Ground Control Leveling Almost Always Fails With All Jacks Reporting Fault

[johnrushing]

I have a 2018 Fuel 322 with the 6 point Ground Control leveling system and it almost never works . IF I park on a perfectly level pad where the truck is also level I have a 50/50 chance of the system working, IF I can get a spot that is high in the front it almost always works. I have a 2WD Dodge 2500 so the trailer sits somewhat nose down anyway, so I have only got the leveling to work a couple of times. I can always get level manually, but there is no way to get the middle stabilizing jacks down manually, and now I have a crease in my kitchen linoleum that looks like maybe the trailer is drooping in the middle.

I didn't realize just how far off the ground the Fuel toyhauler 5th wheels are, and I think this is the main issue; the landing gear has to come soooo far down even with railroad ties under them and the extension dropped right down to the blocks (again, starting a bit low because of my truck). Obviously this causes the trailer to have a ton of movement when parked as well.

Has anyone else had this problem? Any suggestions other than taking it in for service (I mostly live in my trailer and am not very close to a shop so I'd rather not have to leave it for a week in the shop). I realize I probably have to bite the bullet and get it in, but maybe someone has already found a fix and can save me some hassle.

Thanks!!!

 

[danemayer]

I have a 2018 Fuel 322 with the 6 point Ground Control leveling system and it almost never works . IF I park on a perfectly level pad where the truck is also level I have a 50/50 chance of the system working, IF I can get a spot that is high in the front it almost always works. I have a 2WD Dodge 2500 so the trailer sits somewhat nose down anyway, so I have only got the leveling to work a couple of times. I can always get level manually, but there is no way to get the middle stabilizing jacks down manually, and now I have a crease in my kitchen linoleum that looks like maybe the trailer is drooping in the middle.

I didn't realize just how far off the ground the Fuel toyhauler 5th wheels are, and I think this is the main issue; the landing gear has to come soooo far down even with railroad ties under them and the extension dropped right down to the blocks (again, starting a bit low because of my truck). Obviously this causes the trailer to have a ton of movement when parked as well.

Has anyone else had this problem? Any suggestions other than taking it in for service (I mostly live in my trailer and am not very close to a shop so I'd rather not have to leave it for a week in the shop). I realize I probably have to bite the bullet and get it in, but maybe someone has already found a fix and can save me some hassle.

Thanks!!!

Hi johnrushing,

Welcome to the Heartland Owners Forum.

If you have the Lippert electric ground control, you might take a look at the manuals here to see whether there's any useful advice. The Ground Control 3.0 controls look about the same as the hydraulic auto-leveling system, so you may just want to try manually leveling to see if you get more predictable results. I almost always manually level our rig.

 

[Lou_and_Bette]

John, don’t know about your Ground Control but my hydraulic sydstem works best when I use the manual control to raise the front of the rig up to disconnect and leave it in that nose high position when I begin the automatic leveling process.

 

[avvidclif]

The manual for the hydraulic system states the rv must be nose high for the auto level to work. The first thing it does is dip below level, come back up to level and then start on side to side. FWIW I quit using it, too flaky. I have a Level-Mate Pro I use for leveling. If it still doesn't want to work correctly make sure the front and rear leveling boxes are securely mounted.

I call my RV a proper lady because when I use auto level the RV curtesy's to me and then starts to dance.

 

[Freshman]

Were you able to get this resolved? I have a 2019 Torque toy hauler and have the exact same issue. If I park in my driveway it works almost every time, but if I try to auto level at the campsite I bet it only works 25% of the time. Of course I can manually get it level but the mid jacks can't be put down manually, so they are not being utilized.

 

[johnrushing]

I have managed to get it to work most of the time now through a combination of things:

1. I raised my hitch head an inch, so my trailer rides level now and I can extend the legs a bit more before using the electric system.
2. I purchased a set of Anderson jack blocks (the ones that look like upside-down buckets), which helps the rear jacks to not fault because they don't have to travel as far. These things are expensive, but I really love them as they stabilize the trailer really well. One tricky thing about these is they are sometimes too tall for my jacks, so I have to lower the front just to get them under the back jacks, and then raise the front to get the middle ones under before initiating auto-level.
3. I really carefully re-zeroed and found that helped.
4. I always raise the front at least 0.5 degrees high before starting auto-level.

Unfortunately, if you have a toy hauler with high clearance you can't park in a spot that is low in the front and expect the Ground Control system to work properly. The best workaround would probably be to set up the hitch so it's a tad high and then if you had airbags you could probably add another inch before you drop the landing gear legs. I've also considered building risers for my bucket blocks out of 6x6s - imagine 3 18-inch long 6x6s attached in parallel to make a square, you could add some angle iron for the bucket to sit in if you wanted to ensure no chance of sliding off. Of course you'd have to lug around some heavy hunks of wood...

Anyway, best of luck and I hope this helped some!

Were you able to get this resolved? I have a 2019 Torque toy hauler and have the exact same issue. If I park in my driveway it works almost every time, but if I try to auto level at the campsite I bet it only works 25% of the time. Of course I can manually get it level but the mid jacks can't be put down manually, so they are not being utilized.

 

[LBR]

Of course I can manually get it level but the mid jacks can't be put down manually, so they are not being utilized.

Are you saying that after the front legs are down you cannot get the 2 middle jacks to drop, but the rear 2 will?

 

[carl.swoyer]

I have a 2018 Fuel 322 with the 6 point Ground Control leveling system and it almost never works . IF I park on a perfectly level pad where the truck is also level I have a 50/50 chance of the system working, IF I can get a spot that is high in the front it almost always works. I have a 2WD Dodge 2500 so the trailer sits somewhat nose down anyway, so I have only got the leveling to work a couple of times. I can always get level manually, but there is no way to get the middle stabilizing jacks down manually, and now I have a crease in my kitchen linoleum that looks like maybe the trailer is drooping in the middle.

I didn't realize just how far off the ground the Fuel toyhauler 5th wheels are, and I think this is the main issue; the landing gear has to come soooo far down even with railroad ties under them and the extension dropped right down to the blocks (again, starting a bit low because of my truck). Obviously this causes the trailer to have a ton of movement when parked as well.

Has anyone else had this problem? Any suggestions other than taking it in for service (I mostly live in my trailer and am not very close to a shop so I'd rather not have to leave it for a week in the shop). I realize I probably have to bite the bullet and get it in, but maybe someone has already found a fix and can save me some hassle.

Thanks!!!

I'm going to ask a dumb question? Your truck is disconnected when performing the auto level , right? I asked this because you make reference to your truck in the post.
The first step in the auto level is the nose goes straight down then senses then starts dropping the other legs.So if the truck is still Hooked up it can't perform step one.
Sorry if I miss read the post.

Sent from my moto z3 using Tapatalk

 

[johnrushing]

Correct; if the auto-level fails the middle jacks don't go down. Often, you can manually get to level on the front and rear jacks, but the automatic system can't.

Are you saying that after the front legs are down you cannot get the 2 middle jacks to drop, but the rear 2 will?

 

[johnrushing]

Sorry for any confusion - the reference to truck height has to do with the starting point of the landing gear. If the kingpin is close to the ground (nose down) at the time of disconnecting the truck, then the landing gear legs cannot be extended very far, then when the electric jacks lift the front, they have to travel farther to get to level. This system needs to start with the nose above level, then it often wants to raise the nose farther and if the electric jacks are almost at full stroke the system will fail.

I'm going to ask a dumb question? Your truck is disconnected when performing the auto level , right? I asked this because you make reference to your truck in the post.
The first step in the auto level is the nose goes straight down then senses then starts dropping the other legs.So if the truck is still Hooked up it can't perform step one.
Sorry if I miss read the post.

Sent from my moto z3 using Tapatalk