What was that noise???

[nevadatear]

Sam and kat are up here in the north.

[bc toys]

Thank you Debbie I really like there camp site area maybe I need to go north

[desertmoose]

Thank you Debbie I really like there camp site area maybe I need to go north

it's just a 7 or 8 hour drive from Vegas.... Come on up!

Like Debbie said, we're from the Carson/ Minden area. Just down the hill from Lake Tahoe.

Lots of pretty country nearby, even if a lot of it is across the state line in California.

The creek in the pictures above is south of Minden, heading towards Bridgeport, Ca. It's not as private as the pictures imply, there is a lot of traffic/ campers there. We just found a spot that was snuggled into the bushes.

BTW, around noon on monday, we saw the top of a silver teardrop with a roof rack go by. It looked like it was being towed by a Jeep maybe. Hard to tell with the bushes blocking the view. Our camp was totally out of sight from the road, so I don't think they saw us.

Sam and Kat

[nevadatear]

Hey sam that tear sounds like the one we saw up by donner over the fourth. New 'droppers from reno with a socal.

[rebapuck]

Goodness! Isn't Mother Nature grand?

[desertmoose]

I’ve read that axle U-bolts that aren’t torqued to spec can cause springs to break. The little bit of slop in the fit between the spring and axle will stress the area at the hole. Here’s some more info: http://www.eatonsprings.com/ubolttorques.htm

Thanks for the info.
I looked up the torque specs and crawled under both the tear and the 30' toyhauler with a torque wrench. I did find a couple that needed snugging up.

Interesting thing I didn't expect... the u-bolts in the tear are larger that the one on the 12,000 pound toyhauler!!!

5/8 on the tear, 1/2 on the toyhauler.

Sam

[Mary C]

Lets see TD is your bed, spring broke, yea, that's what he said when the bed broke, Sorry you had problems oh yea spring broke, Glad you are ok, but just think, you went on an adventure and that is what living is about. Love the adventures.

Thanks for the pictures and it is a great camping spot.

Mary C.

[bc toys]

I'll be coming that way weekend after next the Vegas 2 Reno race. I get to come all the way to Reno and I'm going to stay a extra day come back to vegas on Monday nothing to do on Sunday got any Ideals I don't like to gamble plus I'm broke. We hope to get around and see the country side since we want get to see much going up there wife has never been up that way before Peoch is as far as she has gotten to.

[Redneck Teepee]

It's hard to say what caused it. I planned on the tear weighing 1500 pounds... it ended up on certified scales at 1960 with the mattress in it. That's total weight. Add the camping gear, subtract the tongue weight, and I guessed it was close to the 2000 pound spring rating. I don't know how much if any margin was on the 2000 pound rating on the original springs.

We have over 4500 miles on it, with a lot of dirt/ rocky road miles.

The broken edge was right at the center bolt hole. Maybe there was a crack started from the drilling? Maybe not.

That is also the side that we lost the tire on a year ago. Not sure if many miles of running on a rim would have contributed to cracking the spring.

An older post I realize,.... I broke a trailer spring on a utility box trailer a couple years ago and it just so happens we have a place in Modesto (a nearby bigger city) that builds trailer springs from little ones to big 18 wheeler springs, they have been doing this for many moons. Long story short I went to get a replacement and I asked why my spring broke near the shackle eye (about 2" away) He said an unloaded spring (trailer not loaded) hitting a pot hole, as an example, will break where mine did, an overloaded spring (beyond the rating) will break in or near the axle center such as yours did. Just good info for all.


Anyways, with a broken spring, I went up a size to the 3000 pound ones.

Sam

[Shadow Catcher]

If you can post or send a picture close up of the end of the spring I may be able to help with a cause. Drilled holes can interrupt the grain of a forged spring, one reason not to buy drilled brake rotors, they crack around the holes.

[tony.latham]

Looking at that beat-up rim is painful. Made me wonder if I couldn't add a couple of tire pressure sensors to my trailer and monitor through my Tacoma TPS. But nope. Not that simple. It'll only monitor the five on the truck. There's trailer tire pressure systems out there but they are a bit spendy.

Tony

[desertmoose]

Looking at that beat-up rim is painful. Made me wonder if I couldn't add a couple of tire pressure sensors to my trailer and monitor through my Tacoma TPS. But nope. Not that simple. It'll only monitor the five on the truck. There's trailer tire pressure systems out there but they are a bit spendy.

Tony

Actually... for the next Christmas, I received a tire pressure monitoring system from Kat....

Hope to never repeat dragging a flat like I did on that one!!

Sam

[tony.latham]

Actually... for the next Christmas, I received a tire pressure monitoring system from Kat....

Hope to never repeat dragging a flat like I did on that one!!

Sam[/quote]

Which one did you get? (You knew this was coming!) How's your faith in it?

Tony

[desertmoose]

Which one did you get? (You knew this was coming!) How's your faith in it?

Tony

I had to go out and look at it..


It's a "Truck Systems Technology" brand. Made more for large trucks, trailers and motorhomes. I got enough of the sending valve caps so that I can use it on my 30' toyhauler also.

We haven't had a flat in the year I've been using it, but it's fun to see how the tire pressure varies as the tire warms up. It's a lot more than I expected.

It has high and low pressure alarms, and a high temperature alarm also. You can set the alarms to whatever pressure you want it to go off at.

Setting the valve cap codes was a bit of a learning curve, but not too bad. One minor complaint is the power off. Whenever the power cord is unplugged, you have to hold down a button for 6 seconds. If you don't, the thing gets stuck in some loop somewhere and sometimes takes several times to "reboot" it and get the start screen back up.

With that annoying detail, I tend to not use it when I'm just in the truck by itself. (I did get the sending caps for the truck also). Most over the road truckers have it wired in so it's under power all the time, apparently.

Sam