How To Repair Landing Gear On A 5th Wheel Rv

Clunk, Oh Oh!

The rider side landing jack on our Keystone Cougar 5th wheel suffered a major failure concluding week. I was in the procedure of jacking the trailer off the truck when I heard and felt a loud clunk. In fact, my married woman who was inside setting things upwardly immediately looked out the window and ask "What the heck was that?". "Not sure" I replied, but I knew something was not right with the jacks.

I decide to retract them once more and that's when I saw the rider side landing leg was non lifting up! Luckily I was all the same hooked to the truck and so I set to work removing the faulty landing leg to try and decide the issue. Removing the trailers landing leg was pretty direct forward involving undoing just a few bolts, its pes pad and locking pin assembly. In no time I had the whole leg out.

Landing Leg removed

Disassembly and Failure Diagnoses

I thought for certain I would detect a stripped bevel gear or 2 on the acme part of the leg, but to my surprise, they looked in pretty good shape. The culprit had to be the long worm gear mechanism, but I was having a heck of a time disassembling the leg to become at it. I could not for the life of me figure out how to become the beveled gears out so I could next become the worm gear out. Subsequently researching on the internet I found many sites selling beveled gear replacement kits for fifth bicycle jacks. Only, I couldn't find any clear instructions on taking the leg apart. I surmised that a small metal pin needed to exist punched out to get the ball rolling sort of speak.

Taking apart the leg

Sure enough, once I punched out the pivot on the top askew gear and another below the larger lower askew gear, the balance of the mechanism could exist easily taken apart exposing the long worm gear. Turned out the worm gear was in fine shape but the collar nut it ran through was hosed. I could feel with my finger that it barely had whatsoever threading left and I could easily slide the worm gear in and out of it without even turning it.

Stripped Collar Nut

The neckband nut also seemed pretty dry with barely any lube on it. My guess is this is what caused it to wear out. At present that I have had the leg completely apart I come across exactly where it requires routine lubrication. I was doing that at the top where the beveled gears live but not enough was getting all the style down to the collar nut surface area. Live and learn I guess, although it would exist nice if they had a grease nipple down there for easy lubing. Taking it apart only to lube it is kind of a pain.

Landing Leg Gears

Lippert 146059 Venture Lead Landing Gear Leg Repair Kit

Finding the Replacement FW Landing Legs

And then the real bad news was there is basically no like shooting fish in a barrel way to change that neckband nut every bit information technology is stamped in place. I decided the best grade of action was a whole new leg and while I was at it I may as well change out the other side. Who knows how close it may be to failure equally well. I could find absolutely no numbers or markings on the legs. Researching online I found some replacements by a company called Stromberg Carlson. They had a blueprint with all the fundamental measurements and they matched mine exactly.

Leg Dimensions

We stopped in at a nice RV park called Maverick Ranch in Lajitas, Texas, leaving the truck hooked up and I ordered up some new legs from Etrailer.com. I had used them in the past and was very pleased with their parts quality and customer service. They had replacements in stock from Stromberg Carlson priced at $134 each. Swell. They did offer free shipping simply I elected to become for the 3-day shipping for an extra 39 bucks. That really turned into 5 days considering of foul weather for UPS going across Texas, but what can you do, Murphy'due south Law, eh?

New Landing legs from etrailer.com

Installing the New Trailer Landing Legs

The install was a very smooth procedure and everything fit perfect. All I needed was an 60 minutes of time, a few wrenches and a Philips spiral driver. The legs came without the anxiety and locking pins so I had to transfer the old ones over. No biggie though. We were soon OK to disconnect our Cougar trailer again with our shiny new landing legs. Hopefully, this article and the accompanying video volition assist out someone who is fixing their similar fifth wheel landing jacks. If you check out the video, in information technology I testify you all the innards and how they come up apart. I searched the interwebs a fair bit and couldn't detect much instruction on how the heck to go the dang landing leg autonomously. Turns out it is pretty like shooting fish in a barrel once you lot know the sequence. 😉

New landing legs installed