Camco 42493 RV Range Hood Vent Replacement Kit, Black

Every RV with a stove has a range hood, and every range hood exhausts through a vent on the exterior sidewall. That little black cover takes a beating. Sun, road spray, tree branches at the campsite, a decade of thermal cycling every time you cook. Eventually the flap cracks off, the housing goes brittle, or the whole thing fades to a chalky gray. When that happens, bugs and weather start finding their way into your galley. This Camco 42493 kit is the fix.

It's a full repair and replacement kit for the exterior range hood vent, not just a face cover. Camco built it to be a near-universal fit, so you don't have to hunt down the exact part number your coach maker used ten years ago. It fits side wall openings anywhere between 10-3/4 inches by 3-7/8 inches and 11 inches by 4-1/8 inches. Measure your existing opening before you order. If your cutout lands in that window, this cover will seat over it.

The part that makes it truly universal is the flange system. You get three mounting flanges of different depths in the box. RV sidewalls aren't all the same thickness, and that's usually where a universal vent fails to fit right. Camco covers a range from 5/8 inch all the way to 1-5/8 inch of wall depth. So whether you've got a thin-skin fiberglass wall or a thicker laminated sidewall, one of the three flanges will let the cover sit flush against the exterior without gaps for wind and water to sneak behind.

Then there's the flap and the scoop. The flap is the spring-loaded damper that stays shut when the fan's off and swings open when you fire up the range hood. That's what keeps insects, dust, and rain out of your ductwork the other 23 hours a day. The scoop directs the exhaust airflow down and away from the wall so grease and cooking odor don't streak up the side of your rig. Both come in the kit. If your old vent lost its flap and you've been living with an open hole, this brings that function back.

Material is polyethylene, which is the right call for an exterior RV part. It flexes instead of cracking in a cold snap, it shrugs off UV better than cheaper plastics, and it won't corrode. The finish is black, which hides road grime and looks clean against most modern coach exteriors. If your current vent is white and you don't mind the color change, black actually tends to weather more gracefully out in the sun.

Installation is straightforward for anyone comfortable with a screwdriver and a caulk gun. Pop the old cover off, clean the old sealant off the sidewall, pick the flange depth that matches your wall, run a bead of RV-grade butyl or self-leveling sealant around the opening, set the cover, and screw it down. Twenty minutes, maybe less if the old one comes off clean. We always recommend fresh sealant on any exterior penetration. That's cheap insurance against a leak down the road. Take a minute to test the flap after it's mounted, too. It should swing freely and fall shut on its own when you let it go.

Who's this for? Any RV, travel trailer, fifth wheel, or motorhome owner whose range hood vent has seen better days. If you cook inside your rig, that fan and its vent do real work pulling steam, smoke, and grease out of the galley, and a broken cover kills the whole system. It's also a smart thing to keep in the parts bin if you full-time or do a lot of boondocking, because a branch strike or a hailstorm can take one of these out with no warning. At this price, having a spare cover, flap, and scoop on the shelf just makes sense.