Re: Water damage Clou Trend 570
Geschrieben von Stefan Knorsch am 01. November 2002 17:59:11:
Als Antwort auf: Water damage Clou Trend 570 geschrieben von Lorella Brombini am 01. November 2002 17:57:37:
Hi Lorella,
I'm not astonished that Niesmann gives you a poor support. Since they are belonging to Hymer the service has become really bad, compared to the good old times when they were private owned. On top their abilities to speak foreign languages are very limited. And your local Italian dealer wants to sell new cars and maybe can help you with some small repairs, but not for sure with an issue like this.
From where in Italy are you?
How is the consistence of the wood underneath the PVC. Is it still solid or is the wood already disintegrated and pulpy?
If the consistence of the wood is still ok and it's only wet you are lucky. You have to remove the furniture in the affected area, take out the PVC and let the wood dry. Before you glue new PVC on the floor you have to eliminated the reason for the water damage, but to this I'll come later.
If the wood is already of a bad consistence, like it has been in my case, you have to remove the remnants of the wood carefully. You can leave in the wood which seems to be stable, but only wet.
The floor plate is a sandwich made out of a glasfiber reinforced outside of 1 millimeter, approximately 45 mil. PU-foam (should be light blue in your car) that fortunately absorbs no water and inside your car the woodplate of 8-10 mil.
As I said, it is a sandwich, glued together under a huge press to give the material the strength that is needed.
So if you remove the old wood be careful to not damage the foam underneath. After the disintegrated wood is removed there are two options.
In the past Niesmann and Bischoff glued new wood plates in segments onto the foam. This has to be done with the right glue and with heavy weights on the plates to reach a stable connection between wood and foam. Afterwards there is a lot of work to smooth the connections between the wood plates and between the old wood and the new one. This has to be done with a filler and often breaks after a short period.
Actually ( also in my car) Niesmann uses a liquid synthetic material that they pour onto the foam and that gives a stable and stress resistant surface. Also the connection to the remaining wood is easier to achieve.
The car has to be in an absolute horizontal position and still then it's not easy to receive a flat and even surface. After this mass is hardened you have to grind it and then you can glue new PVC on it.
Where does the water come from? That's always a good question and difficult to answer. If the watersystem inside your car (including all Alde water pipes) is dense, the water has to come from the outside.
The problem is that water often takes curious ways to get in. When you have removed all your furniture and the PVC, you might see in which area of your car the humidity is the highest. In most cases water comes through defect or missing sealings of windows and doors. Also one possibility is the sealing between the Aluminium frame of the cabin and the sidewalls, that has to be renewed every 2-4 years.
The only way to find this out is to water your car partially and then look inside if and where the water is coming in.
Also on the roof there is a sealing tape between the Aluminium frame of the cabin and the roof sandwich that, from time to time, has to be renewed.
In my case Niesmann forgot to mount some sealings in a door and water came also in through a not proper sealed frame of a door and missing sealing material around the 220V power outlet.
I don't know how good your abilities as a craftsman are. I made everything on my own, besides the pouring of the floor and the sealing of the car, but more for warranty reasons. I wanted a 12 month warranty on these works. I paid approximately 7.500,--Euros for the sealing and the new floor and received the car still leaky.
If you want to make it on your own I will be available to answer any question you have (e.g. you have to know which liquid synthetic material Niesmann uses).
Otherwise maybe you find a dealer in Italy who is able to repair your car. If not I guess you have to bring your car over to Germany.
If you have further questions don't hesitate to contact me.
Destini saluti
Stefan Knorsch