5th wheel help

[jelag]

I pieced up a piece of scrap 1/2 plate about 6" wide x 14" long and I cut 2 square holes in it... and welded a piece of 3/8 wall tube down, with a pin hole for the B&W hitch and on the other end of the plate I have a piece of the same tube welded up... I caped the tube and drilled and tapped the hole to pull the Companion down to the bed. . We must have maybe 12-14K miles on the adapter now... we have no problems with our dually... .

On my next day off as a volunteer here at Bonneville Dam Fish Hatchery I'll take a few photos and post them... On the Towing RV thread...

 

[CharlesHoward]

Yikes, so many Fifth Wheel to Gooseneck adapters are manaufactured and sold without any epidemic of reported frame failures.

Almost every trailer frame/pinbox failure reported is with a standard Fiver Hitch. Apparently poorly built/welded "random" manufacturer problems are to blame.

Even Lippert now makes a Gooseneck Pinbox!

The solid construction/heavy steel and attachment to the Fiver kingpin just transfers the forces to the pin and truckbed like any hitch would.

I've towed 12K Fiver plus since 07 with a STAR PERFORMANCE Kingpin Adapter (Gooseneck adapter) that includes a GLIDER Motion that is probabaly at least as effective (if not more so) as the best Fiver hitches at alleviating stress. And most Adapters sold are just solid connections without noticable problem reports.

Good Luck!

 

[HBarlow]

Few owners are going to come here and tell us that they experienced a frame failure due to converting their standard fifthwheel kingpin to a gooseneck and the frame manufacturers and trailer manufacturers are certainly not going to so it is not surprising to me that we have not heard of an "epidemic" of frame failures but there are certainly many known of.

 

[MegaJeff]

Harvey... . I have heard none of this except for the thread here. When I Google the GN adapters, most of the responses are "Love em and been using them for years". You would think there would be some type of warning out there or something with regard to their use. Not saying your point isn't valid at all. I very well could be buying trouble.
I think that my old 5th wheel hitch put a lot of stress on the pin box because of it's torsional rigidity. Yeah, it did rock a little side to side but not much. The gooseneck allows much more movement side to side which would seem to be easier on the connection point. Just my thought.

 

[HBarlow]

Jeff,

If we pause a moment and think about it we all know that altering the frame on our fifthwheel would almost certainly void the warranty. Extending a gooseneck adapter a foot or more below the kingpin is like using a long cheater bar to break loose a stubborn bolt. It creates tremendous leverage which can be measured as stress on frame members.

When I bought my C&C in early '08 and had a flat bed with a gooseneck pocket installed I considered adding a gooseneck adapter to my HitchHiker fifthwheel so I could remove the fifthwheel and have a clean flatbed deck.

The very first thing I did was pick up the phone and call NuWa and ask to speak with an engineer. A typically helpful NuWa engineer took my call and we discussed the issue. He promised to research and get back to me. He called the next day and told me that NuWa (HitchHiker) considered the Young's Frame under my fiver capable of handling the added stress but Demco, the manufacturer of the Glide Ride kingpin box would void the warranty because of the added stress the leverage of a kingpin adapter would create.

I decided against it and recently, after owning and using a 14k gooseneck dump trailer, I decided to convert the gooseneck trailer to fifthwheel kingpin instead of my HH fiver to gooseneck. I installed the fifthwheel adapter on my dump trailer this morning. Haven't towed with it yet.

Edit:

Forgot to add this: I believe if you google RV frame failures or review threads on RVNet, the RVer website, you'll find complaints of lots of frame failures. Try Lippert or Montana fifthwheel frame failures. It is widely known that lots of Lippert frames have failed including lots of Montana fivers.

 

[CharlesHoward]

Its hard for me to believe that if many Adapter users had failures, they would not want to blame the Adapter manufacturer or even offer actual advice about their failure for the many times this subject comes up. Not once that I have seen.

This includes my research prior to 07 purchase and subsequent decision to use the STAR PERFORMANCE adapter.

My trailer has survived getting STUCK twice, and once that including me pushing on the trailer via the adapter AND another truck pulling the trailer via a chain on the axle. That was in 2009.

Also, its very seldom that we're in a Campground and there is not at least one (or more) other Fiver with an adapter. But I've never seen another STAR PERFORMANCE adapter in my travels.

 

[B.G. Smith]

100_2740 | Flickr - Photo Sharing! If the pin box is moving an inch you are probably headed for trouble. bg

 

[HBarlow]

Its hard for me to believe that if many Adapter users had failures, they would not want to blame the Adapter manufacturer or even offer actual advice about their failure for the many times this subject comes up. Not once that I have seen.
This includes my research prior to 07 purchase and subsequent decision to use the STAR PERFORMANCE adapter.
My trailer has survived getting STUCK twice, and once that including me pushing on the trailer via the adapter AND another truck pulling the trailer via a chain on the axle. That was in 2009.
Also, its very seldom that we're in a Campground and there is not at least one (or more) other Fiver with an adapter. But I've never seen another STAR PERFORMANCE adapter in my travels.

You are clearly one who refuses to believe the valid evidence of frame damage caused by fifthwheel to gooseneck adapters that is widely available.

That's okay. It's your trailer and your choice. If you need to bury your head in the sand to avoid the truth that's up to you. I have no need to argue with you.

My interest in this discussion and ones like it is not to persuade the person who has already made up his mind and committed to something like this but the objective, curious reader who may be considering it. He should hear "the rest of the story. "

 

[MegaJeff]

I recognize the fact I am no engineer, but I still don't understand the "cheater bar" example if the trailer is not any farther from the truck than it was before. The actual distance from the pinbox to the bed is the same as with my 5er hitch. Yeah, I undertand the method of attachment is different but why would the leverage factor change if the "lever" so to speak is the same length? I seek to understand... not to prove a point because I may very well be wrong. That's why I ask.

 

[HBarlow]

Jeff,

The horizontal distance is not the problem.

The vertical distance from the collar in the factory kingpin to the new coupling point inside the goosenecks extension becomes the lever twisting the front section of the frame. That lever is approximately 24" long. The force exerted by that lever is multiplied hundreds of times by the stopping and starting forces the truck exerts on the lever.

Think of it as socket on a big nut extending out toward you when you walk back to the trailer and stand facing it. Think of the kingpin to gooseneck adapter as the 24" bar with a 1 1/2" socket you use to twist that nut off the bolt.

The force even you or I can exert on a 24" bar is significant but nothing compared to the force generated when the truck accelerates strong from a dead stop or the jerk it applies when you shift into drive or release the clutch a bit too hard.

 

[CharlesHoward]

Please point me to the widely available valid evidence that Gooseneck adapters cause frame failures anymore often or even more than rarely.

And why doesn't someone sue Trailer Life for featuring them (of their advertizers adapters) a few years ago, Camping World for promoting them in ads as a reseller and installing them, and the many manufacturers who make them.



I studied Statics, Dynamics, and strength of materials long ago, but not welding or trailer frame construction. However, what is the functional/structural difference between a traditional Gooseneck adapter and the newly introduced Lippert Gooseneck Pinbox?



I bet adapters cause a lot fewer failures than RV Refrigerators catching on fire...

I wish my friend who has an adapter with a long extension to the ball for his shortbed truck and has towed his Montana trailer all over the country would get his head out of the sand along with my other acquaintace who's towed his Jayco Designer since new in 2005 with a Colibert Adapter!