By Chris Dougherty
Chris Dougherty is a certified RV technician. Here is a piece he wrote while he was serving as RVtravel.com’s technical editor.
These tools are essential to help keep your RV leak-free:
Liquid RV sealants: From EPDM seam sealer to silicone to body sealers — all come in 10-ounce caulk tubes; so if you’re going to maintain your RV yourself, you need these.
Caulk gun: You don’t really need a “Cadillac” caulk gun if you’re not using it all the time — you can get a consumer-grade gun — plastic and no frills. They range up to $25, and there are even pneumatic ones for the air tool lovers out there. One with a piercing tool and tip cutter is convenient.
Little red nozzle caps: These little red caps are great for preserving open tubes of caulk and glue.
Newborn Caulk Buddy: Great little item for tooling a silicone caulk seam. Buy it separately or with their gun as a kit.
Non-marring scraper: These plastic scrapers, available at Harbor Freight, Amazon.com, and most big box stores, are great for scraping old sealant and other things from surfaces you don’t want to damage.
Utility knife and long-tip awl: If your gun doesn’t have a piercing and cutting tool, you’ll need these. They also make a specific caulk gun cutting and piercing tool — I’ve never owned one, though.
In addition, paper towels or shop rags are important, and some people prefer to use latex gloves to protect their hands. For the common roof sealants, excess can be removed carefully with mineral spirits.
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