The molding piece right behind the driver door was coming loose so I unscrewed the little screw holding it in place. The molding was very loose and I noticed that several of the large pop-rivets that hold the molding on were sheared. I slid the molding off since I didn’t want it falling off going down the road. So now I’m to the point of wanting to put the molding back on and am in a quandary. I called Newell and they said i would need to remove the engine bay cover at the rear of the coach and slide the LONG piece of molding out and then put the the other in. Well this made sense until I tried it. Seems there is an aluminum trim/stop in the end of the short molding that makes it impossible to push over the plastic clips that hold the molding on. Any ideas? Do I have to remove the main cabin door to get the piece to go on?
The pop rivets on mine holding the stanchions on sheared because the rivets holding the skin needed replacing that are underneath the trim. I removed my door bell/intercom out of the way. The first stanchion from the door I left enough slack upon re-reveting it to let it pivot. I threaded the trim back on with the door open and slid the trim back in place by tilting the door end in the 2 o clock position, installed and then put the end screw back in. You get the long piece off with one person holding and pulling the trim while a second person hits it with a rubber mallet toward the rear of the coach. I had to pull both of those pieces and replace the rivets and the rivets in the stanchions. The trim starts to become loose when the hidden rivets under them shear. I think Tom may have done this on the drivers side of his coach. Get you a $39 air rivet gun at Harbor Freight or you will look like Pop-Eye trying to pop the rivets in by hand.
Steve Magown
Calhoun, LA
2001 Prevost H3 Vantare
formerly Newell #458
(This post was last modified: 04-20-2020, 07:57 PM by smagown.)
Thanks Steve/Steve, It was actually pretty easy to remove the long piece once I got the engine bay cover off - it just slid right out of the clips holding it. I got the larger pop-rivets from Newell and replaced them for any of the clips that were loose. I’m pretty sure I will need to remove the cabin door in order to replace the short piece of trim but am going to talk to Newell’s Paint Dept soon about it to make sure - maybe they have a trick I have not thought of...
I called Newell and they suggested using double-sided tape to secure the molding to the coach near the cabin door and removing at least two of the clips to get the molding to slide in. I also talked to Steve Magown about how he secured his molding by leaving the two clips near the door loose and sliding the molding in place and screwing the molding down with the original holes in each end. I did a hybrid approach: I removed the clip closest to the cabin door and also the third clip. The second clip is loose so it gives when the molding slides past the open cabin door. As the molding slid through the second clip it was apparent that the molding would not give enough (you have to very careful not to bow/bend the aluminum molding) and so I removed the next/third clip and this helped the molding slide in with the use of a plastic dead-blow hammer on the other end (near the door). Now I have the molding inserted fairly loose but will use double-sided VHB tape to adhere the molding and then screw it down - I may have to use a little oversized screws or use some of the suggestions for epoxy/steel wool to make the screws tighten properly.
Thanks for everyones’ help on this! Another project just about put to rest and hopefully it will help others in the future.
