So my buddy Mike from Trailer and Marine Services, in Ft. Pierce, FL ( I HIGHLY recommend them for all your trailer needs) Helped me put the visor back on my GMC.
Mike has my almost twinsie coach, another yellow 23'. His is 3 years older and different floor plan, but due to the fact we only live about 80 miles apart, people we know mistake our coaches for each other (even a few in the GMC community).
That's his in the foreground and ours in the background. As you can see the windows are different as his has the bed in the back and a side bath, vs. our rear bath.
Anyway, I got rolling and made it up to his shop and we got right to work on the issue. The first thing he showed me was how he modified his visor after his flew off too (well his stay partially attached).
After we cleaned up the tape residue and drilled out the holes where it ripped out. Previous install just had screws into the fiberglass with no backing! We used a hole saw and made a couple of cuts.
Mike then taped out a scribe line from the top of the hole to the corner.
Using a body saw (very high RPM air tool), he ripped down the line enlarging the space between the top of the coach and visor, thus reducing the wind load on the visor that wants to rip it off the coach.
The beauty of this mod is that you hardly even notice it even when you know what has been done.
Air foil reduction!
As mentioned the big bolts up front were just lag bolts screwed into the fiberglass. How they held with the adhesive for 20 years is kind of amazing. Anyway, Mike used Rivnuts. They go in like a rivet and the back side mushrooms out, and it is a threaded nut. Pretty cool stuff.
Washers and bolts and of course we used some strong adhesive under them.
Sporting my sweet color matched Birchaven (the model of GMC we have) T-shirt I just got. Had to wait a couple hours for the adhesive to set, so we went to see the boat Mike just bought to restore and then off for a sandwich and a brew.
After 2 hours I gingerly drove her home as I had my sister coming for dinner. I tried to stay under 50 mph the whole way home and for the most part I did, but it was PAINFUL. The hour and half ride up took 2:15 on the way home, but she got here and the visor stayed on!
The broken flywheel is a far bigger issue than I thought it would be and today I ordered a new one, now just need to get it installed before our Thanksgiving adventure.
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