Sliding Door Noise Suppression

Our van's sliding door was making a lot of creaking and groaning noises when the body would experience torsion, like turning on a hill, going over a curb, etc.  I tried a lot of different lubrication ideas for all the door's contact points, and the combination of the following has knocked down the noise about 90%.

I used white lithium grease for most of the contact points, sprayed into a rag and wiped on with q-tips.

These mechanisms are sometimes referred to as 'pin cups'. I used white lithium grease on both the male and female parts.

Many people on the internet say that greasing this peg is very helpful for noise suppression. I did it, and it helped.

I used silicone spray on the surface of this rubber bumper.

And more lithium grease here.

16-October-2020

Stabilizing the Window on the Sliding Door

Many Revel owners have noticed that there is excessive rattling and instability in the large window in the sliding door.  This is primarily because the stabilization ribs for the door have been removed by Winnebago to make room for the window, leaving the window attached ONLY to the thin metal skin on the door. The red lines, below, show where the support ribs were.

In order to improve this, I followed examples from Facebook Revel members Ralph Hill and Jason Vigil to create structural ribs that connect the window to the structural supports in the door.  This is an illustrated guide for doing that.

• Time: 3 hours
• Cost: $25
• Tools: Philips screwdriver, hacksaw, drill
• Materials: Angle aluminum (see below), silicone glue, 10 wood screws

Remove the plastic end caps from the window blind frame and remove screws behind them.

You may need to use an offset screwdriver to access the lower right corner.

Remove the screws from the four inner corners of the window blind.

Remove the 4 screws holding the grey plastic panel to the door frame.

I bought 2 pieces of angle aluminum shown below.

I measured approximate lengths of 26.5" and 25.5" for the front and rear ribs, and cut the aluminum to fit. After repeated placements and adjustments, I was able to cut each of the grooves shown here with a simple hacksaw.

The angular cut shown below is to accommodate the grey plastic panel when it is reinstalled.

Repeatedly making small cuts and testing the fitment resulted in a tight, solid fit.

I used a black marker to determine where the screws would attach to the window, and drilled them out with a hand drill. I used 5 screws per window.

Yielding this as the final product. Time for installation.

Following others' suggestions, I applied a bead of silicone glue between the window frame and the aluminum support.

After mating the aluminum support to the window frame, I put 5 screws in each support, giving the final result here.

Note that the tolerances are fairly small. There was some concern about mating steel and aluminum, resulting in Galvanic corrosion. However, my neighbor happens to be a metallurgist, and he told me, "If you're dealing with mild steel (not stainless steel), then it's no problem. Aluminum and mild steel are very close on the Galvanic scale."

Jul-1-2020