Like a lot of Ekko owners, I’ve had issues with the Carefree awning binding while extending and retracting.
Mine has done it for quite a while, but because I rarely use the awning, I never spent much time figuring out what was actually happening.
Once I finally got up on a ladder and watched the mechanism closely, the problem became pretty obvious.
On my awning, the issue was the black plastic wire-management strip for the LED wiring along the rear arm. As the awning moved in and out, that strip was binding against the top edge of the housing.
The fix was simple:
- remove the strip from the top
- relocate it to the side of the arm
- make sure there’s still clearance when the arm folds closed
The important part is placing it on the correct side of the arm. One side folds tightly against the adjacent aluminum extrusion and won’t leave enough clearance. The other side remains angled slightly away from the housing and works correctly.
After moving the strip, the awning now opens and closes smoothly with no binding.
Honestly, once I saw the problem, it immediately became one of those:
“How did I not notice this sooner?”
It also looks pretty clear that the LED wiring solution was added after the original awning design rather than being integrated into the extrusion itself.
Materials Used
- Double-sided tape (Walmart)
