Hooking and unhooking questions

Slow down and take your time, get out of the truck and check things out multiple times if you need to.

The fact your truck doesn't have an air dump isn't doing you any favors, the trailer can be adjusted by cranking the landing gear in low gear, not fun but not too difficult either. Raise it up a little or lower it slightly, better safe than sorry.

 

You either have air or you don't. Unfortunately sometimes the only thing you can do is crank the trailer up higher. If it's uneven from side to side you can put some wood under one side of the landing gear but that might make it hard to mate the truck and trailer for the next person. If you and on a slope you will have to crank it up higher or else you king pin will come close to the cross member. Under normal circumstances I will lower the landing gear to about 2 inches from the ground except if I have a very heavy trailer I will let it just touch the ground. I don't have air bags either. I doubt if your truck is "jumping up" when you get out from under it but just feels that way. Lower your landing gear more and it wont do that. You dont want to 'bang' into your fifth wheel when hooking up. There is no reason you cant just slide into it easy and listen for the click. Sometimes because of the weight of the trailer and how high someone before you has dropped it, you will have to ram it to get the trailer up on the fifth wheel but after it's up there take it easy. Keep your plate greased. It's good you sent your truck to the shop because you should not have to slam it in to the trailer to get it latched. Maybe it was just all gunked up.

 

Be careful with those bent handles. If it's all the way in it will be shortened and give the illusion that everything is normal and the arm won't be all the way around the kingpin. Y'all get your minds out of the gutter, we are taking about trucking here.

 

I agree w/ rogueunh above. When hooking up, after 20+ yrs. I still always get under it with a flashlight, even daytime, and visually check that the fifth wheel locking jaw is around the pin. Be careful when backing under it, don't bang it in there too hard, I've seen many careless guys damage equipment, like the 'back of cab dents', don't be lazy. I back up to a trailer so the fifth wheel is near the front of the trlr plate, then get out and check that the level of 5th whl is close to height of trailer plate. If trlr is too low crank it up with the landing gear.

When I pull out from under one, I do it slowly til the tlr slides down the 5th whl, and stop to check mirrors that the trlr is not tipping hard to one side or something. If the trlr seemed to drop hard off the 5th, I get out to check and see why, check that both landing feet are pretty level on ground, usually I will crank the gear up higher a little bit so its easier to hook up later.

 

If you are on uneven ground see if you can find a piece of wood, or, a steel plate to put under the landing gear to try and level things. Then, you can lower gear as normal.
As far as tug test, yes two times, then, get out and look to make sure the king pin is seated all the way down in the fifth wheel and the locking jaws are completely around the king pin shaft and locked.

What happened is a easy mistake. The fact you are willing to ask questions and learn shows a great attitude on your part.

 

CAN'T STRESS THIS ENOUGH

I have a question, how many people dump the air in their suspension to hook up?