Hi.....At the moment steam is coming out my ears!!!!!!! Just been told by Sales/service company not a million miles from Bournemouth who specialise in Eribas, that they now only look at the Touring range and not our Future 430T !!!!!!!!!!! Good enough before they moved and took plenty of dosh from us to service and repair etc...but not now.

Our problem..... we have a small leak coming inside and are most certain it's from the awning rail on the outside. I can get my nails behind the rail on the top. We have also noticed most of the screws have been put back in at an angle (is this normal)or has it been repaired before. We are not great DIYers and am afraid we could make the whole thing worse.

Does anyone know of a mobile repairer or company in Dorset/Hampshire that might do this work...or.....any tips to do ourselves?

Off for a glass of wine and a calm down............ Chris

Gonna try to do ourselves...
Update:
First problem already ...the screws need an Allen Key and they are not the normal size looks like we need a 2.25mm??

2nd Update!! have eventually found a special screwdriver that has removed all the screws..getting scary now!!
But, can't get the awning rail to come off!! Does it take a great deal of pulling to get it away from the black gunge?? Terrified to damage rail or caravan surface.

Hi Roger...knew someone on here had just done it, but couldn't find. Will go and have a look at his blog. Have just updated to say we have now got the screws out but can't get the rail off!!
Chris

pulled the rail gently its almost that the sealer is suctioned on and the rail and underlay came off in one, well on ours the rail is in 3 pieces (front section and 2 sides) and removed underlay then as we were replacing on the troll,
the underlay sort of sits in a grove on the back of awning rail,
the sealer removes by tapping on itself if that makes sense, sure wrote something better on 10 year blog.
does this help of course am not expert and this is how i did it on our eriba

Hi Pop540 and Pepe. You have both mentioned something about an 'underlay' under the awning rail. Ours is just filled with all the black gunge stuff and a single thin length of string running down one of the inside grooves. We think it has been repaired in the past as there seems to be 2 types of black stuff. Do you think they threw away this 'underlay' and need to replace with new? Where can we buy it, if thats the case.
Thanks for all the help, Chris

hi Chris

although not sure how futures were constructed compared to tourings, but this post suggests d'élastiques sur les côtés
perhaps means seals
http://translate.google.fr/translate?sl=...%2Findex.php%3F
edit for some reason doesn't go to the thread, its in caravans old and new, then eriba others and the discussion is eriba future 2004 almost as expensive 2010 ,half way down first page


if its just gunge clean off, reapply fresh gunge of the butyl kind, ensuring the attaching screw / allen holes in body are covered
get a damp check done a few weeks afterwards for piece of mind

it is possible its been repaired before, my translator is limited but there was hints of factory doing something

any eriba dealer should be able to supply seals/ underlay but you will need to measure the whole rail for the length adding a little extra
jandi or automotive leisure, tebay

am afraid that's all I found on the net apart from a eriba future brake shoe change

The chap we had to the house once and is too booked up. Still trying to find one to fix the thermo couple in the cooker.

Hampshireman how about going on hols somewhere in country and meet up with a fixit person, if your local area is fully booked??

>Hampshireman how about going on hols somewhere in country and meet up with a fixit person, if your local area is fully booked??

Come down to Cornwall and book my recently found mobile serviceman. Called him and he came and serviced my van in a week.

Chris, I can't help with the technical but something has occured to me. AL are Eriba dealers aren't they? Surely this means that they should deal with all Eribas, not just Tourings. I would get back onto AL and ask them how they justify their stance on your van. If need be maybe talk to Hymer. This can't be right unless there is such a thing as an Eriba Touring dealer.

Hi Julie, Keith had already decided to go in the office next week as they are only a couple of miles away. Our money was good enough before they moved!! If we don't get a satisfactory answer, we will take it higher. By what he said to me, they are really only interested in sales and not after service. I know if we upgrade anytime in the future, who won't be getting our custom!!

One thing has come out of this, we are doing it ourselves and hope to save a shedload of money in the process....steep learning curve
Chris

If I had known the prob, we were in Newquay last week and might have done it as you suggest - thanks

Hi.....well the leak is fixed ....and has been tested in 2 downpours of which one lasted for about 11 hours!!

We decided to do the cleaning job ourselves as felt this would take the most time, but were not confident about using the black gunge and reapplying the rail. Was worried if we didn't do this correctly, we would have to start the whole job again. After getting the rail off, which incidentally took some major leverage and doing so distorted the rail somewhat, we started the big clean!!. We worked out we must of spent some 20 man hours just cleaning off the gunge from the van and along all the grooves on the rail....glad I didn't pay someone to do that We now have a pristine rail and van.

Next we decided to put the rail back on the van and leave it there for a few days in the hope this would push it back in shape. We are lucky that our van is under cover, so didn't need it to be sealed immediately. It also gave the van time for the insulation within the walls to dry out and more importantly find a mobile mechanic who could help with the sealing.

We eventually found a caravan mechanic through a neighbour and he duly came and looked at the van. He explained what he would do and that he had done loads of rails without any problems. He also told us about the Mastic Sealing Tape he uses instead of Sikaflex (gunge). He told me what to buy etc and would come back and put the rail up when we were ready.

Rob told us to buy the tape with the 45mm width as it made it easier to centre the rail and then cut off all excess on both sides. This tape is also available in 32mm and 19mm wide. Colours are white, grey or black. We purchased 45mm wide in white. Hope this link works..

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00J...pf_rd_i=desktop

If link above not worked...go to Amazon and its called W4 Wide Mastic Sealing Strip, 5M x 45mm wide. Can't find the actual ad I bought from as this one was only 32mm wide not 45mm as advertised...box in picture is marked 32mm

Anyway the strip arrived 2 days later and boy is it sticky!! Practised with 2 bits of plastic and they are still stuck together!

Rob arrived last Tuesday and we gave him a hand reattaching the rail as it turned out to be a 3 man job.
He firstly took off the awning rail that we had reattached to straighten and this had definitely helped. He fixed the strip to the rail as the rail was curved. He said if it was a straight area, he would of applied the strip straight to the van. He then inserted some old long panel pins in the screw holes on the van, so he could locate the holes in the rail easily as there is only the one chance of getting it right!. We then, between the 3 of us offered up the rail to the van at the same time not letting any of the rail touch the van before all the panel pins had been pierced through the holes of the rail. He then exchanged panel pins for the original screws and trimmed off all the excess strip. This all took a total of about 2 hours. I gotta say he did a great job and love the white edging instead of seeing black stuff oozing out along the rail.

I had also bought some new Hertzim (think thats what it's called) strip and he also did that for me.

Now the big test...well two actually. We went off camping that day as we heard it was going to rain that night and also to go 'off grid' for the first time!!!
Well both were a great success. This was the first time we had put the fridge on gas and we even tried out the central heating for an hour. The fridge took a few clicks of the piezo but fired up quite quickly. At 9pm it started to rain and it rained and it rained until about 8am the following day. I must say, I got very little sleep as I was forever checking the wall where we found the leak originally, but am pleased to say not a drop of water came through.
So please with last week that we again went 'off grid' this week in the New Forest at a great camping site with just WCs for 2 nights and at only £10 per night could get used to this way of camping.

Anyway fingers crossed the leak has been fixed and we have booked Rob for next April to give the van a service...

Regards Chris and Keith