Community Forums

woodburner · 12-12-2010, 02:06 PM

OK; considering getting a motorhome in the not too distant....Am curious as to how far out of level a campsite can be before you can't make it up with the leveling system provided with these coaches.
FWIW; considering an Allegrgo 34TGA or a Fleetwood Pace Arrow. Still looking right now.

GaryKD · 12-12-2010, 02:31 PM

Hi woodburner,
Most HWH jacks have a 13" travel. Some (few) have a 16" travel..

Larry & Rita · 12-12-2010, 02:44 PM

I have had a Pace Arrow for about 10,000 miles and found that the 13" jacks sometimes are to short. I found some scrap 2x8 lumber that was part of a deck one of my neighbors was replacing, he was glad to see me hauling it off.
I cut the lumber in 12 inch lengths and put them in the basement of the coach, with full intention of using them for fires to roast marshmellows, the next time out I got a real junky site, I used the planks for extra 4 to 6 inch lift, and used some to put under the wheels to lift a side. some of the parks require you to use planks to keep the jacks from sinking into the ground.

Larry

Vegasdan · 12-12-2010, 03:11 PM

I recommend you carry some jack pads whether the site is level or not. Keeps you from sinking the jacks into soft ground and then pushing the dirt into your seals when you raise the jacks. If you do that you can count on replacing the seals in short order. I've stayed at quite a few parks this year and most were relatively level. If you do get into one that slopes, it's not a good idea to raise your rear tires off the ground, I have seen fronts off the ground.

WheelingIt · 12-12-2010, 08:12 PM

Agree w the others. We have treated wood blocks for our jacks and levelling blocks for our wheels. Although theoretically it's ok to raise the front wheels off the ground (never the back mind you) I prefer not to do it. And the blocks under the jacks help to prevent sinking. The blocks are easy to carry and have kept us level cross country from private parks to forest and wilderness locations.

RickO · 12-12-2010, 08:33 PM

The question can't really be answered in slope or inches. It depends on a lot of things but my experience is that is I rely on my automatic levelers the site has to be fairly level for it to work properly. However, if I use blocks under the jacks on the low side I get a lot more effective travel out of my jacks. That does sometimes require that the front wheels leave the ground. We haven't found that happening frequently but it does happen. Probably not surprisingly, we found it more in the west than the south or east. We bought two sets of those yellow plastic interlocking jack pad/blocks and will now use those under my front wheels to releave some of the strain on the suspension if the wheels come off the surface.

I think I'm going to change the gear I carry to help level the coach though. The above suggestions about using planks (I'd probably use 2x10) are right on the money. I want to replace my yellow plastic pads with some number of planks cut to sizes between about 12" and maybe 36". I think they serve multiple purposes. It should be easy to use the short ones for jack pads and they can be coupled with the longer ones as a "ramp" to drive the coach up on if I want to work under it. Several members mentioned this method and purpose in a thread recently about how to safely raise your coach to work under it.

Rick

dmason · 12-13-2010, 06:29 AM

Agree with all that has been said and will add one recommendation. Drill a few holes in your wood blocks so when you get ready to leave you can hook them with your awning pull down rod and easily get them out from under your coach. On my HR (three point leveling system) the front leveler is dead center on the front of the coach. Without the hook and holes in the blocks it would be difficult to extract.

az bound · 12-13-2010, 06:30 AM

The longer the moho the more exagerated the grade is. A 20' rig may need 6" of travel to level on certain grade. A 40' would require twice as much on the same grade. Always a good idea to carry some type of material for blocking as others have suggested. I don't like having the front suspension dangling in the air and the front of the coach being supported by two 1 1/2" pegs. It may not hurt anything but I dont want to find out.

woodburner · 12-13-2010, 10:58 AM

Thanks everybody for all the responses!
That was informative and kind of what I expected but wasn't really sure....disappointing considering we like to do a lot of Ohio St. Pks. which usually aren't too level though I'm sure we could find a space if we looked and booked early enough.
Heck; some of our favorite sites are like ski-slopes which are OK and relatively easy to make up with the 5ver but would never consider trying to park a mobile home on them....

**NLOVNIT** · 12-13-2010, 06:53 PM

John,

Yay, how fun you're shopping for a coach. Keep us posted on your hunt.

We had a 30ft Cougar 5-r before we had the Bounder. We've found we could way more easily level the 5-r than the coach on sloped sites. Although, the coach has somewhat of an advantage. Because there's such a long overhang behind our rear tires & as long as there aren't any trees/brush or other obstructions immediately behind a pad, we usually can back the rear tires to practically touching the timber backstops giving us as much of the pad as possible to find level front to back. Side to side can be another issue though.

As you know, when it comes to the OH state parks, you have to take their site descriptions with a grain of salt. Anymore, if I'm not sure the level description really means level, I'll ask Jim (Superslif). He keeps fantastic records on sites & knows which ones will accomodate whose Pond Piggie rigs. Even then, we carry 6 pcs of 2x10x24 for running the tires up on & 6 pcs of 2x10x10 squares for the jacks. I'd say, 9 x out of 10, we get level without the front wheels leaving the ground - although it has been known to happen (i.e. Pymatuning, the OH side).

Also, IMO, staying under a 40ft coach will stand you a better chance of still being able to find compatable sites at the OH state parks.

Lori-

Lakeman1 · 12-13-2010, 07:24 PM

Whats the deal with not lifting the rears?

Purplefans & Harvey · 12-13-2010, 07:30 PM

What about side to side leveling? Our driveway has a tilt. We stored our old Class C, without problem, leveling the left front and rear tires by using wood to raise the tires. Is that a problem with Class A? And when we set it up for our camp in the driveway in the summer, the rear tires need to be raised. Am I causing problems for the MH?

David K · 12-13-2010, 07:50 PM

Lifting the rear wheels off the ground is a brake issue ----- your air brake that you set when parked is for the rear wheels --- if they are off the ground you might have a problem of the MH rolling when you don't want it to.

re leveling one side with wood ramps --- I have the same problem (sloping driveway) and I drive my MH up on 2x12 ramps (4 pieces high) --- two ramps for the dual rears and one ramp for the front. The 2x12's are cut with each piece 6 inches longer than the next piece so you have a gentle ramp to go up.

**NLOVNIT** · 12-13-2010, 07:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pete & Linda

Whats the deal with not lifting the rears?

The parking brake is on the rear & when you lift your tires off the ground there's nothing to stop your coach from rolling backwards if you're on a rearward sloping site. I have seen coaches with blocking behind the front tires when their rears are off the ground, but that's just asking for trouble.

Lori-