
How to Properly Place a Jack
Dave SolbergDescription
Many RVers assume the best place to set up a jack on their trailer is one of the brackets, but Dave thinks that should actually be your last choice. Realistically, every model of trailer should have a recommended jack point, and on Dave’s demonstration vehicle it’s the frame. Dave explains why he prefers to use a floor jack and then discusses all of the things that he considers when going through the process of jacking his trailer for maintenance on the wheels.
If you ever need to raise this trailer, jack it up to change tires, rotate them, do any bearing work. You gotta know where the proper place to put the jack is at and a couple of options in the jack. Now, trailers don't come generally with the jack standard. So, uh, personally I like the floor jack. Um, some people we use the bottle jack to me that's not enough stability and, uh, this one is a little bit overkill here, but it, uh, they do come in really smaller versions that can handle the weight of this nice four point stability on it.
So it, it's a better jack in my opinion. So a lot of people think it's easy. I'm gonna go right here. I put it right on that bracket there. I don't have to go too far up to get to it.
That's probably the last place that you wanna put that jack. That is the bracket for the leaf springs. You could bend that, uh, and then you could have some real suspension issues. So you have to check with the manufacturer on where they recommend most of the trailer. Um, frames are built by Lippert and I checked with Lippert and they said do not use the axle, do not use any of the brackets in there.
You could bend, those do not use a bottle jack, it's not very stable. They recommend anything on the frame itself. And so you can see here that there's a nice frame rail that runs all the way front to back on both sides. It's very stable to do that. And so I just crank this down.
All right. So I'm gonna move this so that I have good pattern on it. Now, before I lift this up, I'm gonna loosen the lug nuts on this side. I have put a block over on the other side because I don't want this trailer to roll. And, uh, even though we're on a, we're pretty flat with the trailer tongue at the beginning, but, uh, I'm gonna break those loose first, get that secured on the other side and then you can hear how it's kind of creaking, but we can see that that is a good stable spot and they were freak one other thing when you're taking tires off, make sure you put your hands on the outside at kind of a, a quarter distance away from each other.
Don't put your hands underneath. If this ever falls down, you don't want your hands under the tire to pinch them. Also, if you're gonna be working on this for a longer period of time, I do think it's a good idea to use the jack stands on different areas here just, just to help support that. So find a jack that works, check with your RV manufacturer on where they recommend pulling that, putting that jack. So you don't do damage to any of the other outriggers or compartments.
I agree with jacking the trailer up by the frame. My 08 Keystone fifth wheel has a belly cover that extends over the frame and the aluminum siding bend around and both the aluminum and the belly cover attach to the frame with several self-tappers. How to I jack this thing up without damaging the aluminum and belly cover?