Hack Your RV Table Drawer with a New Slide

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Hack Your RV Table Drawer with a New Slide

Scott
Trip Date 03/02/2020
Posted On 04/15/2020 16:15:00

Camping | Hacks | RV | Table | Drawer | Slide | Drawer Slide | Broken Drawer Slide | Replacement Drawer Slide

Does this sound like an experience that you have had while traveling in your RV?

"It all started on our most recent RV journey when we were quietly enjoying Florida's warm February weather. After opening the RV's kitchen table drawer, the silence was immediately broken when we heard ball bearings bouncing on the floor. Hmm ... that can't be good! What was it? Over the next couple of days, each time we opened the table drawer, a few more ball bearings were heard bouncing on the floor. Then BAM ... the whole drawer loudly fell to the floor."

The good news is that this is actually a very easy and low cost repair - even if you are not really the do-it-yourself type!

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Purchasing Parts

I quickly realized that I had another project to add to my "after I return home" list. Since I had replaced some drawer slides in the past, I didn't worry too much.

After doing some online research, I decided that I did not want to use RV drawer replacement slides. Why? First, drawer slides designed specifically for an RV cost much more than standard drawer slides. Secondly, RV drawer slides have ball bearing parts and narrow slide pieces that can much more easily come apart.

I shopped for drawer slides commonly available at home stores and quickly realized that the 9.5" length of my current slides was unavailable as it is not a standard length. My first step would need to be to determine the drawer slide length that would actually fit.

I did some detailed measurements of both the drawer and the entire drawer space under the table. I also verified that there was enough depth underneath the table to accommodate standard 12" slide rails. Good news! Standard drawer slides were close enough in length and would fit just fine.

Knowing the length, finding and purchasing the replacement drawer slides from our local home store was quick and easy. I chose the Everbilt brand, but there are several other brands available that all appear to have the same dimensions. The total cost was just barely over $5.00.

Packaging Remnent of New Hardware

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Replacing the Drawer Slides

Since all that I had was time during the shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic, I had plenty available to make the quick repair! Here's the steps that I followed:

Dismantle all of the pieces of the old slides.

Broken Pieces of Old Slide Hardware
Assemble the new slide components on the drawer. (There are actually very few pieces. This kind of hardware uses wheels to easily slide, rather than grease and ball bearings. The best news is that the wheels are secure and durable.)

Attaching the New Drawer Hardware

RV Drawer With New Slide Hardware
Assemble the new slide components on the drawer space below the table in the RV. (I was very lucky as the middle hole already lined up with the hole leftover from the old rail. Since the screw fit tight enough, I used it! No drilling was necessary for the remaining holes as the point of the screws was sufficient to just push into the table wood.)

Attaching the New Drawer Space Hardware
While the measurements seemed close and the drawer did slide in and out okay on the new slide rails, I felt that it was a bit loose. After playing around with it, I also noticed that at certain angles, the drawer would easily come off of the rails and fall. I decided that I needed a small spacer to fill up the 1/8" inch excess gap so that the drawer would fit snugly.
I found some extra nuts in my toolbox that had just the right dimension. I removed the drawer and the slides from the drawer space below the RV table so that I could start over with attaching the rails. I first placed the extra nuts between one of the rails inside the drawer space and the wood. I then used a similar, but slightly longer, screw to screw everything together tightly.

An Extra Spacer is Needed
After repeating this step until all of the screws were in, the drawer now fits properly and slides.

Lessons Learned

As it turns out, due to my reusing the existing screw holes, one of the rails is about 1/16" off of perfect alignment. Although the drawer works, because of this misalignment it doesn't quite click into the closed position correctly. If you decide to replace your drawer slides, keep an eagle eye on your measurements on each side to make sure that they are exact!

When we're traveling and our RV slide is in, the table drawer can't come open more than a few inches due to its distance from our kitchen island. I am hopeful that this will keep it secure enough when bouncing down a bumpy road. If I find out otherwise, I'll need to put a latch on the drawer to secure it in place while we are driving.

RV Hacks

Interested in some other hacks? Check out our article titled, "Fresh Water Mysteriously Missing from RV Water Tank" to for another idea. If you have ever noticed that your fresh water tank loses water when you are on the road, you'll find a great solution!

Share Your RV Hacks

We hope that you found this article helpful and we'd love to hear about more RV hacks. Let us know if you've had a similar issue with your kitchen table as well as how you repaired it. If not, do you have any other favorite RV hacks?