Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 11:02:03 EDT
Reply-To: KENWILFY@AOL.COM
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: KENWILFY@AOL.COM
Subject: Luggage Rack Seal- Report! (longish)
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Well there was some debate about the luggage rack seals last week and I just
thought I would throw in my observations. I bought a full pop-top seal kit
from Go Westy (Gary Smythe) and installed it in a customers Vanagon. It is
an excellent kit and comes with one long seal with the bulb on it for you to
cut and install on the pop-top and luggage rack, along with the
"over-the-top-seal", lock tight sealant for this seal, and step-by-step
instructions. Really nice kit for $79.95 (I sell these same kits for the
same price FYI). Any way at the time a List member was here who had gotten a
pop-top seal kit from another list vendor (no names). He mentioned to me
that his seal kit had come with two separate seals, one for the pop-top and
one for the luggage rack, and that the front seal had no bulb on it. He
thought that this would cause problems with water retension, and I considered
his words. I almost cut the bulb off of the seal, but then I decided to
install it as-is and see what happened.
I have had the oppurtunity to have this van here for about a month after we
installed the new seals (my helper did this following the instructions and it
took him 1 hr and it looks excellent). We have had many, many rains here
since then, including a major downpour last night. I have repeatedly checked
the luggage rack after these rains to see if there is any evidence of water
being held back under the rack and even after last nights deluge there was
none. The canvas and everything under the pop-top was dry as a bone this
morning (the ground was still wet).
Having observed this, I called Gary at Go Westy to ask him exactly why he
uses one seal for his kits instead of two seals (as someone suggested that
the only reason to do this would be that you were unwilling to stock two
different seals). Gary said, initially he had sold the seal without the
bulb. But then he had gotten calls from several people that their luggage
racks were whistling going down the road or rattling. So he decided to test
using the pop-top seal on the luggage rack. After testing it for some time,
he determined that it eliminated any chance of wind noise and rattling, and
did not retain water at all. That is why he sells the kits this way. He
said that actually the stock front luggage rack seal is cheaper and he has a
bunch of it left over from when he used to sell it, but he refused to sell a
product that his customers could have a problem with down the road.
This is the experience I have had with my dealing with Go Westy all along.
When I order something from them (as I do to help fill orders for camper
parts), I never have to worry about getting something inferior.
This post is not meant to slam anyone or suggest that another vendor's
products are inferior. It is merely to clear up a misconception that these
seals are inferior to stock. They have been proven to be superior and I will
continue to sell and install these without any hesitation.
Just FYI,
Ken Wilford
http://www.vanagain.com
John 3:16
Phone: (856)-765-1583
Shop: (856)-327-0027
Fax: (856)-327-2242
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