5th wheel landing gear repair

[Roostre]

So, thought I would see if anyone here has repaired a landing gear or had a good source for parts.



Our 5er is a 2007 Weekend Warrior (out of business) that uses Atwood landing gear. The motor is on the drivers side and that leg works fine.



The pins in the crossover tube are good and it does drive the gears on the passenger side. I had my wife operate it while I felt them turning. Does this mean that the main screw inside the leg is stripped/bad??



If so, do we need a whole new landing gear or is there a way to repair it?



Thanks in advance for any input!

 

[RVTRKN]

An RV store here in So. Cal. has parts for the different landing gear, but they get their stuff from a general RV warehouse. I have repaired my own and was able to get the different gears, but they had a collection from many sources over the years. You need to find an RV store in Utah where you live that has been in business for a while and they more than likely will have parts from other sources. I don't know if you can get the parts, I pasted a link, hope this helps.

http://www.atwoodmobile.com/chassis-components/landing-gear.asp

 

[ScottLewis]

First thing to check is the "shear pin" in the inoperative gear. It locks the screw shaft to the gear by fitting into a notch in the underside of the gear. Mine ended up having the top part of the shaft twisted off so I just replaced the entire units with much more robust ones that each have their own motor and drive.

 

[B.G. Smith]

Think you can buy the gears, try this site. bg http://www.americanrvcompany.com/Atwood-Jack-Replacement-Parts_c_389.html

 

[MLee]

Go to http://Etrailer.com and do some checking there. They have some proceedures to find the problem, and also questions that have been asked that might give you your answer. They also have the best prices I have found so far for these parts. E-mail them and they will reply.

 

[HBarlow]

OEM landing gear installed on most fifthwheels is marginal for the loaded weight when new. If you like the trailer, use it a lot at full capacity, and plan to keep it for a few years, you might want to consider replacing the motor gear train on the street side and the driven gear train on the curb side with higher weight rated parts. It'll cost you a little money but you'll probably never have to replace or repair it again.

 

[jelag]

Harvey has a great point. . I've done the gears on 2 5th wheel landing gears... and in both cases found the gears stripped and pin to be in good condition... In my case I was able to find the gears and bought 2 sets... . I also found that I was over retracting the gear or over extending it... . I took the legs and painted a simple strip where the leg intersected with the housing so I know when its either too far retracted or extended ... . and to date have had no more problems. .

 

[wcoomes]

Be careful working on that, just read a post on rv.net within the last month of some guy getting crushed while working on the landing gear.

 

[Roostre]

Thanks for all the great responses! Gives me a better idea what I am up against and where to look for parts.

Biggest issue is the way they mounted the gear on this trailer; it is inside the front storage compartment so its dark and cramped. It almost looks like the leg is welded onto a couple of spacers in there!!! Its going to stink if I have to grind the welds off to remove it for repair.

wcoomes: thanks for the reminder!! I'm big on safety and plan to use some heavy duty jackstands or maybe even hook it up to the truck while its being fixed.

I leave on a short trip with it Thursday, so it will be one-legged for one more weekend. I have been carrying a floor jack to lift and drop the passenger side.

 

[MLee]

Do you think it might be the worm gear thats gone? Replace the whole leg. If its the bevel gears on top they can be done with the gear in place, they are under an inspection cap on top, and have drift pins that hold them in place.

A friend of mine lost his beveled gears and the leg would not retract, he got it up and had to tie it in place to get it home. He to run the landing gears up to tight, this is what broke them. He bought the bevel gears localy and they were expensive.

 

[Roostre]

Well, I finally had time to tear into this today.

After putting it on heavy duty jackstands I removed the pin in the cross-shaft and pushed it back out of the way. Next I loosened the two clamp bolts and the whole assembly came loose. I then had to pull the foot off to get it to drop through the hole in the floor of the cargo bay.

The bushings and gears all looked good, but the bottom gear showed signs that it had been forced up and over the pin that goes through the shaft. It was jammed from being driven too far up, which caused the gear to jump. It's funny that the pin didn't shear; it had some wear marks, but was not damaged.

I pulled the screw shaft out and cleaned it up, then used a drill to run it up and down while lubricating it all. Wanted to get a new pin, but a trip to the local hardware store turned up nothing. Put it all back together and it seems to work well so far. I will be ordering a gear and pin kit to keep handy for the day this happens and the pin is sheared/or the gears are damaged.

As intimidating as the job looked, it wasn't really bad at all.

 

[Roostre]

BTW- for future searchers:

#ad


I had a heck of a time finding a good breakdown showing how it is supposed to go together!!

 

[calex]

5th Wheel landing gear dissection

Thanks so much for the diagram - something that is hard to come by.

I have a question on removing the inner tube of the lead landing gear leg: were you simply able to extend the inner leg to the point that the jack screw came out of the jack-nut? If so, I cannot.

My symptoms were frequent gearbox clutch 'clicking' at many various points in the Lippert landing gear travel. I replaced both legs - problem solved!

In bench-testing the leading leg assembly, many tight spots can be detected when rotating the motor driven shaft by hand as well as using a 1/2" drill motor. When the inner leg is near full extension, it really starts to bind up as if the lower end of the jack-screw is deformed and causing great interference with the jack-nut; hence the screw will not exit the nut to allow removal of the inner tube.

With your experience - do you have any thoughts or comments?...otherwise I have no way to access the pin that secures the jack-screw bevel gear without drilling a hole.

"READY TO TORCH"

Chuck

 

[MLee]

That pin is interference fit. The bevel gear just sits on top of it. I think that there is a pin or something that keeps the worm gear from coming out. Mine was the same as yours, rough spots on winding and trying to get the worm drive out of the jack nut, or disassemble it there. hard to do. I did get the inter-lag to come out of the outside tube, but not the screw.
What bends these gears is doing the pull test with the gears down tight to the ground. They recommend to lift the trailer when backing under the skid plate but this does not always happen, and maybe the gear should be wound up off the ground a a inch or two to avoid this type of damage. I don't need to do a pull test cause of the way my hitch works. Always check the hitch first, make sure its locked.