Sheet metal stress failure - center rock guard cover

[Blischke]

I just finished up repairing the rock guard failure but will also contact Airstream to see if there is this damage is covered under a warranty. As others have commented, I installed a 4x6 inch patch using 0.025" aluminum sheeting. I removed the bracket by grinding off the rivets. I was not able to find the recommended sealants and instead used DAP Butyl Flex rubber adhesive which provides a waterproof seal for metal surfaces and seams. I was able to rivet the patch and bracket to the trailer using a Stanley hand held rivet gun and 3/16" aluminum rivets. The rivets were slightly larger than the previous rivets so I had to enlarge the bracket holes slightly. I also added some of the rubber adhesive to the surface of the rivets. Overall, it was a fairly simple repair. I hope it holds! Photos of my repair are attached.

[Ray Eklund]

Lots of theories from... Your tow vehicle is too big, hitch, wind and no doubt your fault. Ha ha ha... more of the same "Ain't my fault in manufacturing... it is Your Fault for using the Trailer."

It is not, from my perspective the owner's fault.

I removed the left and right Rock Guards so my Airstream Dealer could inspect the Indents on the lower corners of my storage door and also my Rock Guards rivets coming loose. The curve on my Rock Guards is so... POOR... the majority of Rivets that hold the curved trim piece are pulling OUT. I can insert my fingers into the center bottom of the trim for about 40% of the length.

After removing:

Swinging out the Rock Guard... and flipping it over... it is obvious. There is tremendous stress with the CURVE, nothing else. The curve is not the same as the curve of the panel it is suppose to be protecting.

If anyone who has posted their theory... have you removed your Rock Guard and compared them while laying on the ground? Tell us what you found. I might try to measure the curve of the trailer's panel to the length of the curve of the Rock Guard.

I found that the hinge is STRAIGHT.
The Panel itself does not FIT the Curve of the front panel of the trailer.
The Panel is closer, if not rubbing the lower trim strip at the bottom.
Rocks can drop into this area and 'burrow into the skin' if not removed.

The Rock Guard is hinged on a Frame Member. The bottom screw that holds the bottom is under stress as well. When I removed the screw... it sprung up to just under an inch... both sides. When I reinstalled the Rock Guard, I used a 1 1/2 Lath Screw and did not snug it into the welded area. I secured it, but left the TORQUE out of the last screw. Just enough, but not to the frame, flush. (I did not have a measuring tape to give exact widths... this was suppose to be a routine remove and replace.)

The Left and Right aluminum framed plastic window guards. Look at the top. The insulation is not close to preventing water from running between it and the window. The water then runs into the top of the Trim. If you do not seal it... it will eventually get in between the trim and into the rivets and screws. Look. I discovered all of this this Fall.

The Frames and plastic window guards are made by the same Supplier of window guards. Do not fit very well, either. As a set.

(I do not know who the Rock Guards are manufactured... THE plastic windows above the Rock Guards are made by the same company.)

The gap on the top of the window guards is wide open for water. The lower part is tight against the aluminum panel... and varies... check it out.

I am watching this all very close. When to align the center thread through the hole to attach the nut... it takes a lot of pressure to get it aligned. Also those on the outside edges. The tension is excessive. It does not fit properly to the curve of the side panels.

THIS IS WHAT I BELIEVE IS THE PROBLEM. Nothing else. Poor fitting 'guards'. All of them. Windows and Rock Guards shields.

I hope I am wrong for MOST owners. Different batches of panels are not exactly the same. Like our same year, model and construction of our Trailer. My Dealer said if I do not like my Rock Guards, I can buy a new replacement pair. Just swell...

[Ray Eklund]

There is plenty of gap on top of the Rock Guard between it and the skin.

The bottom edge varies. Mine is in contact with curved plastic closer to the hinge. The guard frame has rubbed on it.

Curb side I left a gap at bottom of 3- 25cent coins. Driver's side 5. I may back out the curb side to reduce more stress. These are across from the Indents of FB Models... too. Hmmmm? or not?

I loosened the the center nut on the curb side panel, center nut, thinking it would reduce tension and rest. Made no difference. The driver's side had less tension.

Without having another trailer, side by side, it is difficult to solve this. If some trailers are having an issue... it has not been ours... with all of the negatives mentioned earlier, this should have happened with the 2014 with same negatives as I am using today. So far... Maybe using better Air in my Tires?

[FredWilma]

I had exactly this issue on my first trip with a new 2021 Caravel 22FB. I had it repaired under warranty.

This was my first experience with an Airstream. Towing it with a Mercedes 350GL with air suspension and using an equalizer hitch, running tires at the recommended 80psi.

I have no science behind this observation, but I attribute this damage to too much stress on the towing system with the high tire pressure that puts undue stress on the trailer.

Similar issues have been reported in other threads related to dimpling in the front panel and frame separation.

Other signs of this were cussions from the dinette scattered all over the trailer, cabinet doors opening during the tow etc.

My solution was to lower the tension on the bars of the equalizer hitch and drop tire pressure to 70psi which is plenty for the load rating of the tires.

There seems to be much less vibration of the trailer and everything stays in place in side during the tow.

I hope this helps.

[H_Mark]

We have had this issue repaired at a local Airstream facility. The sheet metal was replaced with added sheet metal support under the outside panel. My own opinion about this failure is poor design for the vertical stresses encountered by the outside curve of the panel. There are support points at both top and bottom at the corners of each panel. The corners are either on or near underlying struts and furthermore, they lie close to the multiple rivet support at the edge of the panels. This is not so with the outside curve where only the top has an attachment point anchored to a single layer of sheet metal. This leaves the entire center vertical curve supported at only one point. Vertical forces inherent near the tongue then become focused on this single point on the outside curve. Imagine holding a curved piece of metal 4 feet long by the outside edges and shaking it up and down. What does the outside curved edge do? It rotates. These vertical forces are normal resulting from road surface and probably stopping and starting horizontal travel. They can be affected by tire pressure variations and suspension. In a few words, this failure resulted from metal fatigue failure from design deficient in managing the physics of vertical motion motion.

[ROBERTSUNRUS]

Hi, my trailer has the same concern with the center segment protector mount. I was cleaning the dirt and green slime off of my trailer; Something that I have to do yearly after moving to Oregon. Most of this slime, and dirt, settles on horizontal parts like the body side moldings. I peeked in between the segment protectors and it was horrible. They always fit very tight and are hard to open. As one of my fixes, I drilled the six holes with a larger drill bit. Only the center mount on the street side was bad, and hanging loose. I was un-able to find any aluminum at the stores and I was thinking that I would have to buy a sealer and a can of clear coat for it.

I am famous for buying items and not using them for their intended purpose. In this case I bought a stainless steel push plate, made for doors. It had six holes in it and I decided to use four of them. I tried to cut this plate with sheet metal shears, but it was too tough. I ended up using my Dremel with a cut-off wheel. The four holes were just a tiny bit smaller than 3/16" so after I had it mounted on my trailer I drilled them out to fit 3/16" aluminum pop rivets. On the bracket all four holes were broken on the skin, so I drilled two more holes in the middle. I used 3-M two sided tape to hold the mount to my new patch plate and to hold the patch plate to the skin. After everything was lined up, and stuck in place, I drilled six holes for 1/8" pop rivets and four holes for 3/16" pop rivets and installed all of the pop rivets. I like the way it came out.

[Ray Eklund]

I maintain and upkeep our Airstreams since 2006.

Never had this problem with the 2006 nor the 2014... but as I posted earlier... the 2019 27 foot had misfitted rock guards. Just a little... hole tweaking to fit smoothly without effort.

My 2019 27 foot: Post 42 & 43 were the easiest pressure reducers.

This is NOT Sheet Metal. It is brittle thin Aluminum and after a couple of flexes... it breaks. No kidding... it takes very few flexes... and it breaks.

The Hinge: I modified these holes as described earlier, after adjusting the hinge being straight and the front curve of the Airstream at an angle from the top and then 1/4 inch or more at the bottom for both, to relieve the excess tension. When you remove the Rock Guard from the bottom first...you will see it will pull away from the skin of your trailer. (Then you will understand what I am describing. It adds a lot of torque from the rock guard and fit. Hard to describe, unless you try this.)

That helped the street side. It swings easy and I lift, align with the three bolts, tighten the acorn nut.

The curb side was OFF. more You would have to torque it to align the holes to the screw to apply the acorn nut. I would swing the guard and lift and the holes would not align. I would have to tug and align the misaligned screws. That created tension that many discover TEAR THE ALUMINUM SKIN WHERE THE CENTER BRACKET IS LOCATED. Probably do the same to the top and bottom end bolts.

My 2006 towed with 2006 Tundra and the 2014 Tundra, Equalizer... no problem.
It is not my F350 doing the damage. It did none to the 25 foot.
It is not my Equalizer Hitch doing the damage... with three Airstreams.
It is not my Driving, Traveling, Dirt Roads or Towing.

It is the misaligned nuts to the Gravel Guard. This creates a lot of PULLING FORCE AWAY FROM THE SKIN, PULLING THE BRACKET. THIS SKIN IS THIN AND BRITTLE.

MY.... mutilation... works. I took a 3/8 hardened steel drill bit to DRILL OUT THE STAINLESS STEEL SMALLER HOLE IN THE GRAVEL GUARD. Yep... and have someone hold the guard to steady it.

Have someone help. Slowly align the screws to the holes. It should swing easily into the screw holes and then align the threads to the acorn nut.

Drilled out the upper and lower end holes. Swung the gravel guard over... the top one was a bit off and the center bolt was off more. Inserted the drill bit and elongated the top center hole by forcing the drill bit towards the area that was not aligned. When you close without twisting... easy does it... the screw threads on mine were off to my RIGHT... and I elongated the hole, so the threaded screw CLEARED... easily.

After a bit of 'drill hole tweaking'... the Gravel Guard swings over, I lift it... the holes align, I tightened the Acorn Nuts.

No stress NOW on the brackets. Aligned the hinge earlier on this Thread to discover the holes were still out of alignment.

No problems since. Nothing has fallen off. Nothing is tearing the aluminum skin away from the trailer.

ONLY if you mutilate this poorly fitted Gravel Guard...will you be able to say... Aaaaaah.

If this may not work for you and afraid to do it... that is OK with me. When you have to repair the aluminum skin... you may rethink this. Costs you nothing... but will cost you a lot if you are a 'wait and see what happens' kind of person.

Drill... a powerful plugged into a wall socket drill. Not a battery, unless you are patient. A 3/8 inch metal drill bit. Enlarge the hole and make necessary tweaks. If the hole does not permit the acorn nut to secure, add a washer. Save yourself lots of money, anguish and feel happy.

To post this Thread took longer than the 10 minutes to start and finish this checking the fit on both rock guards.

Have my F350 Diesel, My Equalizer Hitch, Michelin tires inflated to 72psi, and more if necessary and nothing falling off. Took a few years... but waiting for the next unexpected problem. Hopefully after nearly three years... A Keeper.

[corvettes]

Originally Posted by H_Mark

2014 Flying Cloud has developed metal fatigue stress fractures at both right and left front rock shield upper middle stud mounts. There have been no impacts or collisions to cause this. I believe the cause to be wind pressure and wind turbulence from passing vehicles. The left stud mount body surface shows the most damage on the side where vehicles pass. So far the only suggested remedy is replacing the panels. The problem with this is, it does not correct the underlying failure which is the sheet metal at that point can't support the wind pressure. Just replacing the segment with the same material would likely result in the same stress failure. I wondering about alternate solutions. One is an external patch afixed with 3M marine sealant. Another might be to reinforce a new panel on the backside in a similar manner. The attached photos show the sheet metal failure.

I have had similar issues with my 20X basecamp and 16X basecamp, relaced shields and brackets under warranty 3 times, before I added stiffners to my rock guards, of my design, which stopped all the vibrations and issues...hope this helps