2001 Contessa leak search

[LaMonte Monnell]

On my 2001 Contessa I have a leak that has been stubborn to find. I had a leak on the side passenger window and the wife and I removed that and put new butyl tape on and reinstalled it. That was one fix and have one to go still.

This is quite a leak in the right front corner of the front wall of the passenger side. It is right above the corner of the floor and wall just above the actual corner. I know that it probably must be from the connection point at the front cap and the side of the coach. Would the best way to find out be to remove all the sealant and stuff the original owner used to try and stop it and pull the gap cover off and inspect the underside area to see what I can do to seal it properly, or what I will have to replace to get rid of the leak?

I'm not going to start on it till after the Christmas holiday as we are actually going to use our coach for a couple of weeks(finally)!

[Mike Groves]

I did that on my Driver's side after much time trying to figure that out.  I removed the cover piece for the seam just above the front of the driver's side window, then squirted some lexel into the obvious hole in the seam that I found, then covered that with adhesive and a rubber strip the whole way down.  Finally I screwed the metal cover strip back over it with a little lexel in each screw hole, then lexeled the strip on each side.

Been working very well! 

Mike

[Steve Huber Co-Admin]

La Monte,
Also check that you are not getting a leak from where the outside assist handle attaches to the wall. If the plexiglas seal fails on the bottom end, water will get into the attach fixture and ultimately start leaking through the mounting screw into the wall of the coach as there is no other place for it to go other than evaporate.
I experienced this on my 01 Contessa. My fix was to switch the top and bottom mounting fixtures since the top one had a good seal ring and then drill a "weep hole" in the bottom of the fixture to give any water that did enter a path out.
Steve