meier-rv-repair-llc

RV Refrigerator Not Cooling on Gas or Electric: The Usual Culprits

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 06:38:55 GMT

QUICK ANSWER: An RV refrigerator that will not cool on gas or electric usually has one of five problems: the rig is sitting off level, the cooling fins on the back are choked with heat or debris, the heat source is failing (a fouled propane burner, a weak ignition board, or a dead 120 volt heating element), the control board or thermistor is giving bad signals, or the sealed cooling unit itself has failed. Work through them in that order. Level, airflow, and burner problems are usually fixable. Yellow residue behind the box or a sharp ammonia smell usually means the cooling unit is finished and running it any longer is a safety risk.

You open the door on a Friday afternoon, the milk is warm, the butter is soft, and the display says the refrigerator is running. The frustrating part is that an RV refrigerator can look perfectly healthy and still be doing almost nothing. There is no compressor humming, no obvious fan, and no sound to tell you whether it is working or only pretending. When it fails to cool on both gas and electric, owners tend to assume the worst, but the cause is often something simple that only looks like a dead refrigerator.

Most RV refrigerators are absorption units, and that single fact explains nearly every symptom you will see. They have no moving parts in the cooling circuit. Instead, a sealed set of tubes holds a mix of ammonia, water, and hydrogen, and a small heat source at the bottom drives that mix around a loop. The heat comes from a propane flame or from a 120 volt electric element. Everything else on the back of the box exists to help that loop run, or to get the heat out of it once it has done its job. When the loop is interrupted by something as ordinary as a tilted floor, the cooling stops, and no amount of changing the switch from gas to electric will fix it.

Start With Level, Because the Loop Depends on Gravity

An absorption refrigerator needs to sit close to level. The liquid inside the cooling unit moves through the tubes with the help of gravity, and it has to flow and pool in the right places. If the rig is sitting noticeably nose high, nose low, or leaning to one side, that liquid stops circulating the way it should. Cooling drops off or quits entirely, and the unit can even overheat in the process. Parked on a sloped driveway or a soft gravel pad in Branch County, an RV can drift further off level than most owners realize, especially after one wheel settles into wet ground.

Check this before anything else because it costs nothing. Put a level on the floor inside the coach, or on the refrigerator shelf itself, and adjust the jacks or blocks until the rig is close to level front to back and side to side. Then give the unit several hours to recover. A refrigerator that ran badly while tilted for a weekend can take a long time to catch back up, so do not judge the fix after twenty minutes.

The cooling unit has to dump heat as well as make cold. The finned coil on the back of the refrigerator, behind the outside access panel, is where that waste heat leaves. It rises up through a vent in the roof or the sidewall. If that path is blocked or the air around it is too hot, the unit cannot shed heat and the box warms up. This is one of the most common reasons a refrigerator works fine in spring and struggles in July.

Look at the outside access panel and the roof vent. Wasp nests, leaves, dirt, and spider webs build up behind the panel, in the lower vent, and in the roof vent, and any of them can slow the chimney effect that moves heat out. A refrigerator parked in full afternoon sun on a ninety degree day, with the back wall facing the sunlit side of the rig, has a hard time on its best day. Shade over that side helps, and so does a small battery powered fan set behind the box, which many owners add for hot trips. Remove any winter vent covers before the season starts, because a cover left on for the cold months will smother the flue once the weather warms.

Loading habits matter too. A warm box packed full of room temperature food and drinks puts a heavy load on a unit that moves heat slowly. These refrigerators are slow by design. Starting one a full day before a trip, and loading it with food that is already cold, makes a much bigger difference than most people expect. A door that does not seal tightly also lets warm air leak in, so run a dollar bill or a strip of paper across the gasket, and replace the door seal if it slides out with no resistance.

Heat and Airflow Are the Next Suspects

If the refrigerator cools on electric but not on propane, look at the flame. Gas operation depends on a steady propane supply, a clean burner, and an ignition system that can light and keep the flame. A short list of things goes wrong here again and again. A tank that is nearly empty or a regulator that is not delivering steady pressure starves the burner. Cooler months bring a quieter version of the same problem, because propane is slower to vaporize in cold weather and a low tank can fall short.

The burner itself is another common culprit. A tiny orifice feeds propane into a thin burner tube, and soot, rust flakes, and insect nests can partly block either one. Insects like the warm, sheltered space in a stored rig, and a blocked tube gives a weak, lazy, yellow tipped flame instead of a crisp blue one. A weak flame produces only a fraction of the heat the cooling unit needs, so the box slowly warms even though the control panel says it is running on gas. The flue tube that carries exhaust up through the middle of the cooling unit can also fill with soot and scale, which chokes the flame and leaves the refrigerator underpowered.

Ignition is the other half. On many units, a control board sparks the burner, senses the flame, and shuts off the gas if it cannot confirm that it lit. A worn electrode, a dirty flame sensor, low battery voltage, or a failing board can leave the refrigerator trying to light, giving up, and cycling through lockout. If you hear the clicking and see the error light but never smell propane burning or see the flame behind the lower panel, the fault is in the ignition path rather than the cooling unit.

WARNING: Do not poke at the burner, flue, or any gas fitting with metal tools or compressed air while the propane is turned on. If you smell propane at any time, shut off the tank valve, keep flames and sparks away, ventilate the coach, and have the system checked before you use it again. Gas side repairs and pressure tests belong in a shop with the right equipment.

When the Problem Is on the Gas Side

If the refrigerator cools on propane but not on shore power, the heating element is the first place to look. On 120 volt operation, a cartridge style element slides into a pocket on the cooling unit and heats it directly. Elements wear out. When one fails, the refrigerator will not cool at all in electric mode, even though the display lights up and the board seems happy. The thermal fuse that protects the element can also open, and a loose or burned connection in the element wiring will have the same effect.

Before blaming the element, confirm that the box is actually receiving full power. A weak pedestal, a long thin extension cord, or a tripped breaker can deliver low voltage that lights the control panel without heating the element properly. Plug in elsewhere or check the voltage at the outlet if you can, and look at how the rig is wired. A shop can check element resistance and current draw to tell a dead element from a power problem in a few minutes, and that test saves you from buying parts the refrigerator does not need.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

When the Problem Is on the Electric Side

Sometimes the cooling unit is fine and the brain is confused. Modern refrigerators use a control board to choose between gas and electric, light the burner, and keep the temperature steady. A thermistor, a small temperature sensor clipped to the cooling fins inside the box, tells the board when to add heat and when to back off. If that sensor drifts, corrodes, or loses contact with the fin, the board gets the wrong message. It may think the box is already cold and idle the heat source, or it may fail to call for cooling at all.

The symptoms look like a refrigerator that is slow, cycles oddly, or reaches a middle temperature and sits there. Damage from moisture and corrosion on the board is also common after a rig has sat through damp seasons or taken on water from a roof or window leak. Diagnosing these faults means testing signals and voltages rather than guessing, which is why part swapping can burn through money without ever solving the problem. Burner, board, thermistor, and cooling unit faults all feel similar to the owner, and they are very different repairs.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

The Control Board and Thermistor Can Mimic a Dead Unit

The sealed cooling unit is the part nobody wants to hear about. If level, airflow, flame, element, and controls all check out and the box still will not cool, the fault may be inside the sealed tubes. Over the years, the working mix can degrade, a weld can develop a pinhole, or the loop can partly clog with sludge, especially in units that were run while badly tilted or overheated. Once that happens, the refrigerator makes little or no cold regardless of how it is powered.

There are signs that point toward this. A sharp ammonia smell near the refrigerator or inside the box is one of them. A yellow or greenish powdery residue on the back of the unit, around the boiler, or along the welds is another, because that residue is where the working fluid has escaped. The refrigerator may cool for an hour and then quit, or cool the freezer a little while the fresh food side stays warm. None of these can be repaired with a part swap, and the real choice is between replacing the cooling unit or replacing the whole refrigerator.

TIP: Before a long trip, run the refrigerator on both propane and electric for a full day each at home, with a thermometer inside the box. If it holds a steady temperature on one source but not the other, you have narrowed the fault to that side before you are parked three hours from anywhere.

When the Cooling Unit Itself Has Failed

Work from the easy end to the hard end. Start with level, because it is free and fast. Then clear the outside vents, remove any winter covers, and look for debris behind the access panel. Confirm the propane tank has plenty of fuel and the shore power is strong, and check the door seal. Give the refrigerator a full day to prove itself before deciding it has failed. If it still does not cool, note whether the problem follows gas, electric, or both, because that observation is worth more to a technician than any guess about parts.

Cooling on only one source points toward the heat source for that mode: the burner, ignition, and propane supply for gas, or the element, fuse, and wiring for electric. Failing on both points toward something they share, such as the cooling unit, the control board, the thermistor, or the box simply not being able to release heat. Anything involving propane lines, pressure, a sooty flue, a yellow residue, or an ammonia smell should go to a shop rather than a driveway.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

What to Check First, and What to Hand to a Shop

Frequently Asked Questions

An RV refrigerator that stops cooling feels like a mystery, yet the cause usually shows itself when you work through the list in order. Level comes first, then airflow and clear vents, then the heat source on gas or electric, then the control board and sensor. Only after those check out does the sealed cooling unit come into question. Giving the box a full day to prove itself after each fix keeps you from chasing problems that are already solved.

With 10 years of experience helping owners in Branch County, MI, Meier RV Repair LLC has seen how often a warm refrigerator comes down to a tilted pad, a blocked vent, or a weak burner flame rather than a dead unit. Testing the burner, element, board, and thermistor one at a time separates a simple repair from a costly one. Owners who find the real fault early tend to save money on parts they never needed and head out on their next trip with cold food.

Start Simple and Work Toward the Cooling Unit

Where RV Water Leaks Really Start and How to Find Them

Wed, 30 Sep 2026 07:51:29 GMT

QUICK ANSWER: Most RV water leaks start at a roof penetration or a seam, not in the open middle of the membrane, and the water then runs along framing before it drips somewhere far from the opening. The real RV water leak source is usually a cracked bead of sealant around a vent, skylight, or air conditioner, a tired slide-out seal, a window or marker light gasket, or a loose plumbing fitting inside a cabinet. Finding it means tracing the water back uphill with a careful roof inspection, a check for soft spots and stains, a moisture meter, and a slow hose test rather than sealing over the first wet mark you see.

You notice a brown ring on the ceiling above the dinette, or the carpet in one corner is damp after a rain, and the natural move is to look straight up and seal whatever sits directly overhead. That is almost always the wrong spot. Water does not fall straight down inside an RV. It finds an opening somewhere on the roof or the sidewall, runs along a truss or down inside a wall cavity, and shows up a foot or two from where it actually got in. Chase the stain and you seal a dry patch of roof while the leak keeps working.

An RV shell is a thin skin stretched over wood and foam, and it is drilled through in dozens of places for the things that make it livable. Every one of those holes is filled with sealant or a gasket, and every one is a spot where water can get past. The membrane on top is barely thicker than a dime, and the plywood under it soaks up moisture and stays wet. So the question that matters is not whether your rig will develop a leak, but where, and how early you catch it. Knowing the usual entry points is what turns a mystery drip into a repair you can actually find.

The Seams and Sealant Fail Before the Membrane Does

Start where two things meet. Water almost never comes through the open field of a healthy roof. It enters at the interruptions: the long seams where the membrane meets the front and rear caps, the termination rails down both sides, and every bead of lap sealant holding those joints closed. Sealant is the part that ages first. It chalks under sun, shrinks as it dries out, and pulls away from the flange it was bonded to, opening a hairline gap you would have to be standing on the roof to see. Once that gap is there, every rain pushes a little water underneath, and the decking below has no way to dry.

This part of Michigan is hard on sealant in particular. A rig parked in Branch County crosses freezing and thaws again more than forty times across a single winter, and each swing works on any crack that has already started. Water seeps into the opening, freezes and expands, widens the gap, then melts and runs deeper. Repeat that dozens of times and a bead that looked fine in October is split open by April. Summer sun chalks the surface, and months of snow load press down on the seams. This is why so many owners find a fresh stain right after storage season, not during the trips that supposedly caused it.

Every hole in the roof is a candidate. Count the things poking through your roof sometime: roof vents and fan housings, the skylight over the shower, the air conditioner, the refrigerator vent, the antenna base, solar mounts, and the ladder brackets. Each one is a cutout in the membrane held down with screws and covered in sealant, and each screw head backs out a fraction as the rig flexes down the highway. A vent flange with a cracked bead lets water straight onto the decking. A brittle skylight dome splits around its mounting frame where nobody looks.

The air conditioner is its own case. The rooftop unit seals to the roof with a foam gasket, and that gasket flattens and hardens over the years until it no longer presses tight. Water then tracks down the duct opening and appears at the ceiling right beside the unit, which owners almost always blame on a roof seam nearby. It pays to check the gasket before you reach for a tube of sealant on the seams around it.

TIP: Walk your roof gently a few times a season and press a thumb along every seam and around each vent, skylight, and the air conditioner. Sealant that has cracked, chalked, shrunk back from a flange, or lifted at the edge is telling you where water is getting in, and catching it there is far easier than tracing a stain later.

The Penetrations Owners Never Climb Up to See

A slide is a hole in the wall that opens and closes. Every time a slide-out runs in or out, its wiper and bulb seals drag across the opening, and those seals take a beating a fixed wall never sees. They compress, crack, and lose their spring over time, and the top seal is the one that matters most because water sits on the slide roof and runs toward the coach. Many slide roofs are built with a slight slope back toward the RV rather than away from it, so any gap in the top seal feeds water straight into the floor of the slide and the cabinetry around it. A spongy slide-out floor usually traces back to a seal that stopped sealing a season or two earlier.

The awning-style topper over a slide helps, but it is not a fix on its own. Debris collects in the seal channel, leaves and grit hold moisture against the rubber, and a seal that is dry and cracked will pass water even when the slide looks closed. This is a spot to check with the room both in and out, because a gap that hides when the slide is retracted can open up when it is extended.

Slide-Outs Move, So Their Seals Wear Out

Water does not only come from above. The sidewalls are full of openings too. Window frames are set into the wall with butyl tape and trimmed with sealant, and both give up over the years, letting water wick into the wall behind the frame. Clearance and marker lights are screwed through the exterior skin with a gasket behind each one, and those gaskets dry out and crack. The same goes for the corner moldings, the entry door frame, the exterior service doors, and the trim strips running down each side. Any of them can pass water into the wall cavity, where it travels down out of sight and rots the framing long before a stain reaches the inside.

Because sidewall leaks run down inside the wall, they are some of the hardest to trace. A window that leaks at its top corner can soak the wall all the way to the floor, and the only sign inside might be a soft spot near the baseboard or a faint musty smell. Delamination, where the outer skin bubbles or separates from the wall behind it, is often the outward sign that water has been living in that wall for a while.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

Windows, Marker Lights, and Body Seams Leak From the Side

Not every leak comes from the weather. The fresh and waste plumbing inside your rig is its own set of leak points, and these have nothing to do with the roof. Fittings loosen from road vibration, a connection under the kitchen sink weeps, the water pump joints seep, or a line that was not fully drained splits over winter when the water inside it freezes and expands. These show up as damp cabinet floors, a wet spot under the bathroom, or a water pump that cycles on its own when no tap is open. A freeze-split line is the classic Michigan version, and it usually announces itself the first time the pump runs in spring.

The tell that separates a plumbing leak from a roof leak is where and when it appears. Roof and sidewall leaks track to rain and show up high or inside the walls. Plumbing leaks show up low, near the fixtures, and often when the system is under pressure regardless of the weather outside.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

Plumbing Fittings Leak Where You Store Things

Trace the water back uphill. Finding a leak is detective work, and it starts with reading the clues inside. A ceiling stain, a soft or spongy spot underfoot on the roof, bubbled paneling, peeling covering near a window, or a musty smell that will not air out all point toward an area, even if the exact opening sits a foot or two away. Map every symptom before climbing up, then get on the roof and inspect every seam, flange, and fastener in that zone, looking for sealant that has cracked, lifted, or pulled back.

Then bring in the tools that read what you cannot see. A moisture meter pressed against the interior surfaces shows how wet the wood is behind the panel, which helps map how far the water has spread even where nothing shows. It will not prove a spot has delaminated, but it points toward the wettest area, which is usually nearest the entry. A slow hose test is the classic confirmation: with someone watching inside, run a gentle stream of water over one suspected area at a time, starting low and working up, waiting several minutes at each spot so water has time to travel and appear inside. Wetting the whole roof at once tells you nothing, because you cannot tell which area let the water in. Shops also run an air pressure test, sealing the coach and pushing low-pressure air inside while brushing soapy water over the outside seams so the openings bubble up, which finds gaps a hose can miss.

WARNING: Do not seal over a stain or a soft area before you have found the actual opening. Fresh sealant or a coating laid over trapped moisture holds the water against the wood and lets the rot keep spreading in the dark, and the leak comes back worse because the real source was never closed. Find the entry point first, then seal it.

How to Actually Find the Source

Frequently Asked Questions

RV water leaks are not mysteries once you know where to look. The stain on your ceiling or soft spot on the floor is almost never where water actually entered. Understanding that water follows the path of least resistance along framing lets you trace backward and find the real opening. Sealant cracks, gaskets fail, and penetrations deteriorate long before the membrane itself breaks down. Catching these entry points early prevents wood rot that would turn a simple repair into expensive restoration work.

Over 10 years in Branch County, MI, Meier RV Repair LLC has traced thousands of leaks to their real sources and sealed them before wood suffered permanent damage. Most owners are surprised the spot they targeted is often wrong, with the real opening nearby or several feet away. The moisture meter, roof inspection, and patient hose test reveal what guessing never could. Understanding how water travels through an RV transforms you from chasing phantom leaks to finding and fixing the actual problem.

Finding the Leak Before Wood Damage Spreads

Soft Spots on Your RV Roof? What Is Happening Underneath

Mon, 31 Aug 2026 06:44:14 GMT

QUICK ANSWER: A soft spot on an RV roof is water damage that has already worked its way beneath the membrane. The rubber or thermoplastic skin on top is barely thicker than a dime, and the plywood decking under it is thin sheeting that loses its strength once it stays wet. A spongy area means moisture reached that wood, started rotting it, and is likely spreading sideways into the walls and slideout floor. It rarely fixes itself. Stopping it means finding the entry point, cutting out the ruined decking, and rebuilding the layer underneath.

You climb up to clear leaves off the roof, take a step near the front cap, and the surface gives under your foot like a wet cardboard box. It does not crack, and from a distance the membrane still looks fine. That soft, sinking feeling is the roof telling you something the outside cannot: water has already gotten past the skin, and the wood that gives the roof its strength is coming apart. By the time you can feel it through your boot, the problem is no longer on the surface.

An RV roof is built in layers. On top sits a thin membrane, either rubber or a thermoplastic sheet, stretched over plywood decking that is kept deliberately thin to save weight. Under the plywood run the rafters and a layer of insulation, then the interior ceiling panel. That whole sandwich stays sound only as long as the membrane and its sealant keep water out. Once water finds a way in, it goes after the one part that cannot handle it: the wood.

Why the Roof Goes Soft in the First Place

Water almost never comes straight through the middle of a healthy membrane. It enters at the interruptions, the places where something pokes through the roof or two pieces meet. Vents, the air conditioner, fans, skylights, antennas, and the front and rear caps are all sealed with lap sealant and gaskets, and those are the first things to fail.

Sealant does not last forever. It chalks, shrinks, and pulls away from the flanges it was meant to bond to, opening a gap you would need to be on the roof to see. A screw head backs out a fraction as the rig flexes down the highway. A gasket under the air conditioner flattens and stops sealing. Any one of those lets water trickle onto the decking below, slowly, a little with every rain. The membrane itself can also thin, tear, or get punctured by a branch, but the seams and penetrations cause most of what turns into a soft roof.

A soft spot is not just a weak patch of roof. It is a status report on damage that started a while ago. When you feel that give underfoot, several things are usually true at once. Water has been present long enough to break down the plywood. The decking in that area is rotting and no longer carrying load. The insulation beneath it may be saturated and holding moisture against the wood. And the damage is probably larger than the soft area you can feel.

That last point is the one that catches owners off guard. Water travels sideways through plywood, wicking along the wood well past the original leak. So the rot spreads out from the entry point in every direction, often reaching the walls and settling down into the slideout floor before a single stain shows up on the ceiling inside. You can have a structurally compromised roof and a clean-looking interior at the same time. The stain, when it finally appears, is late news.

TIP: Walk your roof gently a couple of times a season and press along every seam, around each vent, and beside the air conditioner. Catching a spot while it is barely spongy, before the ceiling sags inside, is the difference between replacing two sheets of plywood and rebuilding the whole top of the rig.

What the Sponginess Actually Tells You

A soft roof develops faster in this climate than almost anywhere else, and the reason is the freeze and thaw cycle. Great Lakes winters run a rig through dozens of freeze-thaw swings across a single season, and each one works on the sealant. Water that has seeped into a tiny crack expands as it freezes, widening the gap, then melts and seeps deeper. Repeat that 40-some times a year and a hairline crack becomes an open path.

Snow load does the rest. Coldwater collects roughly 27 inches of snow across a winter, and on a flat RV roof it sits there for months instead of sliding off. That standing weight presses on decking that is already damp, and wet plywood flexes and delaminates under a load that dry wood would shrug off. This is why so many owners discover the damage in April: the rig comes out of storage, the ceiling panel is sagging, and the trim no longer meets the wall. Sealant formulated for a mild, dry winter can split open here in two or three seasons, which is why the material and the temperature it goes on at both matter so much in this part of the country.

How Michigan Weather Speeds It Up

The instinct when a roof starts leaking is to add sealant, roll on a coating, or slap a patch over the soft area. On a sound roof, fresh sealant at the right spot is exactly right. On a roof that is already wet underneath, it is the wrong move.

Sealing over trapped moisture does not dry the wood out. It seals the water in, keeps it pressed against the plywood, and lets the rot keep working in the dark where you cannot see it. A coating applied over a soft area looks like a fix for a season, then the spongy patch comes back larger because nothing underneath ever dried or got replaced. The same goes for a patch laid over rotted decking: the patch holds, the wood beneath keeps failing. Any real repair has to start by getting the moisture and the ruined wood out, not by capping them.

WARNING: Do not let anyone put a fresh coating or a patch over a spot that already feels soft. It hides the damage instead of stopping it, and the next person to find out how far the rot spread will be whoever opens that roof up later, with a much bigger repair on their hands.

Why More Sealant Makes It Worse

Fixing a soft roof means working from the outside in and being honest about what the wood is doing. The first step is finding every entry point, because patching the decking without stopping the leak just repeats the whole job in a year. That means a real inspection: tapping and probing the surface to map how far the soft area extends, checking each seal, and, where it helps, water testing or running pressurized air with a soapy solution around the penetrations to make hidden openings bubble up.

Once the extent is known, the ruined section gets opened up. Rooftop components come off, the membrane is peeled back, and the soft plywood is cut out all the way to sound wood, since compromised sheeting will not hold a fastener or safely carry the weight of an air conditioner. New decking goes in fastened to the rafters, not patched over from above, and the surface is brought back level. Then a new section of membrane, or a whole new membrane if the old one is failing across the roof, gets bonded down flat, and every vent, fan, and skylight goes back with fresh gaskets and sealant rather than the flattened ones that leaked before.

Whether the answer is a targeted repair or a full replacement comes down to two things: how much decking is soft and how much life is left in the membrane. Local damage under a membrane that is otherwise sound is a repair. A substrate that is soft across a wide area, a membrane near the end of its rated life, or seams you have already resealed several times point toward replacement. A rubber membrane is generally rated around 10 to 15 years and a thermoplastic one longer, so the age of the roof is part of the math too. The point of the inspection is to match the work to what the roof actually needs instead of guessing from the ground.

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

What a Real Repair Involves

Frequently Asked Questions

A soft roof is really a timeline. The give underfoot marks where water sat long enough to break the plywood down, and the quiet spread outward from there has been going on far longer than the sponginess suggests. Sealant and coatings only address the surface; the wood is what carries the load, and once it turns, nothing rolled on from above brings it back. What matters most is how early the spot gets found, and how honestly it gets opened.

Roofs that get walked, pressed, and resealed on a regular schedule rarely reach that point, which is why seasonal checks are worth more than any single repair. When one does go soft, Meier RV Repair LLC has spent 10 years opening these roofs up across Branch County, MI, tracing leaks back to their actual source rather than the stain they leave behind. The honest answer usually shows itself the moment the membrane comes back and the decking is finally visible.

meier-rv-repair-llc

RV Refrigerator Not Cooling on Gas or Electric: The Usual Culprits

Start With Level, Because the Loop Depends on Gravity

Heat and Airflow Are the Next Suspects

When the Problem Is on the Gas Side

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

When the Problem Is on the Electric Side

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

The Control Board and Thermistor Can Mimic a Dead Unit

When the Cooling Unit Itself Has Failed

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

What to Check First, and What to Hand to a Shop

Frequently Asked Questions

Start Simple and Work Toward the Cooling Unit

Where RV Water Leaks Really Start and How to Find Them

The Seams and Sealant Fail Before the Membrane Does

The Penetrations Owners Never Climb Up to See

Slide-Outs Move, So Their Seals Wear Out

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

Windows, Marker Lights, and Body Seams Leak From the Side

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

Plumbing Fittings Leak Where You Store Things

How to Actually Find the Source

Frequently Asked Questions

Finding the Leak Before Wood Damage Spreads

Soft Spots on Your RV Roof? What Is Happening Underneath

Why the Roof Goes Soft in the First Place

What the Sponginess Actually Tells You

How Michigan Weather Speeds It Up

Why More Sealant Makes It Worse

Picking a mount that can handle the spot

What a Real Repair Involves

Frequently Asked Questions

What a Soft Roof Is Really Telling You