jreich888

Yes, they had black plastic rivets with a center to hammer them in and hold it. I thought I had a few spares (was going to take a picture) but can't find them at the moment. I'd assume the nylon rivet would be nicer on the wiper seals than steel/SS rivets or screws, but certainly not as durable. As for the strike plate, on ours it's a pretty simple piece of steel (or aluminum?); if you can't find one from a wrecker/salvage yard, I'd think it would be easiest to take one off your rig and take it to a metal shop and have them fabricate one for you.

In the past I've used the rivets for the slide lock covers from the parts list (on page 136: Nylon Blind Drive Rivets from Product Components Corporation), but they have not done well with UV and sun damage. They are fading and becoming brittle, and many of the replacement rivets I've installed over the last couple years are have broken already. I contacted PCC about UV protection and materials, and they said to do a run in UV resistant materials would need to be in the quantities of thousands. I don't have a price for the UV version yet; the regular quote says "dyed black, not UV black". The few factory original rivets I still have seem to be better without the fading. How have any of you dealt with UV damage on their rivets? Any other sources for these rivets, or other suggestions? Should I start being more diligent about putting 303 on any new rivets I install?

Hi Onthego, looks like it turned out well. Did you do that with a soldering iron or torch (propane or MAPP)? Any any particular kind of solder? thanks, Jason.

Hello all, One of the Dewald slide lock on our 03 Monaco Windsor broke a while ago, and I finally removed it to investigate. Looks like the cable at the bottom came out of the arm/lever that applies the lock when the slide is closed. Overall the condition looks OK, the cable isn't broken, it just came out of the slot where it was originally fitted. See the pictures, below. The slot is actually pretty tight if I reinsert the cable, but it wouldn't stay in there under pressure. Other than that I think the slide lock should be good once its cleaned up and lubricated. The question is how to reattach the cable to the arm. I'm guessing the main options are welding, brazing, or epoxy. I'm not a brazer/welder, so I'm considering using JB Weld for this. Has anyone else done this kind of repair, and what did you do to reattach the cable? Has it held up well? thanks for any advice you can provide, Jason Reich

Scotty, yup, worked for me. Looked at the source and it all looks good (the other problem with the URL isn't there). Hope you can get the topic grouping going, let me know if I can help.

Hi Scotty, I think disabling the lazy loading would probably help with future digests, but can't be sure. The image data-src is a scheme-less URL; if that is what is used in the normal src tag it would likely work in web-based email viewers like gmail, but may not work in full email clients like outlook. But that's just a guess. I'm a software engineer, but more on embedded and mobile technologies, but I've dabbled in web stuff from time to time. hope that helps, Jason.

Hi Scotty and all, I'm enjoying the daily digests, but have a couple suggestions about them: Group the posts by topic. Sometimes a topic gets busy but I'm not interested in it, but there could be several posts scattered among the other. It would be nice to be able to skip/skim over that subject and get onto the others quicker, rather than encountering it again and again. Photos are not working in the email. The images on the site and in the digests are blank by default, and then use some JS magic to do lazy loading of the images. This doesn't work in the emails, and just show a large blank area the size of the original image. You should either fix the email to omit the images, or fix the img src to be the real images and not the spacer. Other than that, I'm glad the digests are back, it does keep me more interested in the site. thanks Jason Reich.

We contacted Monaco/REV and were able to get paint codes for our 2003 Windsor (see attached). I google some of the numbers (like the main "gold" color WI3122), and found this on ebay: https://www.ebay.com/itm/BEIGE-METALLIC-Aerosol-Touch-Up-Paint-12oz-for-Monaco-Coach-/133216277040 It seems like they have many of the Monaco paint codes, and mention cans, bottles, and touch up pens. I've sent them a message for more information, but has anyone here heard of these guys or tried their paints? I'm going to try some a mixes from a local auto paint supply here in Tucson, but may try the ebay seller as well, depending on how it goes. And while we're talking paint, the sheet from REV doesn't mention the fourth "black" color. We'll try phoning REV about that next week, but does anyone here have any details about the black in these schemes? thanks, Jason. Monaco Windsor Paint Codes Cashew.pdf

Hi all, we have an Onan QD 7500 in our 2003 Monaco Windsor, and sometimes it has a problem with stalling. It will run for many minutes (sometimes 5, sometimes two hours), and then will hesitate, surge, and die. The code is a 36 (Engine stopped without command from controller). After giving it a good long prime and an extended cranking time, it will start up again and may run for five more minutes, maybe two more hours. So I'm assuming this is air in the fuel (though I haven't noticed any white smoke). But I've visually inspected the fuel lines and clamps at the ends, and they look good (also confirmed by a reputable shop who had time to take a quick look, but not enough to do a deeper debugging due to my other repairs). Nothing obviously wrong. Now the strange thing: we just did a rally where we were boondocking, and with a full fuel tank the generator was running great, stalled maybe once in two weeks. When approaching a half tank (another time), it will typically run about 30 minutes (plus or minus) before stalling. Another time when the fuel was approaching a quarter tank, it was stalling every five minutes. I'm thinking (guessing?) there's something bad with the fuel pickup tube. Maybe cracked or rusted or pinholes? I haven't pulled it out yet, but psyching myself up for it. So, does my logic make sense? Has anyone had a similar problem or had a fuel pickup tube fail in a similar way? And is the fuel pickup tube easy to remove? thanks for any advice you can provide before I tackle this, Jason.

Hello, we have a 2003 Monaco Windsor with the factory awning, a Carefree of Colorado model Fiesta. It's the manual awning, and currently has at least one of the springs broken. Rather than replace the spring and still having a fiddly manual awning, we'd like to upgrade to electric. It appears that Carefree has a set of electric arms as an upgrade kit, but it's not clear if its compatible with the Fiesta. I'm going to contact Carefree, but also looking for input from the wisdom of this group. Has anyone else done an electrical upgrade on their awning of this type or era? Was it an upgrade, or did you replace it with a brand new awning? Any other hints or advice? And does anyone have recommendations of companies to do this in the southwest or west coast? Thanks Jason Reich

Hi All, thanks for the comments and suggestions. George, I don't believe mine has been changed. Yes, the bolt looks broken off, but I'll take a closer look after more project work today (this was found while taking out the alternator). I'm at a rally, and did find another 2003 Windsor, so took a look underneath and found a rubber hanger strap. (see pic) But even on theirs, the bolt on the chassis side is welded differently. But like I said mine seems pretty sturdy and I have no idea how long it's been gone, so I'm putting it on the "medium priority" list once we get parked for a while in another month. 🙂 thanks, Jason.

Hi all, I was looking under my 03 Windsor, and noticed a disconnected bracket going from the rear of the radiator to the main chassis. It looks like it could just bolt to the stud in the pictures, but the bar doesn't have much wiggle room and didn't want to move to touch that stud. So I'm wondering if there was another connector piece? Overall everything seems sturdy, I'm not sure how important this bracket is in the big picture. Can anyone with a Windsor around the same era take a look and see how their coach looks? Anyone else have any experience with this bracket? thanks Jason.

I used the AM Solar brackets for my install, and happy with them, but agree that the price was painful. The place I bought my panels now have their own mounts of the same design, for a little bit less. If/when I add more panels I may go for these: https://www.continuousresources.com/collections/solar-panels-and-hardware/products/mounting-brackets-for-hightec-solar-panels-160w-210w https://www.continuousresources.com/collections/solar-panels-and-hardware/products/mounting-brackets-with-tilt-bars-for-hightec-solar-panels-160w-210w By the way, when I installed mine I bought only the AM Solar mounts bases, then built my own tilt bars; figured that was maybe an acceptable price compromise. Jason.