No Turnsignals or Hazards

[Joel Ashley]

Just happened to read your post this a.m., Ed, before running a day's worth of errands.  I found myself at the end of the trip near my brother's house, someone I hadn't seen for 6 months, so I dropped by.  Our conversations included the topic of electrical connection corrosion, and I mentioned your CorrosionX suggestion.  My 73 year old brother is well known for his perfectionism, and not the least for it's application to restoring a '36 Plymouth and a '40 Ford.  Replacing a substantial percentage of the cars' fasteners with stainless steel is an example of his aversion to corrosion.

In his garage, a weekend mechanic's heaven, he reached among his stash of automotive chemical containers and handed me a full can of, you guessed it, Corrosion-X HD, with the exclamation, "happy birthday a couple months in advance".  I reckon I hit the jackpot, and won't have to go looking for the stuff now, so will put it to good use.  Brother did suggest that he'd prefer to use dielectric grease instead, but with the extensive amount of connectors and terminals involved throughout a coach, that would be pretty time consuming.  Spraying anti-corrosive sounds  the most practical.

So, thanks for the suggestion;  those of us who follow it will likely benefit.  I'm not sure we're going to be able to get the stuff inside some susceptible components, like controller or sensor boxes (eg Alladin) where many fellow members  have found grief, but connectors like larry's are treatable.

Joel

[Joel Ashley]

I should add that apparently our bay door is adequately sealed.  The Dr Z Air doesn't run out of chemical for several months, in spite of the hidden leak from above.  Like Ed indicates, if the bay was readily seeping in ambient outside Oregon air, I would expect the chemical to be used up much more quickly.

Joel

[Bill Sprague]

I had a wet electrical bay.  Water was coming from the hole where a wire bundle came in from the wheel well.  It had not been sealed well at the factory.   Looking at the bay, it is the bundle in the upper right corner.  When I drove in the rain, circuit breakers got wet and things flashed on an off when they shouldn't.

[Edward Buker]

If your elecrical bay gets wet you need to solve that problem. Wet carpet in there (mine is carpeted on the bottom) does not redily dry and you are creating a terrarium environment to house relay contacts and spade lugs. When that area gets wet and then sits, it will be very hard to dry it out without opening the door. If it gets wet leave the door open until that area has dried out completly and search out the leak source.

Enclosed areas like the bay, a yearly spray will work well with Corrosion X. Exposed terminals under the coach I tend to use this product. It coats and leaves a more viscous protectant that lasts where wash exposure is an issue. It is an amber coating but is still light enough to see if corrosion is occuring. I do not like coatings for contacts that you cannot see through to observe corrosion. Corosion X will work on these contacts as well but will not last and you will have to recoat them and in retirement we only have so much energy...

http://www.crcindustries.com/marine/content/prod_detail.aspx?PN=06026&S=N

Joel's mention of dielectric grease is a good product but it is difficult to get where it needs to be as applied manually and it does not flow. It is used during assembly in applications but we need to spray to redily coat where the protectant needs to be on our finished assemblies.

In the electrical bay I would disconnect and spray the large screw wire bundle connectors like in the photo sparingly with corrosion X if you have been wet in that bay. I would spray the exposed buss bars and spade lugs more liberally. I have not unscrewed and treated my large connectors and probably will not unless I have a problem given my bay has stayed dry. I would not spray circuit boards or be pulling push on connectors unless I suspected a problem. Hope this helps.

Later Ed