Community Forums

pmaen · 07-11-2019, 11:23 AM

We are planning our first long trip with the Forest River Shamrock 23IKSS. I would like to hear about your experiences where you had to travel and break camp every day. Is it safe to leave the rig hooked up to the truck over night? or should we unhook every time we stop. We will be traveling, stopping and breaking camp for about 7 days straight before we get to a place where we will be camped for about four days straight. We went camping a lot when I was a kid and my dad unhooked every time, even though we were heading out in the morning. I am wondering what kind of damage, strain it would put on the truck, tongue, tires, etc if we stayed hooked up to the trailer overnight. would love to hear from you experienced long trippers.
thanx

1320Fastback · 07-12-2019, 11:55 PM

We did a 5,231 mile round trip a few months ago and when on days where we were just leaving in the morning I would leave our trailer fully hooked up to the truck but use the tongue jack to take some weight off the truck and also level the trailer. Id also drop the two front stabilizers to take the bounce out of the floor.

I cant imagine being hooked up over night will do any damage at all and especially compared to some of the roads you will be driving on!

Motor7 · 07-13-2019, 01:55 PM

I agree, leave it hooked up. If you put any jacks or stabilizers down do yourself a favor and do a thorough walk around before pulling out in the AM. And or clip something on the truck's steering wheel that serves as a reminder to do a walk around. Its real easy to get sidetracked and tear something up especially if you do not have a set routine.

I even do walk around at every gas stop looking for visible problems and touching the wheel hubs for excessive heat. Before leaving a campsite, one walk looking under & below the belt, then another looking up.

horsecollect · 05-18-2020, 07:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pmaen

We are planning our first long trip with the Forest River Shamrock 23IKSS. I would like to hear about your experiences where you had to travel and break camp every day. Is it safe to leave the rig hooked up to the truck over night? or should we unhook every time we stop. We will be traveling, stopping and breaking camp for about 7 days straight before we get to a place where we will be camped for about four days straight. We went camping a lot when I was a kid and my dad unhooked every time, even though we were heading out in the morning. I am wondering what kind of damage, strain it would put on the truck, tongue, tires, etc if we stayed hooked up to the trailer overnight. would love to hear from you experienced long trippers.
thanx

Several years ago we made a 3,000 mi round trip with our Roo. We learned the hard way we could leave the trailer hitched up, but only if the site was level.

A couple of times the camp site wasn't level so we used the tongue jack to level the trailer without noticing how much it pulled up on the hitch ball. Repeated levelings like that and a couple of unexpected thumps from potholes sheared the ball off the hitch and cracked the tow bar!

Luckily we weren't moving fast when that happened.

So, you can stay hitched up as long as you don't raise the rear end of the tow vehicle more than 3" using the tongue jack.

Arch Hoagland · 05-18-2020, 07:51 PM

We've done lot's of trips pulling a trailer years ago.

I'd always leave the truck connected with the exception of the electrical connection between the truck and the trailer.

Didn't want any problems with the truck battery being dead in the morning.