Cracked Corian Counter

[Rick Stephenson]

I have a 2003 Adventurer 33V. The motorhome is in "storage", so it has not been moved since mid-November 2004. I now have a crack from the lower left hand side of the sink to the lower left hand side of the counter. The crack, from what I can see, is completely through. Nothing was dropped on it (no chips, marks, etc.) Is there something I could have done to prevent it? What will it take to fix it - i.e. complete replacement?

 

[Rick Stephenson]

I have a 2003 Adventurer 33V. The motorhome is in "storage", so it has not been moved since mid-November 2004. I now have a crack from the lower left hand side of the sink to the lower left hand side of the counter. The crack, from what I can see, is completely through. Nothing was dropped on it (no chips, marks, etc.) Is there something I could have done to prevent it? What will it take to fix it - i.e. complete replacement?

 

[hogbreth]

We have Corian Counter tops in our home. We have had a crack repaired through a corian repair service. Call Corian(dupont) and ask them to recomend someone nearby. They will route out the crack and bond in a new piece. Looks like new.

 

[Tom N]

You do not have Corian in your Adventurer. Some salesmen try to represent this as Corian but it is not. Corian is much more expensive and Corian is used in the Vectra/Horizon. You have a solid surface material made by Vendura. Ventura gives a 15 year warranty.

Vendura 800-394-4524
http;//www.vendura.com

 

[lornaschinske]

RV's flex. Solid surface countertop material doesn't. Take your RV back to dealer. Your cabinets may be to blame also. Solid surface is very heavy and the cabinets must be very solid to hold up to the weight. They can be fixed but you need to keep an eye on it incase it cracks again in same place or somewhere else (keep an eye on the sink area and cooktop/range area).

 

[RRT2]

Interesting about the 'crack'...we 'acquired' one on our road trip to Texas in the last couple of weeks. Back left edge that goes behind stove... it'll be 6 wks before we get back home. That goes on our 'list' for the dealer too.

 

[rhexemer]

Rick,
Our 2002 Journey DL also has a crack in the solid surface counter. I believe mine is Swanstone. I have had it repaired twice at the dealers. It re-cracks about once a year. It goes from back left of sink to wall. I honestly believe it is caused by a high spot underneath it. So far the dealer has fixed it under warranty even though it is well past warranty. I've talked to the dealer about replacing the countertop, but they will have no part of it. Sometime when I get to the factory I'll have them look at it.
Rich H

 

[3huskies]

Rick,
Tom N is right. You have a product from Vendura.
I have an 02 Horizon 39QD and it also has the Vendura product even though I had a Swanstone brochure in my Winnie info packet. If you go to their website you will see all the colors.

www.vendura.com

 

[3huskies]

Rick,
Click on this link which is the parts breakdown for your galley and you will see that it is Vendura-Almondine.

http://www.winnebagoind.com/%7Eservice/wincd/2003/WINNEBGO/3wfg33v.pdf

 

[DonavonP]

Have your dealer fasten the Vendura counter top using 3M # 4950 VHB foam tape. Do a Google search for 3M VHB - there is a service bulletin that discribes the proper primer and application. This foam
spacer will allow for some flexing of the coach. The down side is it's almost impossible to remove if applied correctly.

Winnebago knows how to purchase this tape and primer (#94). If they can't get it for you, 3M has a distributor locator but the minimum order is 3 rolls. There are hundreds of foam tapes on the market that won't work.
I would use 3/4".

If you can't get it, let me know. I'll place a woopie cushion in the proper chair. I don't work at 3M. There are 3M distributors that sell it by the single roll.

 

[lornaschinske]

You can get 3M VHB tape at Outwater Plastics Get their catalog while you are at it. It has lots of neat stuff in it. This stuff is very sticky. I used it to attach the paneling to the interior walls of our pop-up and stuck the Reflectix insulation to the ABS sidewalls to. It sticks to any clean surface (I used alcohol to prep the surfaces)and stick pretty good to my grubby hands too (ouch!). It's a good sized roll (I bought 2) but I have found lots of uses for the stuff.

 

[Rick Stephenson]

Thanks for the valuable information. I'll start at the bottom of the food chain and work my way up. I'll keep everyone posted on the outcome.

 

[richierich-WO]

Had the same problem as you, Winnebago replaced the entire galley countertop. Tech's who worked onit, claim the installation of the cabinets, when it was being built,were not completely level. Mine was replaced at Forest City, Iowa, at the factory. Coach is a Itasca, Horizone,39qd

 

[MDCalvert]

My 1999 Adventurer has a "Corian-like" countertop and the two pieces that cover the stove lid cause me to wonder about the quality of the material.

The large piece that covers the burner area is bowed up in the middle. I have bever used the oven or had a burner on with the cover down, but it bowed anyway -- right in the center. It is raised up about a half inch and the bowed up area is concentrically round and about twelve inches in diameter.

The smaller piece of the stove cover cracked all by itself. The coach was sittng, unused, and when I picked it up for a trip, I noticed the piece was craked al the way through. The crack is about one third of the way from the left edge and runs across the iece from edge to edge.

Does anyone know if this surface was made by the above mentioned Vandura company?

 

[Horsepowerfan]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Rick Stephenson:
...I now have a crack from the lower left hand side of the sink to the lower left hand side of the counter. The crack, from what I can see, is completely through. Nothing was dropped on it (no chips, marks, etc.) Is there something I could have done to prevent it? What will it take to fix it - i.e. complete replacement? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Hi Rick,

The very same thing happened to me. It sounds like the crack you describe is in exactly the same place, and mine cracked during winter storage also. (Nov. '03)

The dealer made 2 repair attempts. The first one re-cracked, the second one resulted in a damaged galley sink. Ultimately, the countertop was replaced. The only problem now is a very slight color mismatch as the flip-up extension, sink covers and cooktop covers were NOT replaced along with the main counter. I never thought about color mismatch so here's my recommendation...

Get the whole countertop replaced and if they'll agree to it have all the other matching pieces replaced as well.

I might add our dealer did an excellent job replacing our countertop and galley sink and I'm happier with the slight color mismatch than I would be with a cracked countertop (and scratched sink).

I was told the new top went in with fewer screws and less glue which will allow it to expand and contract better to prevent future cracking. I hope they're right!