The EASIEST RV Repair Ever, With Instant Curb Appeal

all right guys well welcome back to the shop I just finished up a quick little upgrade to the RV the 2001 Beaver Patriot Thunder and if you just saw it uh put in the comments what you think that uh the upgrade was but this video is not about that this is going to be an end of year hopefully very very quick video and if you've looked at the title you should probably already know what it's going to be about it's going to be about these mirrors right here now when I bought the RV a few years ago I even noted that the Chrome on these uh mirrors was peeling and it looks bad now the uh mirrors themselves the housing is plastic but it is Chrome plated and that's actual metal on there uh painting this is going to be quite difficult and replace an entire mirror for this tiny little uh cosmetic defect seems pretty irresponsible one they're like $1,200 for a replacement mirror because it's Chrome and two replacing or removing a side view mirrors on a motor home is actually one of my least favorite jobs to do do often the wiring to there is uh Too Short uh you have to cut a lot of wires they foam everything in on the back side of the cap right there and you can do a lot of damage to the front cap and a mirror if you're not careful so not having to remove a mirror it would be my number one uh desire a lot of people are screaming at their uh TVs right now is why don't just put a sticker over the top right there and that was my original plan cuz when we come over to my water compartment here and open up the previous owner did find this Beaver emblem right there hello and I think that would look just fine on the front of the mirror right here in fact a lot of high-end RVs already have the emblem right there and also like I've always said usually a cheap patch is the best repair so just while we're on the same page there I did reach out and I picked up some uh new decals right here to put over the top of it but these are not um going to solve my problems because it's just an outline it's not uh opaque as yet I've been unable to find those blue decals that are in the water compartment available so I've had to think about another thing to do and I thought about getting uh a Caterpillar engine uh decal for there or even like a reflective tape that would just be a stick on like that like this carbon fiber uh decal is I did think that would obviously look like a patch and I didn't like the look of it but did lead me down another Trail to uh the repair we're going to do today because if reflective um decals would work why not just use a uh vinyl wrap for a car that's Chrome this one being called viny frog I think I got it off of Amazon for like $8 but uh I think this will look pretty good if you look at how it already Blends in and while I think I could probably wrap all the way around and mimic all the curves right here I'm trying to do this simple and easy and I don't want to have any puckers on the top corners right there I'm not a highly skilled vinyl wrap installer so I think if we just do a cutout section right there all the way around it'll look right and inadvertently as a vinyl wrap it'll protect the mirror from further Rock pitting or damage so that's my hope first thing we'll have to do is uh kind of even out this chrome so I'll probably uh sand it a little bit to get rid of the edge so I can't see it through the wrap new razor and kind of take the uh edge off so to speak found another Edge and next I'll just use some 600 grit Emery cth right here to kind of like Smooth it out all right well it didn't take much but it's point in no return now right it's pretty smooth now I don't have an edge you'd think the next step would be to clean the mirror off but I want to measure it first because I want to make my own basically a decal if you had a cricket or a vinyl cutting machine a CNC machine it'd be a lot easier but I'm going to be doing this by hand now if I was a highly skilled vinyl wrap installer yeah sure I could come over this side right here almost cut the edge right there or wrap it around but I don't have a lot of luck cutting on top of things without damaging the substraight before even with a good razor blade so I'm not going to try that method and if you look at this there is basically a tangle right here on the flat surface that I'm just going to try to apply to to minimize that uh look right there so on this mirror this velvac power mirror looks to be about 5 and 1 half by about 8 and A2 all right so the next step is just to unwrap my new uh wrap even though a razor blade that's sharp does nice cut on this like I said if you have a Cricut Machine or a CNC vinyl cutter that' be the easiest route to go but if not you can just use a paper cutter I know not everybody has one of these but I picked this up at the thrift store uh years ago and it's worked out really well for me but a nice straight line is going to make this uh patch look the best I think and with this we can just go ahead and bring it all the way to the edge of the uh cutter right here right there on the edge we'll mark it right there at 5 and 1/2 there we go 5 and 1 half right there now I can just slide it over just like that and with this Factory Edge again against the uh straight edge right there now you can just go ahead and I'm going to do the exact same thing for 8 and 1/2 all right so there we got 5 and 1/2 by 8 and 1/2 but I think hard Corners will look stupid so I got my high-tech uh US Quarter right there we'll just use that to measure out the uh corners and cut those loose just using that as a guide for a nice even round and look at that I just to cut those I'm going to use a brand new Breakaway razor knife and I do have it on a plywood uh substrate right here with the brand new knife it should cut pretty easily it won't leave a nice bird Edge we just want nice clean cuts on it nothing torn next step is going to be clean the surface I'm just using glass cleaner here to get all the dirt off of it I don't want to have a any dirt that will fall into it when we're putting the the wrap on very simple look at that now I'm just going to be using some alcohol wipes to make sure I don't have any grease or oil that's on the surface right here so that the uh wrap will stick cuz it is self adhesive so that's all I'll be using you can obviously just use uh any Degreaser you want to use as long as it does not leave a film afterwards so I'm just going to stick with the alcohol wipes all right so we just go ahead and wipe down all the surface that we can I I said I'm not the best at doing this so I like to do use a wet method so that I can reposition it if I mess up all you'll need is have that you will need to make sure that you do have a nice non-marine squeegee to install this with a nice sharp edge on it I'm going to make my own application fluid using just uh some distilled water and maybe a drop of uh dish soap I'm not a scientist I'm just told that the add dish soap uh breaks up the water tension of the water molecule itself so it doesn't trap air if you do add too much soap to the fluid it will interfere with the adhesive properties of the wrap now then for me I'm just going to go ahead and uh spray the surface I'm just going to find the edge of the film or the wrap and pull it off the backing here or easily just like that and I'm just going to spray the back of it too now with all those surfaces wet I should be able to just kind of slide this in position where I want it to be that it's sticking yet okay I think I'm actually okay with it doesn't look too bad I'm kind of even with the edge right down there I've wrapped my straight edge with a little bit of duct tape to protect it from damaging the vinyl we're just going to try to push all that water out now we'll use gravity to help us out so I'm just giving some light pressure here and then I just have the straight edge wrapped around a brand new microc cloth uh towel here and I'll just do a final little wipe down with it and now I won't deny you can still see that little guy right there CU I didn't put a lot of effort into it but from this distance right here I think it looks pretty good and don't forget I still have my decals to put on but I don't think I need the word I think I just need the beaver now this will install strangely the exact same way as the wrap and a little bit up there that way when I put it into place I think I can get it to where I want it to look good and then secure it I don't know looks pretty good to me bit this one's just the outline so it shouldn't get too many stuck water bubbles in there ahead and take the uh vacum paper off if you knew that divot was there I think you would uh still be able to see it but if you had no idea I don't think you'd be ever the wiser that I just wrapped a piece of chrome vinyl wrap on my mirror and applied this cool gold Beaver to it now I think think that looks so good that I might as well do it over there on that mirror too and it's done so we have matching little medallions on there now is it 100% no is it a lot better than what it was I'd say 100% And when you talk about $8 of materials that I only used half of it and the decals were $6 have $14 and maybe a half hour of my own time into uh something it was something of an eyesore for me every time I saw the RV I don't know if you guys ever noticed it but I always noticed it time will tell how durable and long lasting this will be but it is another thing off the list of items that I wanted to get done on this Beaver Patriot ever since I've had it it was a very quick video like I promised you guys uh maybe a lot of you guys already knew how to do this but I don't know if this helped anybody out there but it did help me 2023 has been a fantastic year for me and of course the channel I appreciate everybody who's been following along uh I hope to bring you even more videos in 2024 now from me and my family and of course the uh shop here I want to wish everybody a safe and happy New Year and to save you guys from uh having to ask me I'll put all the items that I did use in the description and I got these decals from from Beaver Coach sales in Oregon that's their phone number right there they own all the uh intellectual property and Licensing rights for Beaver motor coach thank thanks a lot for watching guys and I'll see you again in 2024 thanks along for the ride bye I have no doubt for those that are more skilled with vinyl wrapping they could have just gone ahead and wrapped the entire mirror I'm just always afraid the edge not looking good on this side or cutting into the chrome finish here or puckering right there and this is just supposed to be quick easy and painless and that seemed like how it was supposed to be now I have a lot more upgrades planned for the RV still like we talked about in other videos and for those of you guys who uh ask in the comments are you ever going to use your RV or just endlessly upgrade it well I do use this quite often and as often as I can and so I'm happy to share the upgrades I do to it with you guys like recently I did just have to fix my steps so I took that opportunity to add an LED light strip on the front of it and a few more underneath and I connected that to the uh porch light too and I'm hoping now that I have a lot of the more maintenance uh type of repairs done on this I can start doing some more fun repairs but also look how much extra vinyl wrap I still have left I didn't even use all of it even a half of it I don't think and my RV is also a vital part of the shop here um I wish I could tell you guys what the plans are for the next year but every single time I try to put a plan together life gets in my way and uh I just make do with what I uh have going on at the time looks a little bit more convincing in the shade even huh nice

Channel: AZ Expert

Views: 23,005

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Id: cs7Aj_xxO0w

Length: 13min 17sec (797 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 29 2023