5 Important RV Maintenance Projects I Do Once a Year

five important things you should do to your RV every year before the new camping season starts you don't want to miss this one so don't go anywhere [Music] [Music] [Applause] hey guys welcome back to why wait today I want to talk to you about five important things you should do to your RV every year before you hit the road whether your RV has been in storage all winter or maybe you've been stationary like we have or even if you're just traveling around the country these are still things that you should do at least once a year to your RV as just routine maintenance and this is a good time to do it before everybody hits the road and things you may have overlooked and or maybe never looked at so let's go ahead and jump into and the first thing I want to talk to you about today is wheel bearings come on follow me so this is a pretty important one and something that may get overlooked by a lot of people but repacking the grease in your trailers bearings is really important there's a lot of safety issues that can arise from not repacking the grease in your RV bearings now there is a simple way to do this a lot of the RVs nowadays have zerk fittings where you can simply hook up a grease pump and just pump fresh grease into the bearings while this works maybe you can do it once in a while I'm not a fan of that and I really don't recommend it for a few reasons one if you're not opening this up and looking inside there you can't see what's going on and check on other problems that you may have I prefer to repack my bearings by hand this offers me a few advantages number one if you repack your bearings by hand all the old grease that's in the bearings is going to come out if you're going to just end up pumping it in there with a quick fitting uh you're not really going to clean them and get the old grease out number two if I'm going to repack them by hand I'm going to have to open everything up take the bearing out this way I can inspect the bearings for any discoloration or pitting too to make sure everything's okay with that while I'm in there I can also inspect my brakes make sure everything's working make sure all the mechanical components in my brakes are working okay there's a lot of things that can go wrong and if you're not opening these up and getting inside there and looking at them once a year you may be missing on some important stuff one of which is people who do just pump the grease in a lot of times you end up blowing out the grease seals now I've personally seen this happen a few times I've done some other people's bearings and they told me the year before they just took it to a shop and the shop just kind of used this Arc fitting quick pump degrease in and when I went in there to repack their bearings I got inside and they had grease all over their brakes well what happened was too much grease got pumped in there it popped out the grease seal and the grease got all over the brakes which as we all know we do not want to get grease on our brakes very dangerous thing so again I recommend doing this by hand there's lots of advantages by doing it by hand it's not too difficult of a process now I'm not going to get into the whole process today but if you guys know me I already have a video on it put a link to that right up here but this is usually recommended to get done about once a year or 10 000 miles whichever comes first go back check out that video I'll put a link in the video description below so you can find that video as well bookmark it for when it's time for you guys to do that go through the whole process of repacking the bearings by hand and all the other safety things you need to check while you got that opened up not a difficult process most people can do it by themselves you'll save some money and you'll save the headache of having to take it to a shop and by the way if this is your first time checking out our Channel we appreciate it and if you're liking what you see so far we'd also appreciate it if you hit that like button and subscribe to the channel because we have lots more videos like this on RV maintenance DIY projects RV hacks RV tips all kinds of things like that okay number two on the list we all should know what this little Gizmo is right here and that's our Breakaway cable now we all know how this should work you attach this somewhere securely in your truck if your camper was able to separate from your truck somehow this is going to pull the pin out of here thus engaging your trailer brakes they're going to lock up and stop the trailer now for the most part there's not too much you have to do to this but you should inspect it once a year and clean it a little bit so let's go ahead and talk about that real quick since we just got done talking about our bearings and RV brakes anyways this is a good thing to do while you are doing those bearings it's an easy way to check to see if this is working so the first thing you want to do if you're just going to clean this is you want to go ahead and disconnect your battery or any power going to the RV this is not something you want to just pull out and leave pulled out for an extended period of time as soon as you pull this out it's going to send an electric pulse to your brakes which triggers a magnet which then locks up the brakes and you do not want those brakes to be locked up with a bunch of electricity going from the whole time that's not good for that's not good for anything so what I usually like to do is disconnect any power from the battery then you can go ahead and safely pull this pin out and clean it and I like to just spray with a little bit of bow Shield T9 there's some other electric like cleaners that you could spray on it and I'll put some links to those below as well go ahead and spray it you can spray inside there let it dry out real good use a brush just clean it up a little bit put it in exercise it a few times and that should be good for the cleaning aspect of it but again you don't want to pull this pin out and leave it pulled out for an extended period of time if you are still hooked up to any kind of power so how do we test this to make sure it's working correctly well I'm going to crawl up from underneath here because it's an awkward position we'll talk about that real quick so there's a few different ways you can test to see if your Breakaway cable is working properly now you will need power going to the RV to check on this to see if it's working correctly so you will have to have your battery reconnected when you do this now my preferred method is if I'm down there already and I'm repacking my bearings I already have everything opened up you can actually see your brake drums you can see the little magnetic pieces you can see everything working so if you have two people you can have somebody back there by the wheels and you can have somebody go ahead and pull that pin out of there now when they pull the pin out you should see the magnet activate and it should move your drum brakes and you should see that piece actually move and that way hey you know it's getting the signal and it's locking up the brakes that's one way to check it let's say you have the tires up off the ground but you don't have them all taken apart yet if somebody pulls that pin and you have another person back there by the tires as soon as you pull that pin it should lock up the brakes and you shouldn't be able to spin that tire by hand and one of the reasons I like doing it this way anyways is because again I already have everything opened up I can see the drum brakes I can see Springs I can see the magnets I can see all the parts and pieces check to see if everything's working and it's a great way to go ahead and test your Breakaway cable again just real quickly just pull it out just for a few seconds make sure it activates triggers works and then put that pin back in you don't want to leave that pin pulled out for an extended period of time so another way you can quickly test this is if you have a handheld Compass go back by your tires hold it right up by your Tires and Brakes have somebody pull the brake weight cable out just for a few seconds and you're going to see that Compass spin it's not going to Point North anymore it's going to turn toward the magnet that's a good way to let you know that you have power going to your brakes one of the last ways you can test this to make sure it's working I've never done this personally I don't have one but there's a device called a clamp meter you can actually just put that on these wires coming out of the back end of the Breakaway cable right here and that's going to show as soon as you again pull the pin out of here it's going to show or it should show read some amperage going through these wires 12 13 amps going through there that lets you know again you have power going to this but still I like to personally get eyes on my actual brakes because hey you may have power going through this going that way but if there's somewhere disconnected along there you're not going to get power to your brakes and that magnet it's not my preferred method I still like to open things up get some physical eyes on your actual brakes the pads the magnets make sure everything back there is moving and working okay number three on the list five things you should do to your RV every year once a year basic maintenance is our water system now what do I do to our water system once a year well once a year I like to sanitize our fresh water tanks all the lines inside the camper as well as our RV hose some people like to just go ahead and replace the hose that you have on the ground that's fine too but I don't want to spend money on one every year what I like to do is when I sanitize the whole system including fresh water tank including all my piping inside the camper I also like to sanitize the hose that is outside that connects from the water stanchion going inside the camper now it's winter time right now and I have a heated water hose hooked up and things are a little bit different in here than usual but as soon as I unhook this and it's a little bit warmer out I'm going to go through my whole system and sanitize it so how do we do that well that's a pretty long video and guess what we do have a video on that here it is right up here put that one in the video description down below as well you can check that out when the time comes we go through the whole process of the mixture to use to sanitize not only just your fresh water holding tank but to also sanitize all of your hot and cold water lines as well as your hose outside to make sure it's all clean keep any mold and mildew from building up in them this is something we recommend doing once a year and again you don't want to do this with your water heater always make sure you bypass that and we get into the video on how to bypass your water heater because you don't want to put any kind of bleach mixture into that but since we're talking about the water heater let's jump over there and talk about it for a second so the water heater is not something that gets sanitized the same way your fresh water tank or your lines do you don't want to put any kind of bleach mixture into there but you do want to clean it out and there are some things that you want to check annually on it the first thing you want to do after you flush it out and drain all the water out of it is a new anode rod you guys have probably seen this this is nothing new for most of you again the basic concept behind a nano Rod is it's going to protect the water heater um it's going to eat this up first instead of eating the inside of your water heater now I actually recommend this one right here it's made by Suburban for the Suburban water heater it's a magnesium anode rod and again in that video link I put up we get into the whole reason why we use this one versus some other cheap ones and things and we also talk about the whole process of flushing this out as well as descaling it once a year or once every two years I don't always descale it but that's a process of using a white vinegar water mixture letting that soak overnight and that's just the same way you would descale say a coffee or something like that that's an extra way to clean out the inside of this so it's something we do once a year we sanitize all the fresh water tanks we sanitize all the fresh water lines we get all those cleaned up and then we come over here jump over to a water heater and we either descale it or just flush it out and change out the anode rod that's something everybody should do it's kind of an important thing especially if you drink your water straight out of top like we do we have a pretty good filtration system so not only do you want your drinking water fresh and clean I also want my water heater to be clean as well let's go ahead and jump on the roof we're going to talk about number four and number five up there okay guys the next two bring us up here to the roof excuse the sunglasses but it's extremely bright up here now I come up here pretty often I like to just come up here inspect things periodically make sure everything looks okay but there's a few things I only do once a year up here the first one is resealing so by resealing I mean recaulking the roof using a self-leveling lap sealant I like to use the alpha systems 1021 it's recommended by Grand Design you can use a Decor just make sure that it's a self-leveling lap sealant for the roofs so you may see me in other videos talk about the proflex RV that's something I use on the sides of the RV that's not something you want to use on the roof what you're going to want to come up here and do and it's not quite necessary on every aspect of the RV or if you have a new RV you may get away with not doing this every year but usually you want to come up here and inspect all of your lap sealant all the seams everything around your skylights around your fans the front of the camper where the front cap connects to your roof membrane is a very important spot go ahead and inspect it see if everything's cracking see if it's peeling see if it's coming apart if it is it's time to put some new sealant down now for the most part you can get away with the first two or three years at least usually just putting some new lap sealants some new self-leveling sealant right on top of the old ceiling but there will come a point maybe around the four or five year mark or just depending if you've been camping in extreme heat uh conditions extreme hot desert conditions that eventually you will have to remove the old self-leveling sealant and put a whole new layer down so this is extremely important because the roof is your number one defense against the rain and water and all the leaks that will usually eventually happen in almost all RVs but you want to try to fight it as long as you can and this is your first step to doing this So eventually I think I might get into Eterna Bond tape this is a pretty controversial subject but eventually I think I will go the Eternal Bond tape route and this means that I won't have to do this project every year anymore now whether you agree with this or not and I'll probably make a video in a few months about this um that's just another option and there's other videos already out on the internet if you want to look into doing the holy turnab on tape thing versus uh having to put new sealant down all the time so anyways get up here obviously clean the roof I do that more than once a year I clean the roof quite often again with inspections but before you do do this job before you do put new sealant down you do want to make sure everything is cleaned properly go ahead put the new sealant down inspect everything and you'll keep leaks that they for years to come okay number five on the list the last thing I like to do this once a year every year this is a great time of year to do it early spring right before the hot temperatures come and that is inspect your AC units clean your AC units get them all checked out cleaned up ready for the season this is something I do just about once a year and again we have a full video on that we'll put the link up to that we'll put the link in the video description below when the time comes for you to do it go ahead and check out that video I walk you through how to open these up how to clean your condenser coils how to clean the evaporator coils how to inspect things check your thermostat wires get these ready for the year to come you know these have been sitting up here pretty much dormant all year especially if you've had your RV and storage there's a good chance you might have some wasp nests in here that need to be cleared out so be careful about that if you've been out in the desert these can get really dusty and dirty inside here so we want to make sure they're at their cleanest or most efficient and they're not they're working properly for the season to come now not only that but if you haven't seen it we also have a great video about an AC modification to improve the performance of your unit and it'll pump out a lot more air it'll cool quicker haven't checked that out go ahead and check out that modification because that's definitely going to be a game changer for summertime comes it's a great modification and it's going to keep your RV a lot cooler so guys there you have it five projects RV maintenance things I like to get done once a year usually early spring before the busy season kicks off as always appreciate you checking out the channel get out there start your full-time RV Adventure because why wait I'll see you guys next week [Music] [Music] we've met before in our wildest dreams

Channel: Why Wait

Views: 136,287

Keywords: 5 rv maintenance projects to do once a year, Rv maintenance projects, Rv bearings and brakes, Rv water sanitation, Rv water heater cleaning, Rv ac maintenance, Suburban rv water heater, Sanitizing rv fresh water tank, Rv diy, Rv hacks, Rv how to, Why wait rv, Grand Design rv, Repacking bearings, Rv breakaway cable, Anode rod, Rv sealant, Dicor, Proflex rv

Id: 2FfVgCiQoAw

Length: 16min 19sec (979 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 19 2023