luan be? The filon is trashed already, so it can ripped off without issue. And the outside luan is at least partially water damaged, probably about a quarter of the area of the roof.
 
Wow John, you're in a very difficult situation. Unless you have an emotional attachment to the RV I think I would bail out at this point if your insurance would adequately compensate you. I see this project dragging on and on and on and the results I suspect wouldn't be stellar.

Large projects like this will be on the back burner and worked on when the shop has slack time.
John, two thoughts on your post: first, the insurance company won't give me what I need to come clean on this coach, even for what I spent in the last two years. It has new Toyo's all the way around, new carpet, new furniture, Flexsteel captain's chairs, new water heater, rebuilt basement a/c and furnace, new coach batteries, new slide-out toppers, and last but not least, a recent tuneup. All told, I've put close to $12,000 in it in just the last two years and that doesn't account for the other $30,000 I've sunk into it since buying it six years ago. I don't expect to break even; that would be foolish. But I would really hate to see the money I just recently put in it go away. Insurance will probably cover what it is insured for - $45,000, but if I get it repaired, the current market price for this coach with Covid sales is probably over $50,000. I have weighed out my options and to be honest, I am sitting on the fence regarding whether or not to total it because I can see the good and the bad of both sides.

My second thought is about your comment regarding the project being put on the back burner. I met my coach guy at the storage facility this afternoon so he could take a look at both the ceiling work that will have to be done as well as looking underneath to determine where my hydraulic problem is coming from. He'll have to get the slide-out working before he can do anything with the ceiling. He said it appears my slide cylinder blew rather than the synchronizing cylinder. He can rebuild it easily and suggested I let him do both so I don't have the same problem on the road when the other one goes out. I had already thought that one through myself. When he looked at the inside, he said he will need to contact Winnebago to find out how they would take the insides apart the easiest because this coach isn't put together like others he has worked on with the screws in the same places. He is concerned about the interior walls, not the cabinets.

I asked him how long he thinks this will take him to complete. He said the reason he is putting me off right now is to completely clear his workload of other coaches he has right now so when he starts on mine, he'll be able to continue working on it until he's finished. He thinks it will take him about two to three weeks after he gets all the materials needed. I also gave him a laundry list of other things that went wrong while we were on the road I need him to look at and he said to count on him having the coach for about one to two months. I have dealt with him taking longer than quoted before, but that is because he does good work and refuses to be rushed. I have no idea how good this project will turn out but have confidence in this guy to do as good a job as anyone else without fitting the coach with a completely new roof.

Of course, if Winnebago would have been able to make a new roof for it, that would have been my first choice.
 
We had to drop over $10k on a head rebuild for our Cummins ISL a few years ago, RVs and especially motorized RVs can be a huge money pit so we feel your pain.

I'll get in touch with my Winnebago contact next week just for a sanity check about the roof unavailability.

It appears you have thought this out quite well and I wish you the best of luck.
 
Here's an update to my roof issue that I need opinions on.

After keeping the coach for six months without even beginning on the repairs, my coach guy now says he realizes he has bit off more than he can chew, and is backing out of repairing the roof, primarily because he is afraid of what doing the inside ceiling will entail. There is only one other repairman in the area who is willing to give it a try, and I'm not sure if he'll do an adequate job since he has also never done the insides.
I called my insurance company and explained that no one either can or will do the repair. Winnebago even said they can't do it because they no longer have the tooling for that roof. And the way they install a new roof is essentially the only good way to do it - build it on the ground and crane it into position. No repair facilities around my area in SW Florida have that ability.

My insurance adjuster said he will put together some new figures and determine if this thing should be totaled or not. So here is where I'm looking for opinions:

The coach will probably bring $45,000 if totaled, the insured value. The balance on its loan is just over $20,000. I have put around $18,000 into the coach in the past two years with new Toyo tires all the way around, new furnace, batteries, water heater, television, new carpet, window shades, and furniture in the living room, slide toppers, Flexsteel captain's chairs, Saf-T-Plus stabilizer, Koni shocks, and a tuneup. Aside from the roof, the coach is still in good shape with 63,000 miles. The interior is near perfect where it isn't new, and the outside is the only place that needs cosmetic work, and right now, I need to use a lot of solvent to get the adhesive off left by duct tape holding down tarps, and then another good wax job. If I tried to sell it with the roof repaired, my insurance adjuster says it will be worth $50,000 or more on the open market.

With all this in mind, would you still try to repair it and keep it, or accept a $45,000 total settlement from Insurance? Other options may be repairing the outside only, and live with the molded ceiling fabric after buying it back from the insurance company as a junker. or selling off the parts since there is so much new equipment inside. Also, does anyone know of a reputable repair center that is capable and willing to do an entire roof, all the way down to the ceiling fabric? Since I can't drive the coach in inclement weather, it will have to be somewhere in Florida.

Thanks in advance for any and all help you can provide.
 
I had a big branch fall on my last coach (29' Class A no slides) and poke a couple of holes in the rubber roof. By the time I discovered it, about 1/3 of the inside ceiling was ruined. My guy stripped the whole roof, repaired the damaged luan, replaced the damaged ceiling panels and installed a complete new membrane on the roof. Cost Progressive around $8000. Took them around a week and a half and looked as good as new when they were done.
2 years ago one of my hosts had his roof replaced by a mobile repair guy. Took 2 guys about 1/2 a day to strip the vents and stuff, and pull the membrane. They covered it with a tarp for the night and came back the next day and put it all back together.
It's a big project, but not that big.
 
^^ Winniebago's roofs aren't rubber but a sandwich of Filon, Luan, Styrofoam, Luan, and the headliner ^^

Back to the OP's question - I'm amazed you can't find a qualified shop/person in SW Florida to do a major roof job. Considering your scenario, I would take the money and run.
 
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