Windshield Leak

[Dan Walters]

Well, we had not gone anywhere in the motorhome in several weeks, so last weekend we decided it was time for a trip.  We went to the beach close to Galveston, Texas and dry camped and everything went wonderful until we started home on Sunday.  We stopped to eat and walk through some shops and then went back to the MH to continue home.  While we were eating, it started raining--hard.  We had parked out in the shopping center parking lot way out away from the other cars, but the parking lot was not level and the rain ran off of the roof over the windshield on the passengers side.  When it finally slacked up enough for us to return to the MH, the whole right front of the dash was wet and water was standing in the storage compartment in the dash on that side (used to be called a glove box).  Now it was really raining hard--some places in Southeast Texas got as much as 18 inches of rain on Sunday and Monday.  But, it has rained before since I bought the MH and I have had no leaks.  My question is, could this leak have occurred because the parking lot was not level and the rig was twisted in some way?  Could it be that there has allways been a gap around that windshield and it just never leaked because of the way it was sitting?  At any rate, I need to seal the leak off so this does not happen again.  Does anyone have any recommendations of what to use to seal the winshield?  Another note, we drove back in a pouring down rain and it didn't leak while we were driving, only while sitting in that parking lot.  Thanks.

Dan

 

[Joe Bee]

Strongly suggest you contact Tiffin tech support.  They will be your best source.

 

[Gary RV_Wizard]

You normally don't seal an RV windshield - most of them "float" in a rubber molding and have no sealer in the joint. A few are glued in place, but that is rare because the front cap flexes and the windshield has to move with it.

Most any glass shop that does windsheilds should be able to re-seat the windshield for you and it usually isn't expensive. About an 30-60 minutes labor, probably

 

[Jim Dick]

Dan,

I would go along with Gary. Have a good glass shop reseat the windshield. I work part time at an RV dealership and we never mess with the windshields. We have a guy who comes out and does all that work.

 

[Shayne]

Don't know where you are but if near Phoenix  Call KISS  glass Co.  Mine was bad too and he fixed it in no time after years of troubles with it.

 

[Dan Walters]

Thanks everyone for the replies.  I did get up on a ladder this weekend to check out the seal on the front end cap and the seal around the front marker lights to see if my leak could have come from either of those sources.  It appears that the seals on the cap and lights are good.  I didn't see anything that looked like it would leak.  I also took a panel off of the overhead compartment inside and it did not look like the leak had gone through that area.  So my conclusion is that the leak came from the windshield, although I still don't know why.  It appears to be sealed tightly as well, but I am going to take it to the glass shop anyway and get them to reseat that side of the windshield.

Shayne, I wish I was in the Phoenix area.  Just visited there a few weeks ago and loved it.  I have a glass shop here is Beaumont that should be able to fix the problem.  Thanks for the referral, though.

Dan

 

[cuts_up]

This happened to someone I know.  It turned out that their roof was leaking where one of the roof a/c's was installed, and because of the way they were leaning, the water accumulated in the well on the dash.

 

[Jim Dick]

Dan,

A water leak is sometimes very difficult to pinpoint. It can start in an area nowhere near the appearance of it inside. You could try spraying water on the windshield for a few minutes and see if it starts to leak again. That's how we test them after the leak is fixed. Unfortunately it's hard to tell how long it will take to manifest itself but, if the seal is the culprit, it shouldn't be long.