Black streaks? What am I talking about?
Black streaks are the result of the runoff from the RV roof of rain and the collected crud on the roof that comes with it. This mixture bathes the sides leaving behind a residue that seems to embed itself into the paint or other surface material. This residue is worst at the top of the sides but if allowed to continue without maintenance, they will extend down the whole side of the RV. Once on, these streaks are seemingly impossible to remove.
There are many remedies out there that all claim to be the ultimate solution to the nasty black material that embeds itself into the sidewalls of your shiny RV. Nothing I have found except the strongest (and undesirable) of chemicals seems to do the job.
Today I was reading a post from an RV forum I regularly read from a (gone crazy from the black streaks like me?) poster asking for a solution. The post reminded me that indeed there was at least a partial solution, one that brought me back to sanity and another RV Thing That Works for me.
I have owned several different RVs and like most other RVers, finding the solution to the black streak dilemma haunted me on all my them... There was nothing I tried that worked with the exception Castrol Super Clean. From my personal experience, you DO NOT want to use this stuff on your RV. Though it works, it is tough on decals, paint and most anything it comes in contact with. Super Clean is a good product but I do not recommend it for this use.
In searches on the Internet I found a different way to attack the problem. The key it seems is to avoid getting the streaks in the first place. Let me explain.
The idea is to keep the runoff away from the vertical surfaces on your rig. There are two products that I found at two different price points and they both have merits, but I have to say that, for the sidewalls, there is only one product that merits an RV Things That Work mention. First I tried a product that added a small flexible gutter to the side of the RV but I found that this gutter was not large enough to catch and carry away the amount of water that comes off the roof. On my rig, the material was not wide enough to catch a lot of the water coming off the roof. I did find the this small gutter was helpful over the windshield RV as gutter at the top of my windshield, kind of an eyebrow gutter.
The battle continued.
I was willing to try anything at this point and I took a gamble on RainKap, a product that guaranteed success. I think they all promise magic, don't they??Most RVs have a approximately one inch wide aluminum trim piece with a vinyl insert that trims of the roof material to the sidewall. The way that RainKap works is that it gets inserted in place of the original vinyl insert. RainKap is an about 2 inch, downward angled, stiff rubber material that sends the water coming off the roof away from the RV side. I was skeptical, but to that point I was losing the battle against the dreaded black streaks.
Not all RVs have this type of molding at the top so this solution will not work on all rigs. Also it is not a perfect solution. You cannot install RainKap where there is something blocking the molding that it would mount to such as an awning. That means that where the RainKap ends at this obstruction, there will still be some black streaking. But overall RainKap seems to do what the company says it will do... it mostly keeps black streaks from happening at all.Though in my view it is a little pricey, it is very much worth the price you pay. I have yet to find a better way for dealing with the maddening black streaks and for that reason it is another of my RV Things That Work and I am a saner man for it!
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