Have these problems?

We just bought (last week) a new 2008 North Trail by Heartland. The guys at the RV site had real trouble getting the hitch latch to work, but after an hour got it latch down. Today, when I went to hitch up the TT, the latch would not go down. (And I'm not a whimp at this sort of thing! lol.) Thus, we could not pull the TT anywhere. Then (remember this TT is only a week old off the lot), the sliding door to the bedroom fell off and broke the latches. This was not a good start with our North Trail. Anyone had problems with the hitch latch or doors falling off? Larry

Call Heartland

I would encourage you to call Heartland service, 574-262-8030, ask for Jim Fenner. Jim will put you in touch with the person helping Heartland owners in your area. From experience, Heartland will help solve your problem and get your moving. I was 700 miles from home and Heartland arrange for a tech to come to the CG to solve a problem I had with the sliding closet doors. You will discover, as I did, Heartland cares about its owners and works hard to make this right. Good luck.

Tom, thanks for the rec. If I can get the hitch latch down today, I'm taking it back to the dealer and leave it until all item are fixed. Larry

Hitch Coupling

For stubborn TT hitch couplings you might want to first spray down all the mechanism with WD-40. If it still doesn't want to latch, lower the front jack until all the weight rests on the trailer ball, chock the trailer wheels and then VERY CAREFULLY try to pull forward slightly. DO NOT actually move the rig forward. You will just put a little forward strain on the coupling which should relieve whatever is binding things up.

I have a boat trailer that binds up, if the trailer is pushing the truck it binds. So I have to pull forward a little to allow it to latch.

I would give that a try, but carefully.

Tony

check the hitch mechanism. I had the nut loosen on a boat hitch and the plate inside turned 180 degrees. had to loosen the nut and take it off to turn it back around the right way. the hitch went on the ball hard and came off hard. after the fix.... smooth and easy.

In addition to the other posts. I don't remember if the 2-5/16 latch mechanism has an adjusting bolt on the bottom similar to smaller trailer hitches. Just something to check.

We had the same problem with our hitch on our 280BH. It does not have an adjusment nut on it. I even took ours back to the dealer. I was told it would loose up after a few trips. I was also told to lower the trailer on the ball and move my truck up just a bit, which did work. It did loosen up after about a 150 miles of towing. Our next option was going to be changing out the ball. I now spray mine with something like wd-40 before I hook-up. You should look at the angle of you ball, It may need to be adjusted.

Moving forward worked!

I lowered the hitch on the ball, moved the TV forward a tiny bit and the latch locked into place.

I was reminded by the dealer's service department to position the ball 1/8 inch forward of the hitch before lowering the hitch. That has worked now for me.

Thanks...Larry