Landing leg replacement

[halfwright]

I have had several problems with the landing legs on our 2007 342PHT. Mostly it has been the upper gears or pins wearing out. I am thinking of replacing the following leg with another driving leg. I think the leg, motor, and gear box will be around $300. We are full-time, so they do get more than average use. Would this help or just cause more problems?

Thanks
Jim

[Overlord]

I got rid of my OEM landing gear, and installed Bulldog's BD500161 two motor set-up. Easy swap out.

The only thing that I haven't set up yet is being able to use the remote to operate the landing gear when I'm inside the truck when hooking up. I have a switch that disconnects their direct to battery connection through the Bulldog switches and circuit breakers, and need to add another switch to supply & cut off power from the remote control box so as not to back-feed current to each others circuit.

[WaltBennett]

Originally Posted by Overlord

I got rid of my OEM landing gear, and installed Bulldog's BD500161 two motor set-up. Easy swap out.

The only thing that I haven't set up yet is being able to use the remote to operate the landing gear when I'm inside the truck when hooking up. I have a switch that disconnects their direct to battery connection through the Bulldog switches and circuit breakers, and need to add another switch to supply & cut off power from the remote control box so as not to back-feed current to each others circuit.

X2 on the Bulldog set. I ran new separate wiring and didn't attempt to hook up the remote. Mounted their switch panel on the front between the small front basement door and the edge near the propane tank door instead of the side and put a thermostat cover over it to keep direct water from hitting them.

They are an unbelievable improvement over the old single motor thing. I don't have to worry about slightly uneven sites either. Well worth it!

[Phil P]

Hi

We use our front landing gear much more than most people. We carry a large scale model steam train in the basement. When we arrive at an event we pull the pins that hold the fifth wheel hitch to the rails and lift the hitch out of the truck by raising the trailer with the front landing gear. Then we continue to raise the trailer until the basement floor is level with the bed of the truck. After unloading we then level the trailer.

We had problems with the front landing gear before we started carrying the train. We continued having problems until I corrected all of the improper installation.

So here are a couple of things for you to think about.

When you have the legs of the trailer crank them all the way down by hand. Then retract them 1 inch and mark the inner leg so you can tell when you are reaching their limit. Never exceed this mark.

Then retract them all the way by hand until they are all the way up. Extend them 1 inch and mark the inner leg so you can tell when you are reaching their retracted limit. Never exceed this mark.

I did this and eliminated some of my problems.

Now the final fix and we haven’t had any problems with them now for over 5 years.

I decided to add a second motor and transmission and do away with the bar that runs across the generator compartment so I had more storage. We do not have a generator installed in this compartment.

I purchased the motor and transmission from the leg manufacturer and wired a winch relay so both legs ran from the same switch that was installed in the outside panel.

You know about the plans of mice and men well the new motor ran half as fast as the original motor.

I called the leg manufacturer and they told me that Keystone doesn’t purchase the motor from them. So I purchased another motor and that corrected the problem.

If you put a little thought into this you will come to the conclusion that the high speed motor will induce higher temperatures in the screw jack arrangement in the legs. So I am not sure if the second motor or reducing the speed at which the legs run is what cured all of our problems with the landing gear.

That was 5 years ago we now have 100,000 miles on the trailer and many leg operations to unload and load the steam train.

Phil P