We had one day a few weeks ago with a crazy rainfall. After the vent leak last year that damaged my bulkhead wall, I decided to check out the trailer for water leaks. To my disappointment, I found a lot of water on the floor just inside the door. After examining the door gasket, I found it had lots of cracks and was pretty dried out. I had replaced this gasket about five years ago. Hoping this was the source of my leak, I ordered replacement gaskets.

First job was to remove the old gasket and clean the area. I used a putty knife for the big stuff, and a dremel with a sanding disk. It worked pretty quickly and did a good job getting the area prepped.

The next step is to do a final wipe down with isopropyl alcohol. This removes any residue and preps the area for the best possible adhesion.

One particular issue with my door is that it’s bent just enough that any gaskets will not seal the door completely. The left side of the door has less of a gap than the right side. Over the years I tried all kinds of methods to fix this problem. I tried the 2×4 in the door trick, I even removed the door completely and cut a curved jig for the door and applied pressure to restore the original shape. In the end nothing worked. So I dealt with the problem by adding an extra gasket on the right side to make up for the extra gap. In the photo you may notice a white, ya I know, white gasket on the door first. The home center didn’t have black. I applied the standard door gasket to the filler gasket.

The trick to installing the gasket is to remember not to stretch it as you apply it to the door. In fact, just the opposite is true. Especially for the curves, you want to slightly compress the gasket it as you apply it so it’s totally relaxed. It’s best to start at the bottom of the door and work you way around. This will make the joint at the bottom. By the way, they seem to know exactly how much to give you. As you can see in the photo, there is not much to spare. If you intend to replace the gaskets on the door-within-a-door, and the inner door jamb, better order two additional gaskets.

In all I like the way it turned out. The door is a little tight to close, but it was before. The gasket appears to be making good contact all around. Now I just have to wait for the next rain.

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