Parking on Slopes or Hills

[ScubaRx]

1 minute ago, Wayfinder said:

I broke down camp just like you said, raised jacks, slowly, and kept safety chains connected to truck and was ready to pull break pin too if needed.  But, it was steady as a rock.  

I can never remember which way is up with my rubber chocks, mine do not have any concave shape to the one side.   I think mine are these here.  Flat shape on both sides.

Now these heavy duty rubber chocks look like real nice chocks, and weighing in at 3.5 lbs each.  A set of four would do the trick for sure.  And, they'll all match.  😉 

Sorry, I assumed those were Harbor Freight. Either will work just fine. As a side note, I forgot to remove mine in the driveway once. I drove about 10 feet with them skidding along before they finally gave up and let me run over them. Ruined one (broke it).

[Steve Morris]

57 minutes ago, Wayfinder said:

I wonder if Oliver would give me a break my next Oliver if I could make mine float for over an hour or two

I once drove my 1968 VW Beetle nose first down a boat ramp to see if it would float. I got as far as the rear tires a couple inches from the water's edge, and nothing was floating yet. Maybe it was because I had the convertible top down... 🤷‍♂️

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There may have been drinking involved, too. That 3.2% Budweiser was potent stuff! 🤣

[Wayfinder]

37 minutes ago, ScubaRx said:

Sorry, I assumed those were Harbor Freight. Either will work just fine. As a side note, I forgot to remove mine in the driveway once. I drove about 10 feet with them skidding along before they finally gave up and let me run over them. Ruined one (broke it).

See, if you can break one of these Heavy duty rubber chocks, especially in only 10 or even 50 feet, then I would step up to a better brand.  Maybe I'll go for those nice ones I linked before and let folks know what I think of them.  Some advantages to these I am thinking of after camping on a slope:

• Larger
• heavier
• Pass-thru handle that, in a pinch, could be used to drive a large "spike" or "pin" through to secure it more to the ground - no slipping at all.
• Unlike my current ones, these curve with the tire and are quite pointed to get farther under the tires.  
• Really looks top-notch to me.  
• Lastly, HF for $8 each or these AFA Tooling for $12 each.  

[Wayfinder]

2 minutes ago, Steve Morris said:

I once drove my 1968 VW Beetle nose first down a boat ramp to see if it would float. I got as far as the rear tires a couple inches from the water's edge, and nothing was floating yet. Maybe it was because I had the convertible top down... 🤷‍♂️

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There may have been drinking involved, too. That 3.2% Budweiser was potent stuff! 🤣

I saw that movie.  You were fantastic in that.  

[Wayfinder]

Okay @MAX Burner I hope I speak for others on this thread when I ask, how the HELL can someone put X-chocks of any brand on so wrong that they do not work at all.  Oh sure, if they're not tight enough, I can see that, but anything else.  Now that's a head-scratcher.  🤯

I guess we all need to be ready for video cameras in hand.

[Wayfinder]

Also, I'd like name this month as "Pull & test your emergency brake pin month".  In honor of no floating Olivers..... yet!

 

Going out right this second to do it.  I'm afraid of the results.  LOL

 

 

[Steve Morris]

17 minutes ago, Wayfinder said:

I saw that movie.  You were fantastic in that.  

Movie? Nope, true story, during our senior picnic/campout the night before high school graduation, spring 1972.

[Geronimo John]

7 hours ago, John Welte said:

JDo you have pictures of how you use the 2x6 blocks?  I don't understand the shear-plane concept. 

Use of blocks:  Picture a 2 X 6, preferably treated and washed.  Now take a chop saw and cut them  into 2" X 6" X ?".   The "?" is the iD of your milk crate less a bit to allow easy  removal from the box.  Mine are 2 X 6 X 11".  Now stack them to nearly the top of your milk crate.  That is the limit of my pre-planning on blocks.  IE I can raise up my jacks on blocks one milk crate high.  🙂

When at my destination with soft ground, I use two blocks side by side  laid flat on the ground.  Then I stack other blocks so that they are 90 degrees from the ones on the soft ground.  This is done to spread the load and not have Ollie burrying my blocks into the soft ground.  That is not necessary on hard ground or paved areas.  There I just stack up the blocks.

Slip Plane:  This concept ir rooted in the coefficient of friction between to surfaces.  Here is a web site that goes into some detail:  http://www.slipalert.com/friction/

But to keep it simple:  When we jack up our Ollie, the jack plate (the part on the ground) and the ground create a pair of surfaces that are pushed together.  They create resistance (IE friction between them) that will resist their sliding apart if you try to drive off.  This resistance (force to slide) can be measured and a "Coefficient of Friction" can be calculated.  The two of them form what is called a "Slip Plane".  Two surfaces moving relative to each other is resisted by friction.  So if they have a high CoF (Lke dragging a locked rubber tire on concrete) then they don't want to slip. 

Now pretend that you raise your Ollie on soft ground.  You can expect to see the jack plates being pushed into the ground.  If you were to drive off, you surely would damage your jacks.  Now if you always without fail raise your jacks EVERY EVERY TIME  before moving your trailer, you are golden.  But about 80% of us have proven to ourselves that we are not in that elite group of perfect people.  As a result, a lot of jacks have been damaged.  Sadly avoidably. 

So, if you place several sort of smooth timber surfaces together above ground, and if you move your trailer, they will 99.5% of the time slip relative to each other.  Their doing so is a result of their CoF being much less than that of a jack stuck in the mud.  Hence always having two blocks of wood or similar material in use under each jack.

Ok you may think that I now only need six blocks.  Why fill the milk crate with them?  Or, why not have two milk crates of them?

First, I only have room for one milk crate in my basket.  A second reason is that there is a limit to how high we should even consider jacking up on a sloped surface.  One is the limit for my risk assessments. And this is rooted in the concept of levers. 

If you stack up blocks to raise the trailer a fixed number of inches, you reduce the extension of your jacks by the number of inches of blocks you use.  By raising up the height of the jack foot, it reduces the distance from the foot to the jack mounting bolts.  Doing so reduces the lever arm, and makes it much more likely that the boards will slip before the jack hurts itself. 

For day to day routine use on firm ground, If I have used three of my blocks under each jack. Why three?  Because it creates two slip planes.  and if the first block is really stuck (maybe the ground is a littls soft), then I have another one to slip if my trailer gets moved.  By slipping, it will save my jacks and as the jack foot moves off the blocks, it will fall a few inches and whispers to the entire camp ground it is not happy.  Without going into the discussion of sliding vs. static friction... I utter a word or two .... and go pick up my blocks and raise my jack.  Often looking around to see if anybody heard my OOPs. 

One word of caution is that you never want to jack up your trailer to the point that your blocks and jacks are no longer, or could become no longer, perfectly vertical.   Doing so is a recipe for disaster.  Another reason not to have more than one milk crate of blocks.    🙂

Hope this helps.

GJ  

[Patriot]

2 hours ago, ScubaRx said:

Sorry, I assumed those were Harbor Freight. Either will work just fine. As a side note, I forgot to remove mine in the driveway once. I drove about 10 feet with them skidding along before they finally gave up and let me run over them. Ruined one (broke it).

That visual gives a whole new meaning to laying a patch of rubber in the driveway! 😄 

[rideandfly]

We camp quite a bit on sloped mountain camp sites, we use Camco leveling chocks and jack stands.

Please forgive me if this has been previously mentioned.

We place thin rubber sections of welcome mats between the wheel chocks and pavement that wheels roll up on to help prevent slippage of the chocks.

Once we have Ollie’s rear wheels on the leveling chocks in the ready to camp  chocked position, place the tow vehicle transmission in neutral while connected to Ollie and let the rig roll to settle on the chocks. It normally rolls one or two inches. Next set TV parking brake and transmission in park.

This was mentioned earlier. With chains connected to TV, jack the hitch up off of the TV ball, normally don’t have hardly any movement when lifting the trailer off of the TV ball. I still leave the trailer connected with chains to the TV until all trailer jacks are down on the jack stands and trailer stabilized.

 

 

[SeaDawg]

3 hours ago, Steve Morris said:

I once drove my 1968 VW Beetle nose first down a boat ramp to see if it would float. I got as far as the rear tires a couple inches from the water's edge, and nothing was floating yet. Maybe it was because I had the convertible top down... 🤷‍♂️

.

.

.

.

.

.

There may have been drinking involved, too. That 3.2% Budweiser was potent stuff! 🤣

Oh, the memories.

One of my college roommates had a 68 beetle. Driving in Iowa winters,  we always kept blankets in the back. And, used them.

Another trip, central Iowa to Minneapolis,  5 of us , three guys over 6', two girls. So crowded,  but hey, what the heck. It got us there.

We never checked flotation.

Though , it can gain height. I was in a wedding in 72. The guys somehow put the groom's vw bug in the roof of the church hall.

Those were the days....

[rideandfly]

One time while camping at Mt. Pisgah NC, a couple was dumping their tanks at the dump station on a steep grade with a large International converted school bus. The man was out side draining the hoses when the bus started rolling down the steep hill with his Wife and small baby in the bus.

It rolled about 60’ down into the woods with the front bumper hitting trees stopping the bus. His Wife and baby were OK, she was very upset and only spoke French. The rear wheels were still on pavement. We managed to back the bus up and had minimal damage to the bus.

[Wayfinder]

content moved to #what-does-happen-when-pulling-break-cable. (should be brake cable).  LOL

 

 

[John and Debbie]

4 hours ago, Geronimo John said:

Use of blocks:  Picture a 2 X 6, preferably treated and washed.  Now take a chop saw and cut them  into 2" X 6" X ?".   The "?" is the iD of your milk crate less a bit to allow easy  removal from the box.  Mine are 2 X 6 X 11".  Now stack them to nearly the top of your milk crate.  That is the limit of my pre-planning on blocks.  IE I can raise up my jacks on blocks one milk crate high.  🙂

When at my destination with soft ground, I use two blocks side by side  laid flat on the ground.  Then I stack other blocks so that they are 90 degrees from the ones on the soft ground.  This is done to spread the load and not have Ollie burrying my blocks into the soft ground.  That is not necessary on hard ground or paved areas.  There I just stack up the blocks.

Slip Plane:  This concept ir rooted in the coefficient of friction between to surfaces.  Here is a web site that goes into some detail:  http://www.slipalert.com/friction/

But to keep it simple:  When we jack up our Ollie, the jack plate (the part on the ground) and the ground create a pair of surfaces that are pushed together.  They create resistance (IE friction between them) that will resist their sliding apart if you try to drive off.  This resistance (force to slide) can be measured and a "Coefficient of Friction" can be calculated.  The two of them form what is called a "Slip Plane".  Two surfaces moving relative to each other is resisted by friction.  So if they have a high CoF (Lke dragging a locked rubber tire on concrete) then they don't want to slip. 

Now pretend that you raise your Ollie on soft ground.  You can expect to see the jack plates being pushed into the ground.  If you were to drive off, you surely would damage your jacks.  Now if you always without fail raise your jacks EVERY EVERY TIME  before moving your trailer, you are golden.  But about 80% of us have proven to ourselves that we are not in that elite group of perfect people.  As a result, a lot of jacks have been damaged.  Sadly avoidably. 

So, if you place several sort of smooth timber surfaces together above ground, and if you move your trailer, they will 99.5% of the time slip relative to each other.  Their doing so is a result of their CoF being much less than that of a jack stuck in the mud.  Hence always having two blocks of wood or similar material in use under each jack.

Ok you may think that I now only need six blocks.  Why fill the milk crate with them?  Or, why not have two milk crates of them?

First, I only have room for one milk crate in my basket.  A second reason is that there is a limit to how high we should even consider jacking up on a sloped surface.  One is the limit for my risk assessments. And this is rooted in the concept of levers. 

If you stack up blocks to raise the trailer a fixed number of inches, you reduce the extension of your jacks by the number of inches of blocks you use.  By raising up the height of the jack foot, it reduces the distance from the foot to the jack mounting bolts.  Doing so reduces the lever arm, and makes it much more likely that the boards will slip before the jack hurts itself. 

For day to day routine use on firm ground, If I have used three of my blocks under each jack. Why three?  Because it creates two slip planes.  and if the first block is really stuck (maybe the ground is a littls soft), then I have another one to slip if my trailer gets moved.  By slipping, it will save my jacks and as the jack foot moves off the blocks, it will fall a few inches and whispers to the entire camp ground it is not happy.  Without going into the discussion of sliding vs. static friction... I utter a word or two .... and go pick up my blocks and raise my jack.  Often looking around to see if anybody heard my OOPs. 

One word of caution is that you never want to jack up your trailer to the point that your blocks and jacks are no longer, or could become no longer, perfectly vertical.   Doing so is a recipe for disaster.  Another reason not to have more than one milk crate of blocks.    🙂

Hope this helps.

GJ  

"Hope this helps"

John, that is now crystal clear.  Thanks very much for the explanation.  I will start using the same method.  If I put a 2x6 or two on top of the Camco jack stand, it appears that I would create that same effect and also limit the travel of the stabilizer jack even more.  The goal should be to limit the travel of those jacks to be more stable with more of the jack in the housing.  Then if I do drive off, there should be minimal damage if any to the jack.

John

[MAX Burner]

14 hours ago, Wayfinder said:

Okay @MAX Burner I hope I speak for others on this thread when I ask, how the HELL can someone put X-chocks of any brand on so wrong that they do not work at all.  Oh sure, if they're not tight enough, I can see that, but anything else.  Now that's a head-scratcher.  🤯

I guess we all need to be ready for video cameras in hand.

It made my head explode, too!  ...just not thinking, I guess.  "No brain, no headache"!

[SeaDawg]

18 hours ago, rideandfly said:

One time while camping at Mt. Pisgah NC, a couple was dumping their tanks at the dump station on a steep grade with a large International converted school bus. The man was out side draining the hoses when the bus started rolling down the steep hill with his Wife and small baby in the bus.

It rolled about 60’ down into the woods with the front bumper hitting trees stopping the bus. His Wife and baby were OK, she was very upset and only spoke French. The rear wheels were still on pavement. We managed to back the bus up and had minimal damage to the bus.

Omg. That's an awful, and at the same time amazing recovery story. Mt pisgah cg is not a place where you want your camper moving on its own. Glas you were able to help, and glad the story ended well.

 

[Wayfinder]

Well, taking some advice from @Geronimo John and/or @SeaDawg and making some extra leveling & clocking pieces along with non-slip material as a ground base.  

Now that I'm more prepared with 2x6s and X-chocks, I'll never be on a sloping campsite again. 😂

They might be able to help someone else out, someday. 

Heading out to Petersburg Campground this weekend. What an awesome campground. I'm lucky I got in on a weekend. 

This is another reason to keep a small 24" camper. Americans are going crazy with all the big rigs so they can't get in the all the sites. 

[Wayfinder]

Well, I'm not sure who posted their video link to a heavy duty jack stand made from wood, but I made my own as soon as I got back from camping today.  This looks rough, and it is, but I'm letting the Gorilla Glue setup with the weight of the trailer on it as it will normally sit.  

This is made from old reclaimed pressure-treated 2x6s, long deck screws, wood and Gorilla glue.  Once the glue is completely dry, I'll finish sanding it down to get ride of any splinters or chips and then give it a quick stain.  Why not, right? 

My neighbor does have some extra spray paint he can give me.  I'm thinking of painting it safety ORANGE. So from a distance it might look like a cheap piece of plastic. But I don't think so really.  Would be too much of an attention getter.

This is approximately 9 inches high and around 8.5" x 11" (ish) wide/long. 

I think it will last as long as me.  Well, longer!

I made it so it's easy to pick up with two hands, grips/handles on both sides. With the height, it should give more stability to the front jack as it will not need to be extended nearly as much.

I usually just used a small set of blocks as a front jack stand.  Not nearly as stable (also Pictured next to rear tire).

 

[Wayfinder]

I'm really surprised at how stable the front jack is now, even with the rear jacks up. With a 9 inch box, the front jacks is not extended that much and does not wobble much at all. 

[Geronimo John]

On 4/25/2023 at 12:00 PM, Wayfinder said:

Maybe I'll go for those nice ones I linked before and let folks know what I think of them. 

Your AFA chocks are nice.  $50 for four.  I like the design and think the price is reasonable due to the extra material and forming costs it would entail.  

We  carry in the front box of Ollie:

• Four of the below Harbor Freights (at $32 for four)
• A milk crate box of blocking
• 2 1/2 gallons of generator fuel
• Plus some other miscellaneous "stuff"

The above fits nicely with room to spare.  It is possible that the larger AFA's could as well, but it would be a tight fit.            

[Geronimo John]

Wayfinder:  I like your chock set between the wheels.  I typically put them outside of the axle sets.  Yea, a tomato/tomatto discussion.

  

 

Your way though would require me to bend over just once to place both of them.  YEA

With a "tag line" between them, it would allow me to easily allow carry two sets of two in one hand.  That saves travel time box to wheels and back for a second run to the other side.  YEA X2

Thanks for the picture!

GJ

[Wayfinder]

44 minutes ago, Geronimo John said:

Wayfinder:  I like your chock set between the wheels.  I typically put them outside of the axle sets.  Yea, a tomato/tomatto discussion.

  

 

Your way though would require me to bend over just once to place both of them.  YEA

With a "tag line" between them, it would allow me to easily allow carry two sets of two in one hand.  That saves travel time box to wheels and back for a second run to the other side.  YEA X2

Thanks for the picture!

GJ

Too bad they're upside down in the pic!

 

[Wayfinder]

Although my quickie front jack stand box looks like crap (version 1.0), I'm going to do something to it that I have not seen any of you mention in the forums.  So, you'll have to stop by camp site G28 to see it.  I did sand it down some and stained.

Oh, the suspense of it all.