Yes You Can: DIY Mobile Home Repair Doesn’t Have to Be That Hard!

I’m no master carpenter, but I guess you could say that I’m pretty handy. I can use a drill and turn screwdrivers, however I’m not really good at looking at a project and knowing what needs to be done or the supplies I need to finish it. Which is why when I decided to tackle some of my own mobile home repair, I was a little unsure of myself. If you think that all this sounds like a recipe for disaster, you’re not alone. I definitely thought I was in over my head in the middle of a few projects and that a catastrophe was right around the corner. 

I had backup, though. The amazing people at Mobile HomeParts Store always knew exactly what I needed. Just last month, I decided that my place needed a new bathtub. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was going to need to do it, but I knew that I wanted it done. I called their customer service number and explained what I was trying to do. The person at the other end asked me a few questions on how big the project was going to be, what I already had, the condition of the plumbing, what kind of tub I wanted, and if I was also replacing the faucet and showerhead.

Next he started recommending the things I needed. We found that with the measurements I had in my bathroom, I could fit something called a Garden Tub. I hadn’t really planned on replacing the showerhead and faucet, but he suggested I go ahead anyway considering that this past fall I had replaced the one on the sink with something a bit more contemporary. He even recommended a few guides to get to make sure the project went along smoothly. And you know what? It did. I feel more like a mobile home repair expert now than I ever have before. They’ve got some really good people over there. You should consider making them your backup, too.

Easy Galvanized Mobile Home Skirting!

The years of using sheets of corrugated galvanized metal as the predominant material for mobile home skirting are mostly over. While the typical colorless gray of bare steel can still be a trendy design style for some homes, it provides absolutely no insulation benefits and can be very loud during inclement weather when used on its own. However, it can still be used with a backing of insulated skirting or as a second layer over your existing skirting. This way, you retain all the benefits of insulation and quiet that comes with traditional skirting with the trendy design and durability of galvanized metal.

Installing metal mobile home skirting and insulating it separately is a little different than installing it over pre-existing skirting. Before you begin make sure you have all of the materials and tools in the list below ready. You don’t want to be running back and forth trying to track things down at the home improvement store or waiting on UPS to deliver your packages from MobileHomePartsStore.com.

Needed Items:

• Corrugated Metal Sheet 
• Self-tapping screws
• Rubber-backed washers
• J-channel top track
• Corner channel
• Treated 2x4
• Wooden stakes
• 3.5in galvanized screws
• Vents
• Pea-gravel

Instructions

1. Installing the top edge

At the top edge, the J-channel will hold the mobile home skirting and secure it to the house. Most people will simply secure it to the side of the house using the bottom edge of the outside wall as a guide. However, since mobile homes don’t always sit exactly level, you’ll want to use a yardstick, a carpenter’s level, and a chalk line and make a line all the way around at the same height.

2. Preparing the lower edge

Once the top channel is installed, hang a plumb line at each corner and mark the corner with a stake or nail exactly at the point where the plumb-bob rests. Next, run a line around all of the corner markers to establish your homes footprint. Once you have the line run, clear all rocks and debris a few inches from both sides of the line.

3. Building the bottom rail

Unlike newer styles, basic mobile home skirting like this requires that you build your own support at the ground. This way the skirting won’t get bent or blown around by the wind.

Inside the line that you ran for your home’s footprint, lay down a rail of 2x4’s on edge. Check again to make sure the ground is adequately cleared. Behind the 2x4’s, drive wooden stakes into the ground about every 3 to 4 feet. Once all the stakes are in the ground, raise each 2x4 rail up about an inch and secure it to the stakes that are behind it using the 3.5in galvanized screws. In front of your new ground rail, dig a 5-6 inch deep trench and fill it half-way with gravel. Make sure that the trench you dig is not too close to the rail otherwise the integrity of the ground it is staked into could be compromised.

4. Installing the skirting

Next, cut the pieces of metal skirting to the correct length and fit them between the J-channel and the top of the pea-gravel in the trench. Secure it to the bottom rail with self-tapping screws and rubber-backed washers. Use at least two screws on the seams between pieces of your new mobile home skirting. Seams should be layered. In the corners, use corner channel to finish the edges.

5. Adding insulation

If you didn’t install your mobile home skirting on top of existing material, now is when you’ll need to install an insulating layer. It’ll keep the summer head and biting winter cold out from underneath your home which will help keep the inside comfortable and keep your energy costs down. It’ll also help make the space under your home a better place to store things like outdoor furniture, garden tools, or sleds for the kids.

The easiest way to add insulation is to cut foam insulation board to fit precisely behind it. Once it’s cut, glue the foam to the back of the metal to keep it in place. You also have the option of using expanding foam sprayed to the back of the skirting. Sprayed foam can be much more efficient because you can get better coverage which leads to better efficiency. However, it makes it much harder to change the style of your mobile home skirting once it is sprayed in place.

6. Adding vents and access doors

Depending on your local building codes, you’ll be required to add a certain number of access doors and vents to the skirting. Typically, you’ll need at least one door on each side and they should be located so it’s convenient to get to utilities like gas and water shut off valves. You’ll also need at least one vent for every 150 sq. ft. of floor space as a baseline. If your vents have louvers or screens – and they should – you’ll need to increase your vent area by 30 to 50%.

7. The final details

Now that your skirting is installed with doors and vents, you can fill up the pea-gravel trench. This will give the bottom of the skirting somewhere to go if the ground ever swells. Also, if you live in an area with harsh winters, you’ll probably want to avoid screwing the skirting to the house at the upper J-channel and instead leave a little extra space above the skirting to allow for some vertical movement.

Using Peel and Seal to repair your EPDM mobile home roof the right way

For the low-slope EPDM roof of most mobile homes, the best way to repair damage or a leak is with the Peel and Seal self-stick laminatesystem. It’s really the only material you need when you’re repairing your roof and it can be used to do everything from sealing flashing around the edge of the roof to using a narrower role of it to seal your gutters. Peel and Seal is by far the easiest material to use when repairing your mobile home roof.

The best place to find Peel and Seal is at MobileHomePartsStore.com. They carry it in narrow widths of 4 and 6in for use in sealing seams, repairing small holes or tears, or even sealing around vent pipes or flashing. There is also the 12 and 18in width rolls for larger repairs, or you can step up to the full-width 36in wide roll that is perfect for major repairs or for fully sealing your low-slope roof. However, no matter the size of roll that you use, installation remains as easy as ever.

There are only a few items you need when installing Peel and Seal. First, you need Weatherbond primer, a mop to spread it, a utility knife for cutting space for vents, and a seam roller to make sure the edges are sealed and that no wind or water can get under your roof’s new skin. The Peel and Seal material doesn’t just repair and seal your roof, though. It also exceeds the EPA Energy Star guidelines for roofing material. It has an aluminum surface, which comes in either natural finish or with a white coating that reflects the harsh sun away from your roof and helps your home stay more comfortable and energy-efficient. It keeps the drips out while it saves you money on heating and cooling!

The ease of Peel and Seal doesn’t mean that the first time a storm comes along it’s going to blow right off, though. Peel and Seal has been laboratory wind-tunnel tested in conditions that simulate 100mph winds with 8in of rain per hour. They’re so confident in the system that all Peel and Seal products carry a 10yr manufacturer’s warranty.

If you’ve got a pesky leak on your mobile home’s roof, it’s never been easier to seal it up. Use Peal and Seal and save yourself some money!

Get All Your Mobile Home Supplies at MobileHomePartsStore.com

If you’re renovating an older mobile home or completely outfitting a brand new one, you’re going to need specific mobile home supplies. There is really only one place you should be shopping to get what you need for any project you can think of – MobileHomePartsStore.com. Before you begin your project, check out their Building Supplies category where you can find all the general mobile home supplies to repair roofing, replace siding and skirting, or anything else for the exterior of your home. Plus, there you can find all the cleaning products you’ll need once you finish and it’s time to tidy up and get things sparkling.

Now, since you’re a homeowner, I don’t need to tell you that keeping up on your mobile home is more than just making the outside look good and cleaning. If your foundation needs a bit of attention – or if you recently moved – take a look at the Set-Up Supplies category where you’ll find anchors, pads, piers, and tie-downs to keep your home secure and planted. Or, if you’re looking for more permanent homesteading, they also have add-on accessories for your home like fiberglass steps, carport canopies, and complete patio rooms.

But at MobileHomePartsStore.com you can go beyond mobile home supplies that are just for the appearance of your home. If you’re going to be working on any of the functional systems of your home, they can get you those too. You can update or replace any part of your electrical system from circuit breakers and switches, all the way to electrical receptacles. Or go a bit further and clean or totally replace your HVAC system. You can get filters and ducting and even entire Coleman furnaces or Nordyne air-conditioners delivered right to your door! They’ve even got your back on tricky plumbing projects, too. They have all the name-brand faucets and replacement parts to completely refurbish your bathroom. But, if you need something bigger in the bathroom like a bathtub, shower, or sink, they have that, too – and yes, they can deliver those.

Whatever your need, Mobile Home Parts Store has the mobile home supplies to finish the job.

How we got our new Coleman Furnace

My family and I were taking a vacation in our RV over Christmas break. We love to explore in the winter in our RV—seeing nature in the snow is priceless, and even though it’s a little bit more difficult to find RV parks that will accept us, the views are totally worth it. The only problem is that we were planning to leave on a Thursday, and then when my dad did his check of the RV on Tuesday, he realized that the Coleman furnace wasn’t working. Usually, we aren’t too picky and think that it’s much easier to just tough out the cold, but we knew that it was going to get dangerously cold in the sections of the reserve we would be in. We weren’t ready to deal with frostbite.

We called our local maintenance shop, but they said they wouldn’t be able to get the part we needed in time for us to go on our trip. My dad has had some experience repairing HVAC units and thought that he might be able to do the repair on the Coleman furnace himself. So, we began looking online for places that sold Coleman furnaces and parts just like our old one. That’s where we came up with MobileHomePartsStore.com. They had the parts we needed and brand new furnaces for a low price. We decided that the best course of action to take would be to completely replace the furnace. This repair would be one in a long string of repairs to come before the furnace failed completely. It would be more cost effective to just invest in a new furnace now than to do major repairs for the next two years and then invest in a new furnace. Coleman furnaces were even a part of a special deal of the day on MobileHomePartsStore.com, so we didn’t spend anywhere close to the original price of the furnace. Because we ordered our furnace early in the day, we were able to get it shipped to our home right away. Then, my dad and uncle worked all day to install it. We were so thankful we decided to get a new one—the temperatures dropped below zero, and we were toasty warm in our RV.

We will definitely use MobileHomePartsStore.com again if we need to buy anything for our RV. They were so great about getting us our Coleman furnace in time for us to leave for vacation that we know they will also help us with any and all of our other RV needs. Thank you MobileHomePartsStore.com!

My Mobile Home Furnace Went Out and I Still Saved Some Money

Last week, my mobile home furnace went out on me and the family. It was perfect timing, too. I mean, it’s never perfect timing, but it was as good a time as any for it to break down. The weather just started to break and the day that the furnace kicked the bucket was the first day in months that it even got above 65 degrees. I know, I know, I shoulda had it checked out before winter hit, but I got lucky and didn’t have a catastrophic problem while it was cold.

I had a guy come out and look at it. Apparently one of the bearings or something seized up on the blower. He said he could replace the whole blower unit assembly, but with the age of my furnace, finding the right part would be tough. Even if I did find it, my current mobile home furnace would probably cost me more in the long run just on extra energy costs. Plus he said my air-conditioning coil had a fair bit of corrosion on it and it would be a good idea to replace that, too. That sealed it for me. With all the money I’d have to put into getting the furnace back up and running, the old unit would still only last me maybe another 5 years and cost that much more to run, too. So why not get a new, more energy-efficient unit that will last much longer?

Well, I didn’t have a good reason. He told me I could save a few bucks if I ordered the furnace and coil myself. He gave me the specs and I went to look for the best deal. Pretty quick, I discovered that MobileHomepartsStore.com was by far the best deal out there. I ordered a Revolv furnace and had it delivered to my home along with the coil. While I was shopping online I thought about a few other projects that I should tackle, like the fixtures in the bathroom, and thought that with the money I was saving, I should probably order those, too. The furnace man came back and unpacked my new furnace and had it installed in a day. While he did that, I worked in the bathroom on the faucet and other fixtures. I don’t think that guy gets a commission from MobileHomePartsStore.com, but maybe he should. I’ll definitely be shopping there again.

Let the Springtime Sun in with New Mobile Home Windows!

It finally is starting to look more like spring outside, which means it’s the perfect time of year to replace your old drafty mobile home windows without letting the snow and ice inside! Even if your old mobile home windows aren’t drafty, they’re still probably not insulating your as well as they could be. Newer vinyl windows from Kinro are much more energy efficient. But what’s the big deal about energy efficiency? The answer is money. New mobile home windows will keep the inside of your home warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. That means your furnace and air-conditioner won’t have to work as hard to keep your home comfortable, and that will save you money. Just think: a poorly insulated window in the winter is no better than a big hole in the side of your house letting all that warm air out. It’s practically leaking coins! In the summer, old windows will let all the heat from the sun which completely negates your air-conditioning! Now you could just pull your windows out and patch the holes and live in a box. But what fun would that be? No sunlight, no way to let fresh breeze in, and no way to see outside. You have to have windows so why not get the best windows you can?

Windows don’t just have an effect on the inside of your home. The right mobile home windows can put the finishing touch on the outside looks of your home and compliment your unique style. A new set of mobile home windows is one of the most important improvements you can make to your home, inside and out.

The best place to get your new mobile home windows is MobileHomePartsStore.com. Their selection of windows is unmatched, and they carry everything from vinyl windows to aluminum windows, and even self-storing storm windows. They also have a large selection of accessories to complete your window installation including screens, blinds in all sizes, and all the hardware you might need. If you need any sort of rare or replacement part, it’s really easy to speak with one of their staff members and get the piece you need. If they don’t have it, they know where to find it.

So now that it’s spring, make sure you home stays energy efficient with a new set of mobile home windows. It’s important and you’ll thank yourself when it gets cold again.