blinds on an elldis autoquest 370 DGT

[Guest nick dean]

Has anybody had cause to replace blinds / flyscreans with same or similar on their motorhome! advice / cost info etc would be much appreciated. there must be something better out there as have had various problems from new !! all info would be much appreciated especially if replacements did not rattle.?? pleeeeezzzze helpppppp.

[Guest David Powell]

Hello Nick...New blinds c/w their cassettes are surprisingly easy to fit, they come complete with screws and little rawl plugs, the only cutting is to the side pieces to fit the height of the windows, just follow the fitting instructions. Prices I can't remember.I may be wrong but I think your 'van is fitted with the type with the blind in the bottom, and the fly screen in the top, and they clip together. If you travel with them clipped together and clicked down to the bottom, the tension of the recoil springs should not allow any rattle. If both blind and screen reels are at the top, I find that a 3 or 4 inch section of foam tube that goes on 15mm water pipe to stop freezing, slipped over the handle of the blind, stops the two rattling together. I have just done a "rattle run" with my mate in his new van, him driving, me crawling around finding the rattles. He uses an anti-rattle soft self adhesive rubber strip to stop the irritatating noises, works well.

[Guest Derek Uzzell]

It's worth bearing in mind that the window-blinds traditionally fitted to motorhomes were initially designed for the caravan market where on-the-move rattling is irrelevant. Motorcaravan blinds will normally have been manufactured by Seitz (part of the Dometic Group) or Remis, but (based on an earlier forum posting) only the Seitz products will be readily available to the private buyer. As David says, blind-units can be fully cassetted, with an upper flyscreen-roller and lower blind-roller (or vice versa as the position of the rollers can normally be swapped), or half-cassetted with flyscreen- and blind-mechanisms both in the upper section of the unit's frame. I don't know which type of unit Elldis fitted to your Autoquest, but I'd agree with David's assumption that it was likely to have been the fully cassetted version (because these have been historically used on UK designs). If it is this type, then the blind-units are probably Seitz Combi Cassettes that cost from about £70 upwards depending on size. There is a tendency nowadays to move away from a roller for the blind, replacing this with a 'honeycomb' concertina-type screen that slides within the frame. This arrangement is less rattle-prone, but I'm not sure how practical it would be to retrofit such units to your 'van and I think the prices might be prohibitive. My experience is that some blind-units rattle and some don't, but there's no way of knowing which will or won't until the vehicle is driven. So, unless you replaced your blinds with the sliding concertina types, there's a good chance the replacements would rattle as badly as the originals. In your shoes I'd save my money and follow David's advice to clip the blinds together while travelling or invest in some foam or rubber strip.

[Guest Paul W]

Sorry this is not quite on topic, does anyone know a good vfm place to buy the actual blind material. The genuine article seems disproportinatly expensive, when you consider that a domestic 'black out' blind complete with fittings and roller costs from around £15. I just wonder if anyone has found a source before I go down the route of buying complete domestic type blinds to scavenge the material.