Ken told us that he had been in the business of stretching trucks and building high quality custom sleepers for over 20 years. He had won numerous prizes in nationwide contests. When we visited his shop for the first time he was in the process of building a custom motorhome on a tractor trailer frame. The motorhome body was framed out in steel , just waiting for the customer to decide on the final interior design. If all of this was true then how could he have made so many rookie mistakes? Building our small motorhome should have been relatively easy for someone with his experience. We were completely wrong in our assumptions. He did not seem to have any grasp of basic physics or construction.
Around 7,000 miles the cabover developed a horribly annoying squeak. Tony took the finish pieces off and this is what we found.
Ken had filled the space between the truck roof and the cabover with spray in foam. It had broken apart as we drove and was now rubbing against itself. Tony pulled as much out as he could and put the finish pieces back on. The squeak wasn’t quite as bad. What we didn’t realize is that the foam and two little screws were the only things joining the truck cab and the motorhome body together. As we drove the cab roof moved side to side and front to back about 1/4”. We had no idea of how the two pieces should have been joined but we couldn’t leave it like that. Tony took it apart again so that we could appraise the situation. We found that Ken had removed a piece of the cab roof framing that he should have left in place.
We ordered a replacement piece but it didn’t fit quite right and it wasn’t very substantial so a piece 1/8” thick of steel was used instead. Tony also screwed the roof into the cabover framing.
Joining the back of the cab to the motorhome was a little trickier. Here’s what we had.
Creative use of angle iron ,screws and nuts and bolts.
Bottom view.
This will be solidly joined together when the plywood base for the trim piece is in place. These pieces of plywood had been getting gouged as the cab moved.
Plywood screwed into place. The glue is from Ken trying to use glue to attach the final trim ,a piece of vinyl padded plywood.
Trim piece installed.
Joining all of the pieces together worked! There’s not the slightest bit of movement now no matter how bumpy the road or how much we twist and turn.
We owe a thank you to the Dodgen division of Born Free motorhomes. Dodgen builds specialty vehicles such as ambulances and product show rooms. They’ve recently added a line of handicapped accessible motorhomes. They’ve been very helpful especially with construction details about how they join the cab to the motorhome body. Their motorhomes are very well designed and made and I recommend them to anyone wanting a small handicapped motorhome. http://www.dodgenmobiletech.com/products.php?id=18
Everything else seems to be okay. We haven’t had any more leaks , the interior is holding up well and we’re even getting a little better gas mileage!
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