Jacks for leveling

No. Sorry.

Those scissor-style jacks are not strong enough or sturdy enough for lifting. They will raise your camper a little, but not strong enough to actually lift it. Besides, those jacks are hand cranked. I've tried cranking mine several times to actually "lift" the camper, and I just can't get enough "umph" to turn the handle after it reaches a certain point.

I have lowered the tongue jack, tightened the rear scissor jacks, and then raised the tongue jack to give an "extra" bit of tension to the back of the camper for more stability. But not enough to lift it.

I have also been on campsites that were so uneven, front to back, my tongue jack was not long enough to raise the front end of the camper to make it level. In those situations, I'll extend the tongue jack as far as I can, then tighten down the scissor jacks, then crank up the tongue jack and the scissor jacks will be holding the camper up on the front. I can then put more lumber under the tongue jack making it higher, then lower the tongue jack again to continue raising the front. For those few moments, they held. But I wouldn't trust them to support the camper at all for more than 30 seconds!

Answer to your question.... "no."

I wouldn't do it if it were mine. That's a lot of stress at the corners, and maybe too much unless you reinforce the frame from front to rear.

Pick up a piece of sheet metal 4 feet long and just support it at the corners. See how it bends in the middle...that's the same thing your trailer will try to do. That's how I feel about it anyway.

Scott I'd advise against it. Generally unless your frame was designed to be leveled like that you risk tweaking it out of alignment or worse. The corner jacks really are to stabilize the trailer not level it. I wanted to change out the jacks on a previous trailer and when I talked to a tech he explained why it was a bad idea.

Don't do it, the frame isn't anywhere near strong enough.

Definitely don't do it. WW specifically warned against using the stabilizer jacks for leveling.

Use something like Anderson Levelers to level from side to side. If the slope is too big, dig a hole on the high side and use the Andersons on the low side. Then use your tongue jack to level front to back. The stabilizer jacks are just to prevent shaking and rocking once you're parked.

Anderson Levelers

Wow, I'll consider this unanimous. Thanks for the quick replies everyone. I'll keep doing what has been working so far.

What others have said, they're not good for actual leveling, just reducing a bit of "bounce" when inside.

Side note, we used a power drill with socket to crank those things down and up in the old camper, way better than doing it by hand :)

JAC1982 wrote:
What others have said, they're not good for actual leveling, just reducing a bit of "bounce" when inside.

Side note, we used a power drill with socket to crank those things down and up in the old camper, way better than doing it by hand :)

3/4" fits mine ;)

I used to use my kids to deploy and retract our stabilizers. Once the last kid went off to school, we upgraded to a bigger rig with 6-point auto levelers. It takes some of the sting away when I start to miss my children.

dedmiston wrote:
I used to use my kids to deploy and retract our stabilizers. Once the last kid went off to school, we upgraded to a bigger rig with 6-point auto levelers. It takes some of the sting away when I start to miss my children.

yea, same here but instead of paying $$$$$ for a new trailer I bought a cordless 1/2" impact for the stabilizers.