Landing gear

hvphotog · 02-18-2015, 04:06 PM

should you be able to use your landing gear when hooked to truck plug.

My power line to the trailer was not working so brought it into the shop that sold me the 5th wheels set up. A fuse blew and they replaced it and told me i shouldnt use my landing gear while the trailer is plugged into the truck which is most likely why the fuse blew.

Doesn't seem right to me especially since i am unable to keep my trailer plugged it when not in use to keep the battery topped off.

Just curious to hear every ones thoughts ?

WaltBennett · 02-18-2015, 04:11 PM

That makes no sense to me at all. I've used ours many, many times while hooked to the truck and not had any issues at all.

hvphotog · 02-18-2015, 04:14 PM

Thats what i thought..

spicercars · 02-18-2015, 05:04 PM

That's a big load of crap. There is no reason the fuse would pop because you plugged into the truck. Not sure why they would tell you that.

**JRTJH** · 02-18-2015, 05:17 PM

If there were no battery in your RV and you plugged it into the truck umbilical, there's a chance you could blow the fuse IN THE TRUCK, if you activated the landing gear and it was operating under a heavy load, but with a battery in the trailer, that shouldn't happen. Also, if any fuse did blow, it wouldn't be the one in the trailer, it would be the limiting fuse in the truck that would blow to protect the truck wiring.

In fact, it's common practice to set up, unhitch and operate the slides with the umbilical connected and truck running to preserve as much "trailer battery power" as possible whenever dry camping. Additionally, most of us, if the trailer batteries are "discharged" when breaking camp, will plug into the truck to prevent overheating the slide motors and the landing gear with the low voltage from the almost depleted batteries.

I think they offered some "mis-guidance".....

Festus2 · 02-18-2015, 05:22 PM

You shouldn't have any issues at all being plugged into your truck. I have done this for years and often have the truck running when I am raising or lowering the jacks or operating the slide. The guy in the shop who told you that "misspoke" or whatever the current vernacular is.

If your inline fuse is blowing often, I'd swap it out for a self-setting circuit breaker of the same amperage. There may be other factors causing your fuse to pop --- misalignment of the landing gear causing it to bind when raising or lowering the 5th wheel being one reason.

denverpilot · 02-18-2015, 10:16 PM

The most common reason for blowing the landing gear fuse is toggling the gear switch quickly under the load of the trailer. People do it hitching up when they're trying to get the height right for the hitch or just getting tired and their hand slips off the switch and they react and slap at it quickly.

I keep a full set of spare fuses in the trailer for just such shenanigans and other types. Really don't feel like manually cranking the gear because I didn't have a replacement $0.20 fuse handy.

hvphotog · 02-19-2015, 07:48 PM

it wasnt the landing gear fuse which blew it was the fuse in the truck which blew so i am adding another one inline fuse which resets itself for the trickle charge.
i have read elsewhere if the trailer battery is dead it is possible the surge from turning landing gear on could blow the fuse on the truck. Being where my trailer is stored with no power to keep the battery topped off i am going to add a second battery to double my amp hours. Also will have a battery shut off switch near batteries on trailer like i had on my boat.

the trailer is going in to make sue there are no shorts, already had the truck checked out and it is fine.

could have been another trailer i had which blew the fuse, all i know is the fuse was blown so no power was going to trailer. that is now fixed but going to do a few quick and cheap upgrades to prevent any problems in the future

**JRTJH** · 02-19-2015, 08:06 PM

As I said in my previous post, the problem is the truck fuse. The wiring in the truck back to the trailer connector is not heavy wire. It will not carry enough amperage to operate the landing gear with a dead battery. Adding a second battery and a cut off switch may help prevent draining your batteries, but if you do arrive at the trailer and the batteries are dead, having two dead ones will make the problem even worse than only one dead battery. So, if you have an issue with dead batteries after your modifications, you might want to disconnect one of the batteries, leave only one connected and then plug in your truck and let it charge the connected battery for several minutes to half an hour before you activate the landing gear. That would give you a little "head start" on charging the trailer battery and may prevent another blown fuse.

I would suspect that there is nothing wrong with the trailer, just a dead battery and you "overloaded" the truck power source when it was trying to charge the dead battery AND you also put the load from the landing gear motor into the mix.

That little wire from the truck to the trailer is protected, I think, by a 20 amp fuse. At 12 VDC, that is 1.6 amps of power. If, by chance, it is a 30 amp fuse, then you'd be supplying 2.5 amps. As you can see, that's not much power from the truck to be charging a dead battery AND operating a "high torque" DC motor in the landing gear is a "sure fire" way to blow the truck fuse "over and over again"......

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