Awning Repair August 26, 2005, 08:05:54 pm Yahoo Message Number: 57340Hi folks, I just wanted to share some experiences about repair of the factory- installed awning since I have not read much about it in this group. Hopefully someone else will find this information useful at some point, even though I really hope nobody else will experience what we did!On a recent trip not to far from home, we left the awning out overnight, since it was very calm weather. Well, in the middle of the night a stray thunderstorm, just far enough away not to be heard but close enough to create some strong windgusts woke us quite rudely... The awning was completely flipped up, the rafters bent out of shape and the arms twisted. It took my wife and me with all of our weight on the arms to bring the awning down and try to roll it up. Here is the first good news: Even with the rafters severly bent, the awning still fully retracted into the casing. This was a big difference to the other RV's on the campground, who had to disassemble and remove their awnings (theirs looked worse than ours...)With the help of this group I found the contact phone number for Fiamma here in the U.S. I would suggest the following approach, which worked well for me: 1) Download the exploded drawing of the awning from the Fiamma website. We have 2001 26.5 MB, that has a 4.0 Awning. Print it out. 2) I unrolled the awning and started taking it apart. In about two hours I had all damaged pieces removed and marked on the exploded drawing. At this point, the awning consisted essentially just of the case attached to the side of the motor home, the roller mechanism with the fabric and the end piece, so it could be rolled up, but had no other support. 3) With this information, I was able to call Fiamma and order the parts that were damaged. Important: The serial number and model are on one of the rafters, be sure to save this information! The cost for the rafters and arms came to close to $500 with shipping... 4) Once the parts arrived, I rolled the awning out by about 1 foot and pulled it up on the roof. This way, the mechanism was fully exposed without the awning in the way. 5) Using the exploded drawing again, re-attach the rafters. Warning: They *are* springloaded! (one almost knocked me off the ladder) 6) Once the rafters are fully secured again, I gently lowered the awning end and fabric on them and full rolled it out. 7) Now, the end of the rafters needs to be slid into the end piece of the awning again and secured. Carefully roll the awning in to make sure it will retract. If the rafters are not perfectly in the right spot, the awning will not fully retract. This can be adjusted easily, just don't use force... Re-attach the end-caps (the arms attach there, too) and admire your work...All in all, this project took me about 4 hours total, and I am not that technically included. I was able to do most of the work by myself, I only needed help in the dis-assembly process because the parts were so bent... The awning is very well built and actually reasonably easy to work on.It was a scary experience, but we have our awning back and saved a bundle by doing it by ourselves...Hopefully this information proves useful to someone...Jan in Houston 2001 26.5 MB
Re: Awning Repair Reply #1 – August 27, 2005, 09:50:44 am Yahoo Message Number: 57354"Jan Hoelterling" wrote: I just wanted to share some experiences about repair of the factory- installed awning --- Jan, I hope I never have to use your instructions, but thanks for posting -- good information to have.Joan
Topic: Awning Repair (Read 18 times)
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Topic: Awning Repair (Read 18 times)
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