RV Locks can protect your investment
You just purchased your new RV, Motor Home, Fifth Wheel or Camper Trailer; you take it home, put all your stuff in it and start off on your first trip. Now let’s consider the one thing that people forget: the RV locks. All RV’s have an entry door and storage compartments, the bigger the RV the more storage compartments. Now for the problem and how I discovered it.
I recently went looking at motor homes. As the salesman walked us through the lot, we walked in and out of new and used motor homes. We opened the storage compartments and the front entry doors. Somewhere in this process I realized that the salesman was using one key to open all the entry doors and another key to open all the storage compartments. He carried no more than a half dozen keys.
After some research I discovered that most RV manufacturers buy their RV locks from just a few lock manufacturers that specialize in RV locks and locks mechanisms. So, what should you do to make sure that your “House on Wheels” is secure? The first and most important thing is to get the front entry door changed or call a locksmith and get it rekeyed. Next, come up with systems to secure the storage compartments. There could be 10 or more storage doors on some RV’s all having a lock. That’s why I said earlier to come up with a system so you don’t have to carry around a dozen or more keys. Below is a system that you might consider.
Master Key the storage doors. This is where all the doors will have a separate key, but there will be one Master Key that opens all the doors.
- Master Key the left side of the RV and the right side with different master key systems. In this case you will have to carry only two keys.
- Keyed Alike: With this system you can have all the locks open with the same key or you can group doors, such as the left side opens with one key the right side with the other.
The important thing is to come up with a system. I would prefer the Master Key System, this way when you take the RV in for service you could leave the keys for the storage doors that have serviceable items and keep the other securely locked.
I hope that this article starts you thinking of security and RV Locks first instead of last.
For additional information please contact Locking Systems International.
