Attention all Wolf Creek 850 Owners
Hi all I own (owned) a 2012 wolf creek 850 and the passenger side front anchor bolt was spliced in with a small sheet of plywood. This piece of plywood failed, ripped out and my Wolf Creek rolled...
Forum Discussion
Reading this thread out of curiosity. But two points spring to my engineer's mind:
Frame mount vs. bed mount tiedowns would make very little difference in the failure of that tie down. The truck end did not fail, so the ONLY difference could be the angle of pull. The camper end would pull out easier straight down (I would think) than angled somewhat forward because the forces would be normal to the plywood rather than in line with it.
Second, there is much fretting about the plywood splice. I believe that is nearly irrelevant to the strength (or lack of) in that design. What you have is a steel bracket thru bolted in the middle of a plywood panel, fastened with small screws or staples at its edges. There is a small (plywood) corner block at the forward edge providing some reinforcing. This is so inadequate as to be laughable. A continuous plywood panel would pull out at only very slightly more force. Most RVs are "lightly" built, but that is ridiculous.
Reddog1 asks what the hold downs should be expected to do. Somewhere back on this forum are pictures of a Northern camper (similar to Bigfoot) rolled down a bank with the truck. Truck and camper still firmly attached. Also pictures of the wrecker righting the rig (using the camper as a lever), again camper and truck still attached. I somehow doubt WolfCreek's method would survive that. Yes, you can ask more of them!
Reddog1 also asks for a fix. I agree that if you own or want to own one of these things you have little choice but to fix the shortcomings and move on. All brands of campers have build quality issues, just some more than others. What I would do is remove the plywood cover from the bottom (if access is not possible from inside - usually the case) and fabricate a steel 3 dimensional corner that ties the sides, the plywood cover, and the front bulkhead with its jack mount together. Then thru bolt the bracket through that. The steel fabrication would be a very small job, access would be the main issue. But the result would be something that would carry 10 or 20 times the load of the existing setup. If it pulls out, it will take the whole corner of the camper with it. What is there is very easy to improve upon.
Frame mount vs. bed mount tiedowns would make very little difference in the failure of that tie down. The truck end did not fail, so the ONLY difference could be the angle of pull. The camper end would pull out easier straight down (I would think) than angled somewhat forward because the forces would be normal to the plywood rather than in line with it.
Second, there is much fretting about the plywood splice. I believe that is nearly irrelevant to the strength (or lack of) in that design. What you have is a steel bracket thru bolted in the middle of a plywood panel, fastened with small screws or staples at its edges. There is a small (plywood) corner block at the forward edge providing some reinforcing. This is so inadequate as to be laughable. A continuous plywood panel would pull out at only very slightly more force. Most RVs are "lightly" built, but that is ridiculous.
Reddog1 asks what the hold downs should be expected to do. Somewhere back on this forum are pictures of a Northern camper (similar to Bigfoot) rolled down a bank with the truck. Truck and camper still firmly attached. Also pictures of the wrecker righting the rig (using the camper as a lever), again camper and truck still attached. I somehow doubt WolfCreek's method would survive that. Yes, you can ask more of them!
Reddog1 also asks for a fix. I agree that if you own or want to own one of these things you have little choice but to fix the shortcomings and move on. All brands of campers have build quality issues, just some more than others. What I would do is remove the plywood cover from the bottom (if access is not possible from inside - usually the case) and fabricate a steel 3 dimensional corner that ties the sides, the plywood cover, and the front bulkhead with its jack mount together. Then thru bolt the bracket through that. The steel fabrication would be a very small job, access would be the main issue. But the result would be something that would carry 10 or 20 times the load of the existing setup. If it pulls out, it will take the whole corner of the camper with it. What is there is very easy to improve upon.
