Chinook RV

Starting a thread about all the repairs I’m going to do.
I’ve taken photos but can’t seem to upload them in my posts.
This one is the closet door jam that is water logged and warped, so the door keeps popping open when I’m driving:

Oh good, adding an attachment finally worked!
Edit: the metal piece was there already, but I took it off and added a slightly wider one which has worked to keep the door closed, but is ugly. I need to find a nicer one albeit temporarily until I get that wood repaired.

This is the condition of the trunk. All that wood is soaked in there. Seems like the tail end inside wood of the rig is in the same condition.

Now that I am able to attach pics, I’ll take more and add them to my posts. It seems that I have to wait for the upload to complete before I can submit the post.

This is the old biddy!

I’m missing the four button thermostat and it’s been replaced by what looks like a manual household one.
PO said the Dometic Penguin AC was replaced by a Carrier brand a few years ago. I suppose they couldn’t make it work with the original thermostat, but I’m just speculating.
This is the one that should be there:

Astrodokk wrote: January 3rd, 2019, 11:22 pm I’m missing the four button thermostat and it’s been replaced by what looks like a manual household one.
PO said the Dometic Penguin AC was replaced by a Carrier brand a few years ago. I suppose they couldn’t make it work with the original thermostat, but I’m just speculating.
This is the one that should be there:

Note that the propane furnace was also controlled by the old thermostat and the Dometic air conditioner control board. If your furnace is not working it is probably because the new AC and controller are not set up to control it. I think the old controller was Dometic-specific, so you may need to come up with a seperate furnace controller if the Carrier AC does not support a furnace switch. (It may have a furnace controller included since these items have much in common in the RV industry.)

Great to see pics.

Just FYI, the furnace can be controlled with any old "home" thermostat. It's just two wires. It was, indeed, controlled with the four-button "comfort control," originally. And that 4-button controller is no longer available new.

It worked via a "phone wire" that went up to the AC from the controller. The newer version is a 5-button controller and from what I have read here it can be used in place of the 4-button with some modification up in the AC unit (but I don't know about that myself).

So... do the AC and furnace both work? How are they both controlled now?

Okay, now on to the other photos ....

I just took a good look at the larger "gory" photos. I have some questions on the "tire locker" one. How much of that is the detritus of the rotten walls (MDF) vs. what condition is the actual floor in? What would it look like without the MDF in there? Just so you know, the original floor is one floor throughout the coach, and is made up of two layers of plywood one atop the other. Then they carpeted the whole Shebang, and only then put in the walls, shower, furniture, etc. (this is a common method with RV's). That means that if the Chinook was parked on a slant at all, that water from Point X could run to Point Y and make the damage at Point Y. (Or it could simply have come in at Point X too of course.)

So in other words the floor in that compartment is the main Chinook floor. The walls (to me) are like, well that's a bummer, but OTOH good riddance, MDF kinda sucks especially for storage compartments, they can be re-made, everything is just a simple shape you can cut out of plywood. But I would be less breezy if the floor were compromised (which is not to say it can't be fixed if it is). Also (and you are probably already doing this), before just pulling things out I would be thinking about whether the pattern of damage gives a clue as to where the water is (or was) coming from. Just in case that is good info that will be gone once you clean things out.

It's hard to tell exactly what's going on right now in the photo of the tire locker due to the "MDF graveyard" you've got going on. I can see the original carpet on the floor (now there's a great idea for a utility compartment!) but how are things under that?

BTW, I haven't done the tire locker floor yet, but when I had the electrical compartment box out (under the sink) I removed the carpet from that area and used some oil-based marine paint to coat the floor. I would have considered an additional coating (such as epoxy) under the paint but that particular area is already completely fiberglassed due to its location between the wheelwell and the fuel filler door. Now the area where my shore cord is stored is easily cleanable and won't retain moisture [your arrangement for the cord is slightly different on the 2000]. I wouldn't hesitate to get the carpet out of that tire locker ASAP to see what's going on beneath it (besides, why would most people want carpet there?!).

To the good, you'll find you have a much larger available space behind the "back" wall of that locker. There will just be a DWV pipe you need to box in (1-1/2" ABS pipe). On the other hand, I kept the side wall in place because behind there is a lot of plumbing and wiring that wasn't so easy to box in in any great space-saving way -- whereas the back wall is an easy gain.

On the closet latch: Is that actually rotted as in wet? Or did the MDF just tear out because MDF is weak and cardboardy and tears out easily and it wasn't a great latch design in the first place? It doesn't look wet in the photos (no rumpled up "skin") but you're there and I'm only looking at a photo. Not that you couldn't have a leak there, but it's not one of the common places that come to mind.