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Radiator Damage due to Rocks

Yahoo Message Number: 8422
I'm wondering if anyone has lost an engine radiator due to rocks getting into the fan shroud and the blades then kicking the rocks into the radiator core. I've never gone down gravel or dirt roads with the coach. The only places were in camp grounds. If anyone has had this problem what was your soultion?

Lou

2002 Intrigue #11362

Re: Radiator Damage due to Rocks

Reply #1 –
Yahoo Message Number: 8423
Lou:

I lost mine last summer. Was not fun. The good part (I think) was my insurance company covered it under road hazard. The guys in the shop that replaced the radiator put 1/4 'hardware cloth' in back of the tires and under the radiator. They used screws and plastic ties to hold it in place. Looks makeshift but it kept the rocks out on my trip down for the winter. I also carry a tube or two of JB Water Weld now.

During the week I was at the Anchorage Coach Care shop, three other MHs with side mounted radiators were towed in with radiator damage.

The RV repair shop in Tok Alaska says they do a number* of radiator repairs and replacement on the rear and side mounted MHs.
They said all models seem to be affected (no one is worse than the others) ( *I seem to remember they said they do about 80 of them per season)

Lee in Portland, (a poster on this list) has a metal fab shop and is working on some kind of a shield/screen. I'm not sure where he is with that effort.

This is an issue that I wish CC would address. I tried to bring it up at the Home Coming Rally this past Sept and all I got was fleeting guilty looks and silence. A CC rep took me over to a 2004 Magna and pointed to the steel shield it had. Funny in he never said a word just used hand motions.

I would say to anyone that gets a chance to get under the coach, should inspect the fan blade edge for stone chips, and to reach up into the shroud and check for rocks (they tend to get blown to far front of the shroud). Rocks can lay in the shroud and not be a problem until you start up a steep grade or they get bounced up into the fan and the fan shoots them into the radiator.

That's how I got it. I bet I had two years worth of rocks in the shroud when I got blasted. The rocks looked like chips from tar-and-chip road work, they were not the big gravel from a gravel road as one would think.

Good Luck,

Jim Cook

2002 Intrigue #11446
www.al7rv.net

ps: The Alaskan Hwy is paved all the way now! Execpt where they
are repaving it, and they are repaving alot of it!

Re: Radiator Damage due to Rocks

Reply #2 –
Yahoo Message Number: 8424
Lou: My radiator woes were caused by getting caught in a severe blizzard across Wyoming. Unexpectedly the thing came in early and we were trying to beat it to Denver.
Upon arrival, the coach looked like had a block of ice all along underneath. When it melted, it was full of anti-freeze.
Lesson learned for me? Yea, don't drive in a blizzard and I suppose that's why I don't take the thing to Alaska. I tell my camping buddies " My MH doesn't do off road"!

Larry
Intrigue
10762

Re: Radiator Damage due to Rocks

Reply #3 –
Yahoo Message Number: 8443
Not me, thanks goodness, but a friend of had the same problem on American Eagle on a trip to Alaska. $1200 and a few tooth-pics later he made it home. Tooth-pics slowed the leak untill he could get to a service center.

Paul and Nancy
Intrigue 01'

Quote from: Larry Hanson
> Lou: My radiator woes were caused by getting caught in a severe
blizzard across Wyoming. Unexpectedly the thing came in early and we were trying to beat it to Denver.

Quote
>

Upon arrival, the coach looked like had a block of ice all along
underneath. When it melted, it was full of anti-freeze.

Quote
>

Lesson learned for me? Yea, don't drive in a blizzard and I
suppose that's why I don't take the thing to Alaska. I tell my camping buddies " My MH doesn't do off road"!

Quote
Larry
Intrigue
10762