Down In Del Rio, Broke Down That Is!

We had just finished a three hundred mile leg of our trip to Quartzite. There we were planning to meet friends and have a good time sharing stories with our fellow Escapees,(An rv club not a gang of hardened crinimals). As I was setting up Renita walked over and said, "What's that hanging down?"
See she was just as charged and tired as I was as she had driven part of the drive. I glanced behind the rear wheel and then glanced again as I saw the metal bar hanging down. Now there hadn't been anything hanging down as I had checked before we left Fulton. Laying on my back I crawled under the fifth wheel and oh my it was half of a broken spring! I mean it was gone along with the other three leafs. The support brackets were also broken along with the spring on the other side.

Looking further I realized how lucky we were. The tires had been wearing on the frame and there were only two support members left, keeping the axles attached to our fifth wheel. Yeah, I said attached. We had been driving and we could have easily have lost our axles!
So I walked over to the rv park manager and asked him if he knew a good repair shop, after telling him about our troubles. He recommended the welding place down the road and even called the place for me. He went on to say that he had seen a lot of rvs with broken suspensions. He said that a few years ago the rv manufacturers had gone to a cheaper Chinese steel. Hmmm, imagine that.

The next day we drove the house to the welding shop. It was only half a mile away. There Corey came out and crawled under our fifth wheel, where he exclaimed, "Oh my!" He keep pointing and looking and pointing and looking before telling us he could rebuild the entire suspension, and rebuild it better then before.

So he ordered the parts and as you can see the springs are a heck of a lot heavier then the old ones, five leafs instead of four. Furthermore the brackets are massive instead of the thin metal brackets of the original Lippert components. The new suspension also raised the whole fifth wheel up one and a half inches.
Looking back we both realized how lucky we had been. Part of traveling full time is having break downs but this could have been a stopper. We could have lost the whole house. Having spent our Quartzite money on repairs,($757 for the new suspension and $600 for new tires), we needed to go back to Fulton. There we have some shows and classes to teach where we hope to recoup some of the costs. At least we now have a heavier duty suspension for our summer trip to Alaska. Clear skies.

ps If you have a fifth wheel be sure to add, checking the suspension to your pre trip checklist. I know I will be adding it on mine and not just a casual glance.