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Originally Posted by finalcutjoe
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We must not have experienced a real thunderstorm, because water has never been an issue… the 2” continuous rubber gasket acts like a squeegee when retracting….
My opinion on why the slides are slow movers is the towability- you need a superduty/three quarter ton vehicle *minimum* to move these coaches… (let the flames begin) if you’re a pickup person, you’ve got a lot to choose from… but if you need seating for 6+, good luck
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That top gasket while doing a great job when the slide is either fully extended or fully retracted probably suffers from the tolerances that occur in building a trailer. Fractions of an inch are enough to cause that gasket to squeege that top on some slideouts to not getting quite enough contact. I know on my unit, it's not gallons of water. It's a very small amount that really doesn't show its precence until that slide moves in as it's being retracted. As the angles change in retraction, the water starts to move off the top.
Bottom line, this only happens when we get wind driven rain that gets under the protective awning, and I've learned that when I experience one of those storms, I just use a long handled squeege to pull what little is up there off. Considering I've had this trailer for 4 seasons, I may have had to do this 3 times.
It looks like Airstream has been cognative of the hitch loads and the current specs put the hitch weight at 100-150 lbs. less than my 2004 model. This trailer tracks better than my '01 27' Safari and in strong cross winds it stays behind the van almost like it was on the same rail. I've had a hard time determining if the improvement was based on the fact that I went from a Reese Dual-Cam hitch to an Equal-i-zer, or the increased hitch weight or a combination of both factors.
Jack