Do you remove the tongue jack wheel?

Salesman: Leave the wheel on, just chock the regular wheels and stabilize it. It's not oing anywhere

Service Guy: Take the wheel off and leave it off basically all the time except when pushing it around your driveway unhitched.

What to you do?

Our TM came without a wheel. The jack shaft was all bent up so I cut off the bad part and I had an old wheel off another trailer that was wrecked. It fit well enough to push the TM onto the back patio. Most of the time it (the wheel) resides in the garage. I never take it on trips. Now I have a new electric jack and it came with a foot instead of a wheel. The old wheel won't fit the new jack - now somewhere in my junk I have another wheel - question is where?

hitch wheel *barely on the garage floor* for me.

When the swing hitch is swung over, I think it's a good idea to avoid the torque (on the frame) which the unbalanced weight of the swing hitch itself. I crank the wheel down enough only to match the weight of the swing hitch itself, not to actually raise the trailer. At home I have the tires almost completely off the ground, and the trailer resting on the leveling lifts.

In camp, I take it completely off-- the trailer is held up by the levelers, and only a little bit by the tires, with no weight at all on the hitch. (Which I leave in the hooked up position, not swung around.) Away from the garage, I do leave the tires with some weight on them-- raised only to about 1/2 above their "fully loaded" riding height.

I think that you're creating "flat" spots in the tires if they're parked in one spot for a long time (with the full load of the trailer on the tires). So, if it's for longer than just one night, I raise the TM so that nearly all the weight is on the levelers, NOT the tires or the front hitch wheel.
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So I'm much closer to Service Guy's recommendation. But yeah, if the wheel isn't bearing weight, you can leave it on there-- as long as it isn't high enough off the ground to loose.

We do not use our wheel. Our driveway is not paved making it impossible to maneuver the TM with the tongue wheel. And our garage has an apron so the tongue wheel is useless when placing the TM in the garage. The wheel is kept in the back bumper (storage) just in case the need arises.

The only time the wheel is completely removed is when I tow it.

When parked in camp or in the garage the wheel is on, but there is no weight on it. I lower the front jacks, but not the rear.

I have thought about removing the weight on the tires by jacking it up, but we take it out about once a month, except December and January, so it doesn't sit all that long in one spot.

...speaking of stabilizers

Not to ambush my own thread, but the ideal of levelling using the stabilizers has me a bit confused. I know the late model TMs have stronger stabilizers, but just how much "out of level" can they support? Full weight indefinitely?I sure like that idea better than monkeying around with stacked leggos under the tires in all but the most out-of-whack campsites.

I have read that they are (or perhaps were) not to be used for any serious leveling, just for motion control in the trailer. Using the tongue jack for fore-aft levelling and stabilizers for port-starboard leveling sound nice. Is it smart?

I seldom use the jack wheel. It doesn't roll too well, especially on anything but smooth concrete. When I have to jockey the unhitched trailer around, I use a "trailer dolly" device. It has two large pneumatic tires and a long handle that makes pushing the trailer around quite a bit easier, especially in tight or confined areas (my driveway!!). If you do make use of the jack wheel, make sure you remove it when towing or you could easily lose it as it rotates on the jacking tube.

Rich_in_Tampa said:

Not to ambush my own thread, but the ideal of levelling using the stabilizers has me a bit confused. I know the late model TMs have stronger stabilizers, but just how much "out of level" can they support? Full weight indefinitely?I sure like that idea better than monkeying around with stacked leggos under the tires in all but the most out-of-whack campsites.

I have read that they are (or perhaps were) not to be used for any serious leveling, just for motion control in the trailer. Using the tongue jack for fore-aft levelling and stabilizers for port-starboard leveling sound nice. Is it smart?

Click to expand...

Rich,

You might find some helpful information in this thread:

http://www.trailmanorowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4806&highlight=leveling

Rich in Tampa: I have read that they are (or perhaps were) not to be used for any serious leveling, just for motion control in the trailer. Using the tongue jack for fore-aft levelling and stabilizers for port-starboard leveling sound nice. Is it smart?
If you have an "older" trailer, say pre-2000, you may not have the real jacks. My 2000 2619 has a scissor jack at each corner (stabilizing capacity 5000 per jack per manufacturer) We drive up on Lynx Blocks to get it close and then run the jacks down with a drill. We use the crank for the final leveling.

commodor47 said:

Rich,

You might find some helpful information in this thread:

http://www.trailmanorowners.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4806&highlight=leveling

Click to expand...

In addition to all that info, I only want to point out that if I set my four corner jacks too tight then the TM sorta sags in the middle and the door doesn't work well. I keep a lot of weight on the tires. However, I chock the tires very tight so that they are unabel to wiggle or roll.