Spring hanger advice

[wygieman]

I know that the topic of failing spring hangers has been more than thoroughly covered before. My friend who has the same 303 unit I have broke a hanger moving his unit to his house this week. In preparation for a trip, I moved my rig home. After viewing his failure, it was clear that some of the breaks were old enough to rust and some portions were shiny from just snapping as other examples on the forum have shown also. I inspected my unit to see if I could see any problems developing. It looks like the passenger side rear hanger has a developing crack (see picture). There is no evidence of the crack on the outside of the hanger through the paint yet or any sign of a crack on the other arm of the hanger. I know I need to repair this before my next trip but I want to do the minimum because my next trip is to a scheduled Morryde IS install on 6/14 where this gear will be thrown away. That is a 900 mile trip from where I live in NC, though, and I want to make sure I make it without incident. I assume I will have vclips welded on. The question in my mind is whether to replace the hanger also. Any suggestions/insights/advice?

[Jlawles2]

The easiest thing I can think to do is cut a small piece of angle iron and lay it with the legs against the top of the hanger (point down) cross ways. Weld all the way around the angle. Since the hanger is only welded on the outside of the U bracket, this will not affect the removal process, will provide ample surface area and if the legs are long enough, support to prevent flex while traveling which will prevent the break from creeping to failure.

[Guest]

I know that the topic of failing spring hangers has been more than thoroughly covered before. My friend who has the same 303 unit I have broke a hanger moving his unit to his house this week. In preparation for a trip, I moved my rig home. After viewing his failure, it was clear that some of the breaks were old enough to rust and some portions were shiny from just snapping as other examples on the forum have shown also. I inspected my unit to see if I could see any problems developing. It looks like the passenger side rear hanger has a developing crack (see picture). There is no evidence of the crack on the outside of the hanger through the paint yet or any sign of a crack on the other arm of the hanger. I know I need to repair this before my next trip but I want to do the minimum because my next trip is to a scheduled Morryde IS install on 6/14 where this gear will be thrown away. That is a 900 mile trip from where I live in NC, though, and I want to make sure I make it without incident. I assume I will have vclips welded on. The question in my mind is whether to replace the hanger also. Any suggestions/insights/advice?

Its almost always the rear. This has been discussed so no point to revisit but this is a valuable pic. Any signs of cracks on the side of the hanger or only at the far back edge? Can you take more pics? V clips on the rear hangers and an X Factor bracket on the middle hanger is all that's needed IMO.

Jim

[Cate&Rob]

wygieman

All of the reported hanger failures have been rear hangers and most have been right rear (mine was). Your picture is the first that I have seen which captures the start of the fracture. I would suggest that you get a "V brace" (discussed at length in other threads) welded into this hanger for the trip to MorRyde. This reinforcement can be welded in without removing the spring and while the trailer is sitting on its wheels. Note that the brace is usually welded on only one side of each leg of the hanger to allow some flex in the hanger for replacing springs and bushings. Since you will be scrapping all this with the new suspension, I would weld the brace to both legs of the hanger and across the ends of the brace to the frame above.

Rob

[Country Campers]

That is a great picture to share. Clearly showing the , already in progress , cracking of the hanger. This should instill in everyone that reads that a proper inspection of the suspension on the RV should be done before each trip , going and coming back home.
I agree with Rob that you should at least install the "V-clip" on this hanger and any other that may hint at failure. The cost associated with this would be minimal compared to a mobile welder or such on your route to get the new IS installed. Morryde will understand that this needed done.

Brian

[wygieman]

wygieman

All of the reported hanger failures have been rear hangers and most have been right rear (mine was). Your picture is the first that I have seen which captures the start of the fracture. I would suggest that you get a "V brace" (discussed at length in other threads) welded into this hanger for the trip to MorRyde. This reinforcement can be welded in without removing the spring and while the trailer is sitting on its wheels. Note that the brace is usually welded on only one side of each leg of the hanger to allow some flex in the hanger for replacing springs and bushings. Since you will be scrapping all this with the new suspension, I would weld the brace to both legs of the hanger and across the ends of the brace to the frame above.

Rob

Thanks, Rob. That is exactly how I would like to attack it. Glad to hear that the vclip/brace can be welded in place without having to take everything apart. I was especially diligent checking this time because I was just over checking my friends broken hanger. I wiped the hanger weld down with alcohol before checking it to clear the grease on the frame which I don’t usually do.It may have made it more visible. Another view of it attached.

[wygieman]

Wrong photo. Trying again.

[Guest]

Wrong photo. Trying again.

Is that a crack at the upper left?

Jim

[Yoda]

Guest

Wrong photo. Trying again.

Jim - It looks like it is 7/8 of the length of the hanger - not good
However a good mobile welder can make quick work of the repair and brace to hold wygieman over.

[Cate&Rob]

Spring hanger reinforcement was discussed and debated at great length, several years ago. The attached has been posted before, but is included here for those who may not have seen this summary of ideas. Details of the "V Clip" reinforcement (which is now a factory addition for Solitudes) is included on page 6.

Rob

Spring Hanger Reinforcement.pdf

[Guest]

Spring hanger reinforcement was discussed and debated at great length, several years ago. The attached has been posted before, but is included here for those who may not have seen this summary of ideas. Details of the "V Clip" reinforcement (which is now a factory addition for Solitudes) is included on page 6.

Rob

[ATTACH]n52978[/ATTACH]

Nice summary Rob,

We need to consider documenting front axle rise on heavy braking which puts most of the stress on the rear hangers, since the rear axle would be doing most of the stopping. The main anchor point on the rear axle are the rear hangers.
This latest golden picture shows the torque from the rear axle is the root cause of crack propagation. From there any flexing and further braking action will take its tole.

Jim

[Cate&Rob]

Guest
As Jim describes . . .

The "ah ha" moment for both hanger side-to-side flex and load transition during braking (where the front tire lifts off the ground) was the LCI Equaflex video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bp5iRVPwYZg The first part of the video shows the constant "fatigue" side-to-side flex of the tall hanger and at about 4:15 of the video, under heavy braking you can see the front tire (to the right in the video) lift and stop rotating while the rear tire takes all the load and does all the braking. This is not "intuitive" (at least no to me) where I would expect weight transfer forward during braking to more heavily load the front axle.

On my trailer (with disc brakes), I get a lot of trailer braking and have observed that the front axle tires are wearing slightly faster than the rear axle tires. I had assumed that this was from the front axle doing most of the braking. In fact, the opposite is true. This additional tire wear is from when the front tires begin to slide rather than rotate as the weight is lifted from this axle during braking.

The interaction between two trailer axles connected through the springs to an equalizer is very complicated. This does share load when crossing a road bump, but puts most of the load onto one axle when braking. This seems to be made worse with overslung vs the traditional underslung spring attachment to the axle. Pat WardellGyrogearloose (an early 303 owner) did some math modelling of the interaction between the two axles . . . and this was getting really mathematically complex .

Rob

[Guest]

Good summary Rob,

If folks are understanding that the heavier the brake apply the less braking you have, this would be the correct thought. Always having good following distance and never doing panic stops to test your brakes will take a great deal of stress off the rear hangers of the rear axle. This will also reduce the likelihood of tire failures on the rear axle as well since, the rear axle is carrying the majority of the load in heavy or panic type stops. When I pointed out the front axle rise in the other place I also gathered my own video from my Imagine and it was found the most side to side or lateral motion on hangers were on the center hangers. This is due to both axles terminated at that point which doubles the lateral loading there.

Its time for torsion axles or at least slipper spring axles on these rigs. A slipper spring setup will not result in front axle rise.

Hope this all helps where its been a great discussion both then and now.

Jim

[wygieman]

Just for followup. I had the v-brace welded in the rear hangers on both sides of the rig yesterday. It was quick and easy once I got the parts from Lippert. The good news is that the v-braces are less than $5 plus shipping. The install was done on my rig without taking anything apart and took only an hour at the welder so was also inexpensive. The bad news was it took a week and a half to get the parts. My friend who broke the hanger still hasn’t received the parts to allow him to fix his problem two weeks in. I assume if the failure happens on the road the parts will need to be fabricated if you want to get back on the road. The good news for my friend is that Lippert is covering the cost of the repair under warranty since he is right at the end of the 3 years covered. My conclusion from the failures we both had in addition to those reported on the forums over time is that the 303rls of my timeframe (2018) is very susceptible to this problem. Probably this very similar to the greasy brakes issue and Lippert is treating it the same way - fix on fail. Both of our rigs have around 25,000 miles on them over 3 years. In my opinion, any 303rls of similar status is very susceptible to the problem. It is very cheap and easy to have the v-braces added to the hangers before there is a failure. My advice is not to put it off if your unit is this vintage and mileage. Just do it and prevent a problem on the road.

[Cate&Rob]

The V brace is simply a piece of 1/4" flat bar 1 7/8" x 6" bent to 90 degrees. See the attachment to post #10. The width is critical so that there is enough flex in the opposite side of the hanger to accommodate changing springs . . . so, don't use 2" flat bar. But, 6" x 1/4" flat bar is a common item. Any welding / fabrication shop can cut 1 7/8" slices off this. When I had these reinforcements installed (by LCI techs) they fabricated the parts as described. No need to order these from LCI.

Rob