landing gear question....

0rion wrote:
Last year I didn't run into this a single time and this year I've had it happen a few times and it's kinda got me puzzled.

A few times now when running the legs up or down if I have to go very far the motor just stops. If I let off the button and press it again it'll work fine for a while and then shut off again. I have a couple guess' as to what's going on but if someone knows exactly what it is I'm all ears. I'm guessing it's either a thermal protection feature for the motor because it seems to only happen if I'm running the gear for a longer time than usual. My other guess is perhaps a battery draw issue since I *think* it's only happened when on 12v. It's done it both going up and down. The last couple of times it's done it I'll give it 30 seconds or so to cool down in case it is a thermal protection deal. I'm just curious as to why it didn't do it last year.
One thing I noticed this last time that I'd never looked at before is the motor when the gears are running....the motor is moving around quite a bit. Is it supposed to do that or be rock solid?

I think you're probably right that it is either thermal protection,or perhaps an auto-reset breaker. For some reason your gear motor is drawing more than the design current. Have you lubed the gears and lead screws? As for why it is happening this year, but not last year, could be simply that your battery is getting weak. When the battery voltage is lower, the current draw increases.

I will sometimes leave the cord connecting to my running truck while leveling the trailer. Particularly if it looks like I will have a long travel to reach level. I do it mostly to save my battery power, because I will be without hookups. Might as well start out with as much battery reserve as possible, and use the truck power while it is easily available. But the 14 volt power from the truck also improves the efficiency of my gear motor.

It is normal for the motor to bounce around. It is designed that way.