Aluminium chips

[david2015]

Hi,
While examining LL trailers today, I noticed a disturbing amount of aluminium chips in the trailer.  The majority of the chips that I observed were trapped between the bottom of a shelf and the aluminum tube supporting the shelf.  The chips will eventually fall from that location onto whatever is below them. 

Anyone can clean up the chips that can be seen, but that is not my primary concern.  The larger issue here is the chips that you cannot see upon casual inspection.  Metal chips, unlike wood sawdust; are both sharp and conductive.  Metal chips can cut through wire insulation and other plastic materials such as tubes and pipes.  Moreover they can create short circuits by cutting through wire insulation and bridging circuit points in connectors and circuit boards.

Consider what will happen if these metal chips are trapped above your circuit boards, control panels, or refrigerator.  The chips will probably eventually fall, and might short out equipment.

The dealer agreed to bring the issue up with LL.

Has anyone else noticed metal chips in new products?


David

[david]

I am sure that all LL products are full of aluminum chips. When you drill holes, you get chips unless you vacuum as you drill. I don't think LL does that.

David

[pinstriper]

Fortunately, you can vacuum them up yourself and solve the problem. Sweat equity !

[craigd]

Noticed this also in my 14 DBS, but after a couple of trips and a vacuum don't see them anymore. Probably helped that I traveled down these old Indian Roads in Northeast Arizona and think I may have gotten airborne a couple of times, LOL.

[chuck893]

I've seen this issue come up numerous times. We had the problem in our 8.1 when we got it. I used a dust-buster type thing to vacuum them up. The thing is, I've seen replies from the factory that suggest that LL thinks it's a dealer-prep issue; i.e., the dealer should vacuum up the chips during inspection. I hear what you're saying about them being a possible safety issue, but there seems to be a disconnect between factory and dealers, so therefore..."sweat equity." Yes, these are very spendy trailers to arrive full of aluminum shavings, but it sadly appears that that's the way it is. 

[joanne]

I used to work in a machine shop & brought home steel, cast iron and aluminum chips every day. No matter how hard I tried, I had metal chips showing up in the strangest places throughout my house. No way around it.

Didn't die from that. Probably not going to die from the chips in my camper.

Plus - every time I mod the camper, I add more chips.

[david2015]

I used to work on airplanes as a shop grunt.  In that context, chips kill, hence my bias towards clean.

Anyway, LL will sell what the market tolerates.  Might as well get "reduce chip contamination" on their list of things to improve.

This can't be a dealer-prep issue, as the dealer would have to disassemble the entire trailer to find all the chips that can find their way into bad places.  Simply removing the chips that can be seen upon trivial inspection is, well, trivial.


David

[davidb]

I  also encountered a large amount of chips when I removed the access panel behind the inverter, this area is vulnerable to damage from chips since the rear of the inverter is open for cooling.

The ceiling light fixture lenses seem to always have chips fall into them, and I am constantly removing chips from the front storage compartment after each trip.


http://i.imgur.com/AHr2SwK.jpg

[fasteddieb]

Bit of a hijack, but...

...that buss on the floor on the right has me perplexed.


And back on point, those shavings are inexcusable!

[joanne]

[quote source="/post/15768/thread" timestamp="1443998873" author="@fasteddieb"]And back on point, those shavings are inexcusable![/quote]That's a lot of chips. Far more than I had in mine. 

[pinstriper]

[quote source="/post/15771/thread" timestamp="1444002517" author="@michael"][quote source="/post/15768/thread" timestamp="1443998873" author="@fasteddieb"]And back on point, those shavings are inexcusable![/quote]That's a lot of chips. Far more than I [strike]had [/strike] found in mine. 
[/quote]Fixed that for ya.

[charliem]

[font size="3"]Eddie,

First, it looks like you got an extra helping of chips. Did you pay more for those? Maybe you got mine too.

Second, I'm guessing the bus is the 12V system ground bus. Although white, the wires are probably the 12V returns. The black wire may be a negative to something that follows the electronics or auto color convention. The larger solid (#8) copper wire you see going into the converter should hook up to the 120V AC ground bus inside the power panel. The 120V neutral bus is in the panel and has all the neutral white wires connected to it. All this from memory when I took my converter out to add a circuit. BTW next time I'm going to replace that #8 bare solid wire with a piece of #8 green stranded wire. That solid wire makes removing the converter very difficult.
[/font]

[fasteddieb]

Thanks, Charlie, but that's actually the photo davidb had posted, not mine.

I recently had to deal with neutral/ground bonding issues in my home, and between that and the Romex looking wires on the left, I was primed to think of AC, not DC. My bad!

[scout]

x2 + 1 +1 +1 +1 +... many other on here(actually I think we had a thread on this a while back --->)... also have an extra helping of metal filings coming out of my light fixtures after each trip...bad electrical juju for sure...it's almost time for the fall vacuum session... :-S

[daplumbr]

As we unpacked from our recent trip, the front overhead compartment had numerous chips in it, a full year after we got the camper and after many vacuumings. They hide in the aluminum channels and sift out. I'll go get the vacuum.........