# Collision and Structural > Eight impact and structural services, from a light parking lot scuff through frame straightening and a full rebuild after a major loss. Source: https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural Impact damage on a recreational vehicle behaves nothing like impact damage on a sedan. A motorhome is a truck chassis carrying a laminated house, and those two structures absorb energy on separate curves. Steel rails can walk out of tolerance while the sidewall looks clean, or the rails can survive untouched while the wall shears loose from the floor edge. Sorting which of those happened is the first technical decision in every job on this sheet. The services grouped here are ordered by how deep the damage runs. Minor work resolves at the panel and the fastener line. Major work reaches the cage, the cross members and the mounting points that hold slide rooms and axles in position. Restoration work goes further still and rebuilds sections that no longer exist. Assessment sits alongside all of them because nothing gets quoted honestly until the covers come off. All structural work happens in shop at the Yorba Linda facility under 35,000 square feet of roof. Owners making the roughly twenty mile drive from Eastvale on SR-71 and SR-91 arrive at one building rather than shuttling a coach between a frame yard, a body shop and a refinish booth. Measurement records, fastener maps and color data stay with the vehicle from teardown through final fit. Structural bays, laminate benches and the refinish booth sit under the same roof, so a partly disassembled coach never leaves the property mid repair. ## What separates structural damage from body damage? Body damage stops at the skin. A creased aluminum sheet, a torn filon panel or a cracked end cap is unpleasant to look at and expensive to refinish, but the vehicle still carries load through the same paths it did before the hit. Structural damage changes those paths. Once a frame rail bows, a floor outrigger folds or a sidewall stud pulls its fasteners, the load redistributes through parts that were never designed to carry it. The distinction matters commercially as well as technically. Insurance carriers write body damage from photographs. Structural damage requires measured evidence, which means anchoring the unit, taking reference points against published control dimensions and producing a before sheet the adjuster can read. Skipping that step is how a coach leaves a shop looking correct and comes back a year later with cracked corner seams and a slide room that binds on the outboard edge. - Body damage: skin panels, trim, glass surrounds, cosmetic distortion - Structural damage: rails, outriggers, cross members, sidewall studs, roof bows - Structural jobs require anchoring and measured reference points - Slide rooms, axles and hitch hardware are structural mounting points - A square measurement sheet is the gate before any refinish work starts ## Why chassis type changes the repair plan A Class A coach on a Freightliner or Spartan rail chassis gets repaired like heavy equipment. The rails are deep steel C channel or boxed section, the mounting is bolted or riveted, and pulls happen against anchored towers with measurement taken from the rail web rather than from body reference points. Heat control is the governing constraint, because overworking high strength steel in one area to save a pull elsewhere trades a visible problem for an invisible one. A Sprinter, ProMaster or Transit conversion is the opposite case. The cab structure is unitized sheet metal with adhesive bonded joints and mixed substrate reinforcement, so the correct repair is often sectioning at a manufacturer approved location rather than pulling. Travel trailers and fifth wheels sit in between: a welded steel or aluminum tube cage over a ladder frame, where a hit at the A frame coupler loads the entire forward third of the unit. Because the platforms differ this widely, the shop does not run a single structural procedure. Each job starts by identifying the chassis family, pulling the applicable dimension references, and deciding whether the correct answer is a pull, a section, a partial replacement or a full component swap. That decision drives everything downstream, including how long the vehicle stays. ## Services in this category - [Collision Repair](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/collision-repair): Full impact repair for RVs, vans and trucks, from teardown and measurement through panel work, refinish and final water testing. Range $1,000 to $150,000+, 5 to 800+ hours. - [Minor Collision Repair](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/minor-collision-repair): Low speed impact work on skins, caps, skirts and compartment doors, corrected locally without touching frame or cage structure. Range $1,000 to $9,500, 5 to 40 hours. - [Major Collision Repair](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/major-collision-repair): High energy impact reconstruction: rollovers, severe side hits, rail deformation, destroyed caps and slide openings pulled back to square. Range $9,500 to $150,000+, 40 to 800+ hours. - [Full Collision Restoration](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/full-collision-restoration): Complete rebuild programs after catastrophic loss, staged from structure through envelope, interior, systems and full unit refinish. Range $15,000 to $150,000+, 80 to 800+ hours. - [Frame Straightening](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/frame-straightening): Anchored, measured correction of bent and twisted frames using three axis reference data and controlled hydraulic pulls. Range $3,000 to $20,000+, 12 to 80 hours. - [Chassis Repair and Alignment](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/chassis-repair-and-alignment): Suspension mounting repair and geometry setting so a coach or trailer tracks straight, steers predictably and stops eating tires. Range $750 to $6,500, 3 to 25 hours. - [Subframe Repair](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/subframe-repair): Rebuilding outriggers, cross members, bay framing and mounts, the secondary structure between the body and the main rails. Range $1,500 to $12,000, 8 to 50 hours. - [Structural Damage Assessment](https://ocrv.info/services/collision-and-structural/structural-damage-assessment): A measured, photographed inspection that proves whether structure moved, how far, and what repairing it will actually require. Range $285 to $1,200, 1 to 5 hours. ## Frequently asked questions ### How do I know if my RV needs structural work or just body work? Look for symptoms that are not on the damaged side. Doors that suddenly need a shove, a slide room that scrapes on one corner, gaps that changed width along a seam, or a coach that tracks off center are all signs the load path moved. Cosmetic damage stays local. Structural damage shows up somewhere else on the vehicle, which is why measurement rather than eyeball inspection settles the question. ### Will my insurance company pay for frame measurement? Measurement is a normal line on a structural claim and most carriers write it once damage severity supports it. The practical path is teardown first, measurement second, then a supplement submitted with the measurement sheet attached. Adjusters approve documented dimensional deviation far more readily than a narrative description of it. Bring the claim number and the carrier contact and the shop handles the supplement paperwork directly. ### Can you work on a motorhome that is not driveable? Yes. Non driveable units are common on structural claims and the facility has the door height and bay depth for a full size Class A on a lowboy or a hook. All work is performed in shop at the Yorba Linda location, so the vehicle needs to reach the property, but arriving on a truck is routine. Arrange delivery in advance so a bay and a set of anchor points are available. ### How long does structural repair take on a large coach? Plan in weeks rather than days. Teardown and measurement usually run several days. Pulls, sectioning and component replacement depend on parts, and RV structural parts frequently ship from a single supplier on a long lead. Refinish and reassembly follow. Multi panel structural jobs commonly land in the four to ten week band, and a full rebuild after a severe loss runs longer than that. ### Do you repair commercial trucks and fleet vehicles too, or only RVs? Both. Box trucks, high cube vans, flatbeds, refuse and utility bodies, shuttle buses and municipal units go through the same structural bays as motorhomes. Fleet work tends to run tighter on downtime, so scheduling usually starts with a hard target date and works backward through parts lead time. The scope is body, paint, structural and systems work only. --- OCRV Center. 23281 La Palma Ave, Yorba Linda, CA 92887. (949) 799-3387. info@ocrvcenter.com. Serving Eastvale, California in Riverside County, about 20 miles from the shop. All work is performed in shop at the Yorba Linda facility. No mobile, roadside or on-site service is offered. Scope is body, paint, structural, fiberglass, interior and vehicle systems work. Engine rebuilds, transmission rebuilds, drivetrain work, DOT inspections and emission testing are not performed.