scamp left/right weight imbalance - Fiberglass RV
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Old 10-11-2019, 03:55 PM   #1
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Name: jon
Trailer: Scamp 13
Washington
Posts: 34
scamp left/right weight imbalance

hi fiberglass rv folks,


can anyone advise me on the following; my scamp has a weight imbalance causing it to sag a little (1 inch) in the driver's side.


is there a technique for tweeking or supplementing the suspension to make it level again? scamp is 2004 13 foot.


thanks,
jon of sequim wa
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Old 10-11-2019, 05:40 PM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jondsw View Post
hi fiberglass rv folks,


can anyone advise me on the following; my scamp has a weight imbalance causing it to sag a little (1 inch) in the driver's side.


is there a technique for tweeking or supplementing the suspension to make it level again? scamp is 2004 13 foot.


thanks,
jon of sequim wa
Good news is...It ain't so.
Take another look and you will see that the mold is made that way to accommodate the entry door design.
The skirt is like that on every Scamp made for the last 5 decades.
All it really means is that you are getting aquainted with your trailer.




Of course, no trailer is evenly or perfectly balanced when new, then usually gets further off when loaded, It varies by floor plan, but what you are seeing is truthfully explained in that first paragraph.




Mine is a 2004 Scamp13D.
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Old 10-11-2019, 05:49 PM   #3
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Trailer: 2015 Scamp (16 Std Layout 4) with '15 Toyota Sienna LE Tug
North Carolina
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Originally Posted by floyd View Post
Good news is...It ain't so.
Take another look and you will see that the mold is made that way to accommodate the entry door design.
The skirt is like that on every Scamp ..
That was my thought also more on the starboard side where the wheel-well clearance is in fact less... so please let us know why you think it is unbalanced. The only way to know for sure is to use wheel scales under each wheel one at a time. I wish I could do that because I do suspect that my layout four with large fridge on the starboard side is heavier on that side, but I have not confirmed it. I did try to weigh it side-to-side once with a tongue weight scale once, but that was hard to do properly so the results are inconclusive.
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Old 10-11-2019, 06:47 PM   #4
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Originally Posted by gordon2 View Post
That was my thought also more on the starboard side where the wheel-well clearance is in fact less... so please let us know why you think it is unbalanced. The only way to know for sure is to use wheel scales under each wheel one at a time. I wish I could do that because I do suspect that my layout four with large fridge on the starboard side is heavier on that side, but I have not confirmed it. I did try to weigh it side-to-side once with a tongue weight scale once, but that was hard to do properly so the results are inconclusive.

I'm sure you are addressing the OP with the highlighted request above.
But just in case....I don't think there is an issue related to any significant "unbalance".
At least not as it relates to the side to side mold difference.
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Old 10-11-2019, 07:09 PM   #5
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Name: Eric
Trailer: 1987 Casita 16
Illinois
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You might want to check the wheel wells to see if the sag shows in the well. I found that my one side was not properly supported and the outside had sagged, clearly seen by the angle on top of the wheel wells. Once I got that fixed by better support it level out. Just an idea.
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Old 10-11-2019, 07:17 PM   #6
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Trailer: 2015 Scamp (16 Std Layout 4) with '15 Toyota Sienna LE Tug
North Carolina
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Quote:
Originally Posted by floyd View Post
I'm sure you are addressing the OP with the highlighted request above.
But just in case....I don't think there is an issue related to any significant "unbalance".
At least not as it relates to the side to side mold difference.
Agree.. no imbalance as far as the mold is concerned. But I do wonder about the addition of a larger fridge and microwave on the a layout four. In any case, with the different layouts, I can not see how they are all balanced perfectly side-to-side... but how much they are unbalanced I dont know. It could be almost nothing, or maybe more.


Quote:
Originally Posted by EricAllyn View Post
You might want to check the wheel wells to see if the sag shows in the well. I found that my one side was not properly supported and the outside had sagged, clearly seen by the angle on top of the wheel wells. Once I got that fixed by better support it level out. Just an idea.
Not doubting that you had an issue... but I am quite sure that significantly difference in wheel-well clearance is normal in Scamps.
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Old 10-12-2019, 09:08 AM   #7
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Trailer Imbalance

It has been my experience that the only time side to side imbalance of any kind takes place when one wheel brakes more or less than the other one, and this only applies if you have functioning brakes. If you don't, then your imbalance, like the other campers have said, is simply not an issue. If you have brakes, then there are two things you can do. Attend your local commercial vehicle enforcement scale and while working with the enforcement officers, weight your trailer one tire at a time, then adjust your brakes so your trailer brakes evenly and it does not pull toward one side. I did exactly what I have described and sure enough, one side was braking a little more than the other. A simple tweak of the brake adjusters had my trailer behaved perfectly. Problem solved. Now I can stop on a dime, evenly.
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Old 10-12-2019, 09:40 AM   #8
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Name: Kathleen (Kai: ai as in wait)
Trailer: Amerigo FG-16 1973 "Peanut"
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When we had Peanut weighed one side at a time at Paul's old job, before we took it to a certified scale, it was heavier on one side than the other. I've wondered if it would wear out the tires more on the heavier side. We haven't used it enough yet to see any such thing going on. Front-back weight we control with permanent and packing distribution. We want it tongue heavy, and we have that.

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Old 10-12-2019, 10:17 AM   #9
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Tire Wear

If the tires do show wear more on one side compared to the other, then switch them so they wear out evenly. As long as the face of the tire is wearing evenly.
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Old 10-12-2019, 10:30 AM   #10
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Knowing the actual weight on each tire let's you adjust the air pressure to maintain equal rolling radius.
to get accurate weights, find a platform scale that has wide enough aprons on both sides so you can place one wheel at a time on the scale.
CAUTION: do not apply the brakes as that can throw the scale off.
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Old 10-12-2019, 10:49 AM   #11
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Originally Posted by Wayne Collins View Post
Knowing the actual weight on each tire let's you adjust the air pressure to maintain equal rolling radius.
to get accurate weights, find a platform scale that has wide enough aprons on both sides so you can place one wheel at a time on the scale.
CAUTION: do not apply the brakes as that can throw the scale off.
Only if you insist on underinflation!
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Old 10-12-2019, 05:02 PM   #12
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Name: jon
Trailer: Scamp 13
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hi, and thanks for responding with your thoughts.

maybe my approach was too primitive, I just measured the height of the rear bumper on each end and found a difference. I have split water tanks with the larger on the driver's side. but.. I have two batteries and a heavy charger on the passenger side. IF it is agreed that one side is lower for whatever reason, are there any techniques for tweeking the suspension to compensate?
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Old 10-12-2019, 05:38 PM   #13
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Trailer: 2015 Scamp (16 Std Layout 4) with '15 Toyota Sienna LE Tug
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Originally Posted by jondsw View Post
..IF it is agreed that one side is lower for whatever reason, are there any techniques for tweeking the suspension to compensate?
Nothing practical comes to mind, but if you are worried about it, the first step is to get the individual weight on each wheel with a scale.
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Old 10-12-2019, 06:09 PM   #14
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Name: Kathleen (Kai: ai as in wait)
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Use a scale, but do NOT use a household scale.

After weighing Peanut's tongue weight with my bathroom scale (2x4 boards method and all) when I weighed myself I found I had lost a LOT of weight, because it showed me at only 46 pounds.

It was real nice to lose so much weight without dieting...but...

I had broken the scale with the trailer tongue. Oddly, it gave its life for a final, accurate weigh. What we recorded then was what the certified weigh station verified later.

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Old 10-12-2019, 06:23 PM   #15
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Originally Posted by Kai in Seattle View Post
Use a scale, but do NOT use a household scale.

...
Well of course, since the weight will be well over the limit of a scale used to weigh a single person.... something more like this... Portable Weighing Scales | Portable Scales to Weigh Trucks
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Old 10-13-2019, 08:07 AM   #16
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Name: Kathleen (Kai: ai as in wait)
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Hi gordon2: I know I'm stupid, but not completely. Our scale went to 300 pounds; our tongue weight was 165 - 195. Not expected to go over the limit from some preliminary tongue weights at a machine shop. Figured we had leeway. BUT scale was out in the cold shed for several days while we adjusted various installations for balance, plus whatever else went wrong. Maybe Paul "dropped" the tongue onto the boards. It was also partly a joke. A cautionary tale, an anecdote of what not to do.

Your suggestion is better. Though at the time, we were using what we already had as much as possible. It was the best scale I've ever bought for under $6. (True)
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Old 10-13-2019, 10:29 AM   #17
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Originally Posted by Kai in Seattle View Post
... Our scale went to 300 pounds; our tongue weight was 165 - 195. ...
Misunderstood... I was saying, of course don't use a bathroom scale to measure the side to side weight under the wheels, which would be way over 300 lbs. A bathroom scale often works fine to measure the tongue weight on a fiberglass RV.. I use one myself.
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Old 10-14-2019, 08:17 AM   #18
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Name: Kathleen (Kai: ai as in wait)
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gordon2: thanks for the reply. That's what I thought. Did it matter if it was a human or a trailer tongue? Was going to make a pun out of that, but nah.

BEST
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Old 10-19-2019, 12:29 PM   #19
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Name: sven
Trailer: Casita
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What year is your camper? How old is your axle? Do you store it on a slope?
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Old 10-19-2019, 02:02 PM   #20
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Name: Harold
Trailer: 1975 Scamp, 13-foot
Redding, California
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I was going to try

I was going to try weighing my Scamp's tongue with a bathroom scale but I couldn't get the Scamp into the bathroom.

Seriously though, cheap so-and-so that I are, I made one of these for about $22.00 (and used about a thousand dollars worth of tools to do it). It's suitable for tongue weights to 350 pounds. If I get a trailer that has a higher tongue weight requirement all I need do is replace the gauge. Anything up to 3,000 pounds or so would be fine.

Harold
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