jd1923

GJ thank you, my friend! Given I’m spending this kinda money… I’ll add 40 hours of my labor to make things right! A detailer can work around these, but with a little extra effort, the overall finish will be much better! 😎

Funny that GJ revived this thread today. Coincidence given this morning I had an auto-body/detailing professional come to our home and quote finishing our Oliver. Old hull #113 will again have a shine on her! 🤣 Scheduled for the week after next, I’ve been busy removing items like all the covers, furnace, HWH, fridge vents, outlets, awning lower mounts, etc. Everything possible to make for a better detail job. Doghouse and spare tire covers completely stripped down. I’ll post a new thread with pictures in a couple weeks! Almost forgot, I’ve also removed about 2 LBS of silicone caulk!!! (see driveway in first pic)! First time I restored a vehicle, every nut-n-bolt removed, was an Alfa Romeo Spyder, Spring of ‘78. This is the way I work! Tear everything, clean and condition each and every part. 😎 For 2 1/2 years we’ve just gotten our Oliver sun-baked and dirty, now time for some love! Thanks for posting John! 🤗

Thank you, Jim & Chris. Good advise! When I sprayed some the first day, I followed up with soap and water per the instructions. Day two, I sprayed the marine solvent at a sponge in a container and sponged it on the surface only. I've always believed this and never have seen it written so clearly. Thank you again. I've spent too much of my life removing what others think "improve cosmetics" which in essence just collect DIRT! If you're going to caulk (not me), trim back the old caulk first! Caulk on old caulk is not cool. There is no reason for this silicone caulk, period! The sealant is under the mounting frame. They even caulked the refrigerator vents on our hull, OMG! These vents allow highway speed rains to run right through them! Go figure? These pictures show an ugly mess, that btw is no longer there! 😎

A picture is NOT a signature! Are you mocking us? Asking Forum Mods to review this account.

So, 1 1/2 years since this post, and near 2 1/2 years of Oliver ownership and I'm finally getting to making our Oliver look better! I believe it's better to do maintenance and repair, mechanical and electrical work, before the cosmetic work! I've got a guy coming over today to quote the buffing and ceramic coating work. He runs his own business and has good references. Hope he's reasonable! But I'm not having this kind of work done without all the proper prep work. Doing what I can do myself. Spent half a day, used a half dozen razor blades, and made good headway. Check out all the caulk on the driveway, mostly silicone and some butyl from around the furnace cover. I found a new Atwood furnace cover for only $25 on eBay. Thank goodness I do not have to clean the caulk off those parts, certainly worth the money to replace it. Next step, using light 3M pads and solvent to remove the silicone from the window frames and body around the furnace. The frames are painted or powder coated as I can see aluminum in a couple very small spots. This is the waste from this area only (including the window above)! Four windows, the entrance door, and this utility area, lots of useless gunk. I had three piles of caulk to vacuum up end of day!

Agreed, it sure does look good. And excellent installation work too! I'll keep my side decals for now (pic). They're in decent shape and they are of the vintage style. I would like to replace the front Oliver logo, not as good in condition. I have time. I'll use Christian's artwork unless Bill @topgun2 is successful in hunting down OTT original artwork. Thanks to both of you!

Hull #? Signature? Please update asap...

But.., We would like you to take care of your laundry before I/we help again. @ScubaRx, Oliver Elder and Senior Forum Mod asked you to update your profile. That done and add a proper signature with hull #, etc. and then “Welcome to the community.” You have a couple threads started and we do help known Forum Members.

I believe the answer to your question is in your second sentence. You have your warranty claim entered and acknowledged. The schedule is now up to you! The crack ain’t going anywhere! It will either stay the same or grow a little longer. A proper repair can happen sooner or later, it makes no difference. Be cool. 😎

And BOTH bolts holes are too large. When they are the correct size you will not see the square opening at all as it should be completely hidden by the head of the carriage bolt.

I believe it's OK when the OP broadens the scope of the thread. @Steph and Dud B can reword the title to, "Found a Crack - Defect #21!"

I attached a picture of the tack-weld failed mount when I submitted a service ticket and was told OTT did not have brackets they could send me! My next service ticket was re artwork for the front hull. When I was told again NO, I asked why I should ever again enter a service ticket? Five (5) times and not once have I received useful help. But then, if you want something done right… Obviously they do have these brackets. At least the one I fab’d is better than OEM. My square holes for the carriage bolts are of correct size. No need for precision when you drill holes that wide! It’s not easy making square holes in 1/4” steel in a home shop, but should be EXACT when manufactured! if yours is still lose, replace them with hex-head bolts, use a washer and position a wrench on the topside, against the bracket, while you tighten from down below. Sheesh! If half of your 21 issues are like this quality made bracket, I’d feel the same way! Ours is only in good shape after I’ve put 1000+ hours into ours in sweat equity! Which is btw crazy.

Good to see you're back John, safely returned home from your annual mainland trip and contributing here as always! 😂 This is a point of confusion that it seems even Mike Sharpe did not understand the full installation process when I talked to him on the phone, hence his thinking this was a Barker issue (not). The bolt holes that OTT drills into the lower hole and frame are not drilled to precision so that a one-piece bracket can be used (e.g. precision in distance between holes at +/- 0.010"). The ALUMINUM brackets are made by Oliver (same aluminum used in the frame). All Barker components are made from STEEL! Barker welds the STEEL bracket to their jack for Oliver and they have a special Oliver-only part number (learned from talking to Barker rep). After the jack is put in place, the two aluminum brackets are tack-welded. Then they must be removed and fully welded on a workbench, then final installation bolted/torqued into place. If they were manufactured to length (welded by Barker), there would be no reason for a tack-weld followed by a complete weld. In fact they would use a one-piece bracket. Why are these aluminum parts when steel is used for frame pieces? Because OTT only welds aluminum! More info in my post linked below. I can see exactly how it was originally installed by removing and reinstalling these jacks. I believe I have done more jack work than any other Oliver owner, now that I have rebuilt all 3 jacks, ready for the next 10 years! 😎

We've had quite the opposite experience in our 2 1/2 years with hull #113, manufactured 10 years ago. Though I have read everything on our Forum since and I do see many more issues in late-model hulls vs. the oldies but goodies! I've worked a LOT of upgrades, but only a few repairs. And every issue I've found is when we were home. 130 days on the road everything has worked, no issues while traveling, knock on wood! I found a breaker wired in the wrong direction. I have issues with how OTT wired things, but no electrical failures to-date. I've upgraded and rewired everything anyway. I recently found OTT forgot to fully weld (tack-weld only) the mount to one stabilizer jack. OTT blamed Barker, but actually OTT makes these welds as part of the standard installation procedure. I made a new bracket with $10 of steel. We also had two small welds fail on the frame, two cross-members were hanging on one side. Local guy welded them for $75. We had a drawer latch fail, the orange colored connector to the slide, just $10 and 10 minutes to repair. Now I have extra parts if another fails. Prior owner complained of a noisy Suburban furnace, so OTT install an Atwood furnace back in 2018. Likely prior owners had worked through other issues of which I would be unaware. The interior panel of the entrance door is lightly cracked, but this is from wind banging the door. This will not happen anymore now that Lippert friction hinges are installed. We love our Oliver as it is now with my upgrades (inverter A/C coming soon)! We purchased a used Oliver at a good price and I do not expect anything out of OTT since it's long out of warranty. Yes, I would feel differently if we paid new price and had 21 issues listed to date. I don't see better quality out there. Even Winnebago, that some consider to be the best, is not better. We plan to keep our Oliver and leave it to our son when we are done with it. Don't want another brand, don't need something better. If I found this crack on our hull, I would leave it alone and just keep an eye on it. Often bodywork on something small is worse in the long-run! They will likely just do something cosmetic, some fill on the surface. Which is fine, but certainly not worth a trip to Hohenwald for me, in my opinion.

We have two 10Ah batteries. One will power the Starlink Mini all day! One's on the charger while the other is being used. The 50' power cable is supplied. We've just never had a need to use it, so recently I stopped bringing it along! I guess if your going to sit two weeks at a campground with hookups... But that's not us. I can setup the dish on a lunchbreak while traveling, in a minute with no cords. No thin 50' power cord getting wet and dirty, tangled up in the weeds, needing to be wound-up and stowed each time. Everything in our Oliver is battery-powered! 🤣