Changing Tires/Completing Maintenance with Leveling System

[bsmith0404]

I’ve seen the question asked many times if you can change tires or perform maintenance on an RV using the auto leveling jacks to lift the trailer. The answer is yes, they have the lifting power to do so. The electric ones have range issues and would need blocks. The hydraulic jacks are very easy to use. Most times you will get an excessive angle error before you get the tires off the ground, just raise the low side a little more to allow the other side to be raised more. I’ve used the jacks for changing tires and annual wheel bearing maintenance for 9 years now. If I’m just changing the tire, I don’t worry about Jack stands since the other tire will still support the trailer if the jacks were to fail. If I want to pull both wheels at the same time, I do that when I’m packing wheel bearings, I use 6 ton jack stands. I don’t actually support the trailer on the jack stands, although I could, I just drop the leveling jacks enough to put a little pressure on the jack stands. They are a safety catch if the leveling jacks were to fail. Nothing really new here, but figured I’d throw it out there with some pics since I’m in the middle of doing the work now.