# RV Service RV service here means the systems inside the coach: 12 volt and 120 volt electrical, generator, solar and lithium, plumbing and tanks, water heater, furnace, air conditioning and appliances. Mechanical and electrical labour is posted at $260 an hour. ## Systems, not the chassis This shop services what makes a coach habitable rather than what makes it move. Electrical, generator, plumbing, heating, cooling and appliances are all in scope. Engine, transmission and drivetrain rebuilds are not, and neither are DOT inspections or emissions testing. That boundary is worth stating plainly, because "RV service" is used to mean both things and being sent away after driving up from Laguna Niguel is a wasted morning. ## Why diagnostics is charged and credited An intermittent 12 volt fault can take an hour to find and ten minutes to fix. Charging for the finding rather than burying it in the fix is how the work stays honest, and the diagnostic hour is credited against an authorised repair, so it costs nothing if you proceed. The alternative, quoting a repair before the fault is located, means either padding the quote or discovering the real problem halfway through. Neither serves you. ## Lithium and solar changed what a service visit involves A coach with a lithium house bank, an MPPT controller and an inverter charger is a different electrical system from one with two AGM batteries and a converter. Fault finding on it needs the system understood as a whole, because a symptom at the inverter often originates at the battery management system. It also changes the insurance conversation. An aftermarket power system is only covered as well as it is documented, and documenting it before a loss is far easier than reconstructing its value after one. ## Seasonal work in a climate with no freeze Winterisation matters less here than in most of the country, but reactivation after a coach has sat still matters more. Rodent damage to wiring, dried seals, a generator that has not been exercised and a water system that has been stagnant are the common findings at spring reactivation. ## Telling which system has actually failed Systems in a coach share power, share water and share a chassis, so a fault in one presents as a symptom in another. A refrigerator that stops cooling on battery is usually not a refrigerator fault. A water pump that cycles constantly is often a fitting somewhere else. A generator that starts and drops out is frequently a fuel pickup rather than a generator. The sorting question is whether the symptom changes with the power source. Anything that behaves differently on shore power, on battery and on generator is an electrical problem regardless of which appliance is complaining. Anything that behaves identically on all three is a fault in the appliance itself. That single test removes most of the guesswork before a meter comes out. - Works on shore power, fails on battery: house bank, converter or a connection - Works on battery, fails on shore: transfer switch, pedestal or a breaker - Fails on all three: the appliance or its own supply - Intermittent and heat related: a connection rather than a component - Several unrelated things failing at once: a shared ground or a chassis connection ## Repairing an appliance against replacing it Absorption refrigerators are the clearest case. A cooling unit that has failed on an older unit frequently costs more to rebuild than a replacement fridge, and the replacement is more efficient and less prone to the same failure. Air conditioners are similar once a compressor is involved. Water heaters and furnaces usually go the other way, because the failed part is a valve, a board or an element rather than the whole appliance. Ask what fraction of a new unit the repair represents and what the failed part tells you about the rest. A twelve year old appliance with one dead board is a repair. A twelve year old appliance with a dead board, a corroded burner and a rusted cabinet is a replacement being paid for one part at a time. ## Faults that can wait against faults that cannot LP is the category that never waits. A smell of gas, a detector that alarms, or a burner that lights unevenly is a stop everything problem, and a coach with a suspected leak should not be slept in. Electrical faults that involve heat, a smell of hot plastic or a breaker that trips under normal load are the same category. Most other things can be scheduled. A fridge that has stopped cooling, an awning motor that has quit, a generator that will not start: none of these are safe or unsafe, they are inconvenient, and inconvenient work is best combined into one visit rather than driven up for individually. Owners who keep a running list and bring the coach once are ahead of owners who come three times. ## What to do before a systems visit Run everything the day before and write down what happened. A fault that only appears after twenty minutes, or only when two things are on together, is enormously easier to find when somebody has already noticed the pattern. Bring the coach with the house bank charged, because a flat battery masks half the symptoms it does not cause. Bring the paperwork for anything installed after the coach left the factory. An aftermarket inverter, a solar controller or a lithium bank fitted by somebody else is a system with no documentation on this site or anywhere else, and an hour spent reverse engineering it is an hour billed at the diagnostic rate for no benefit to you. ## Questions ### Is there bay space this month for a unit that still drives? Usually, and a drivable unit is the easy case. Bay allocation depends less on the calendar than on height and length: a 40 foot diesel pusher with slides needs a bay that can open them, and those free up in blocks. Call (949) 799-3387 with length, height and whether it tows anything, and you will get a real week rather than a hopeful one. Authorisation, not scheduling, is what usually sets the start date. ### Do you offer rush or priority handling on a repair? Sequence can be changed. Physics cannot. Ordering parts before teardown finishes, running paint prep against structural cure time, and booking calibration ahead of reassembly all pull days out of a schedule. What does not compress: a supplement waiting on an adjuster, a discontinued part being sourced, and cure and flash times between coats. We will tell you which category your delay sits in rather than quoting a date we cannot hold. --- Source: https://ocrv.guru/rv-service/ OCRV Center, 23281 La Palma Ave, Yorba Linda, CA 92887. (949) 799-3387. Serving Laguna Niguel, California. All work performed in shop. No mobile or roadside service. Licences: California Bureau of Automotive Repair ARD00288521; EPA CAL000367879. Published ranges are ranges, not quotes. Every figure traces to https://ocrv.guru/prices/.