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headliner zippers

lschill

Member I
I need help to free up some zippers in the headliners. I have sprayed anti corrosion stuff and let them sit and tried to pull with pliers but to no avail. I am scared I will tear the vinyl or break the zipper. Help.........
 

Loren Beach

O34 - Portland, OR
Senior Moderator
Blogs Author
"aluminum vs. sea air" -- the Air wins...

See the small "search" icon, upper right part of screen?
Type in "zipper" and enter. Others have commented on this problem. Ericson, among other builders, used vinyl headliners with zippers for access to backing plates, etc.
Problem seems to be that the zipper pulls were painted aluminum and they corrode to worthlessness if not sprayed every year with silicon.
I have several that had jammed/corroded permanently, on our '88 model.
Fixing them is on my list of projects, for one of these years.....
Try not (!) to destroy the zipper track when you remove the remnants of the old pulls.
What I would like to find is some sort of liquid that would dissolve the alum. oxide that jams them inside.... (without dissolving me or the headliner!)

Best,
Loren in PDX
 

Geoff Johnson

Fellow Ericson Owner
It's a bad situation and I, fortunately, have encountered this only with my cushions. My fix was to cut the zipper pull off with a Dremel tool (cutting it in half longitudinally and being careful not to damage the zipper) and then pulling the zipper apart (I assume you have nylon coil zippers) and unsewing the other end of the zipper enough to be able to thread on a new (stainless, not aluminum) pull. Getting the new pull on was painstaking and I would not want to have to do it overhead on a liner.

That's all I can offer. Good luck.
 
Last edited:

footrope

Contributing Partner
Blogs Author
Try WD-40 or Break Free

Probably too late for you, but maybe others can benefit.

Recently I've had to free several nylon zippers with corroded aluminum slides and pulls. They were on diving equipment bags that had been unused for years. The first ones were large and we managed not to pull apart the floppy thing from the slide. It took patience, so as not to tear it off, and we even gave up for a week or two while it soaked. Next time, and using more lube (Break Free), it worked. It might help to grab the slide piece, not the floppy handle, with pliers. We were scared it would tear, but this time it didn't.

Next time was with much smaller zippers, and even though we did pull one handle off, we were able to grab the slide and eventually make it work. WD-40 was used here.

Break Free was distributed by Duracell and the can we have is 15 years old, at least.
 
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