geoffdaddy 33 Posted February 28, 2014 Report Share Posted February 28, 2014 Hey guys: We have a Jayco X18D. We love the camper, but one thing I don't love about it is the tongue weight. Unladen, but with all the equipment the tongue weight is in excess of 600lbs (this despite the manufacturers 390lb advertised weight). In general I load heavy as far back in the camper as I can to counter balance this, which breaks the general rule of thumb of loading toward the front, but the trailer is so front heavy we've never had stability issues doing this in all the typical sway conditions you might experience. Still, I'd like a little more flexibility in loading the camper, so that brings me to: The two obvious targets to lighten the tongue are the 30lb propane canister and the SRM-24 battery. The battery is of course in the neighborhood of 50-60lbs. We never camp without shore power so one possibility is swapping this joker out for a breakaway battery and for the rare occasion that we need it switching to LED lighting inside. This would have I think two benefits: most breakaway batteries I've seen are in the 5lb range, and they are also 1/5 the cost of the RV/marine battery. We have camped a whole season without a single fillup on our propane tank, so a smaller tank should be feasible. We still need a battery for the brakes in a breakaway condition...will the small breakaway battery be sufficient? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Grumpy and Grandma 740 Posted February 28, 2014 Report Share Posted February 28, 2014 Why not switch to a small tractor or motorcycle battery? It would give you a little more amp/hours and also probably be better on the converter/charger. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted February 28, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 28, 2014 Why not switch to a small tractor or motorcycle battery? It would give you a little more amp/hours and also probably be better on the converter/charger. I had thought that too... they are still fairly light so that might be an option as well. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mouseketab.....Carol 1,261 Posted February 28, 2014 Report Share Posted February 28, 2014 You may also need a battery for your furnace and air conditioner thermostat. While my heat pump unit works on electric, the thermostat is 12V, so needs a working converter and/or battery to run. Also, RV converters are notoriously cheap. The couple times I have turned the battery off and forgotten to turn it back on, some of the 12V stuff running purely off the converter act a little wonky. (Lights flicker, the display on the radio flashes). My dad said that the battery acts as kind of a "controller" for the converter to keep things steady and good power. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted March 5, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 5, 2014 You may also need a battery for your furnace and air conditioner thermostat. While my heat pump unit works on electric, the thermostat is 12V, so needs a working converter and/or battery to run. Also, RV converters are notoriously cheap. The couple times I have turned the battery off and forgotten to turn it back on, some of the 12V stuff running purely off the converter act a little wonky. (Lights flicker, the display on the radio flashes). My dad said that the battery acts as kind of a "controller" for the converter to keep things steady and good power. Oh, we'll definitely have a battery of some type. The appeal to this solution of course is that the breakaway batteries are 5lbs vs the 50 lbs of the real deal. I could probably save 70 pounds or so by downsizing the battery and LP bottle. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
LONE-STAR 370 Posted March 6, 2014 Report Share Posted March 6, 2014 600 pounds is not a very heavy tounge weight. Unless your trailer is really small. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted March 6, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 6, 2014 600 pounds is not a very heavy tounge weight. Unless your trailer is really small. I would agree that it wouldn't be a problem on a truck, but our Acadia's max tongue is 600lbs. With careful loading I can get it there, but I'd like more margin. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
caveat lector 181 Posted March 6, 2014 Report Share Posted March 6, 2014 Hope you get your answer. There are a lot of experienced/smart folks here.With a thread title like that, I'm wondering how long until the snarky goes R rated Quote Link to post Share on other sites
arthuruscg 34 Posted March 6, 2014 Report Share Posted March 6, 2014 The Jayco X18D is a 18 hybrid. So it should be fairly light. I agree that they tongue weight is high. A brake away battery would work, but a small motorcycle/ tractor battery would be under 10lbs and provide for atleast a few hours of 12v lighting. Check with marine places near you for a 10 or 5 lbs propane tank. Also, for evey pound you remove from the tongue, the tongue weight will reduce by 2x the amount. So, droping 60 pounds off the tongue will lightening the tongue about 120lbs. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
LONE-STAR 370 Posted March 7, 2014 Report Share Posted March 7, 2014 I would agree that it wouldn't be a problem on a truck, but our Acadia's max tongue is 600lbs. With careful loading I can get it there, but I'd like more margin.Ok I get it now. I have always dreamed of a 600 pound tounge weight. Mine is 1400 if I load it perfect. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted March 7, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 7, 2014 The Jayco X18D is a 18 hybrid. So it should be fairly light. I agree that they tongue weight is high. A brake away battery would work, but a small motorcycle/ tractor battery would be under 10lbs and provide for atleast a few hours of 12v lighting. Check with marine places near you for a 10 or 5 lbs propane tank. Also, for evey pound you remove from the tongue, the tongue weight will reduce by 2x the amount. So, droping 60 pounds off the tongue will lightening the tongue about 120lbs. Yeah, dry weight is supposed to be 3600lbs, GVWR is 4400. Really? This seems counterintuitive. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
arthuruscg 34 Posted March 7, 2014 Report Share Posted March 7, 2014 Ups, I had a brake fart. I was thinking if you are moving weight from the tongue and placing it on the bumper. When we were moving stuff around in my dads trailer we figured for about every 1 pound you remove from in front of the axle, the tongue weight will reduce by 1/2 the amount. So, dropping 30 pounds in front of the axle will lightening the tongue about 15lbsThe difference will not be exactly 1/2, there is calculators for removing weight based on how far away from the axle. But the weight closest to the ends of the trailer is near 1 to 1. I think reducing the batter and LP tank weight would be 1 to 1. But say moving stuff inside the trailer would be 2 to 1 or less. If you were to move a dutch oven, 15lbs, from the front compartment to the back, you would reduce the tongue weight by 30lbs. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
LONE-STAR 370 Posted March 8, 2014 Report Share Posted March 8, 2014 So he would do better to keep the heavy battery and relocate it to the rear of the trailer. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
arthuruscg 34 Posted March 8, 2014 Report Share Posted March 8, 2014 Yes but not to many people want a battery box bolted to the tongue or deal with properly venting and sealing for mounting the battery inside. Sent from my Moto X using Tapatalk Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted March 10, 2014 Author Report Share Posted March 10, 2014 Okay, I thought maybe I was missing something, lol... yeah, I was referring to removing rather than relocating the weight near the tongue. In our case, the wheels are set back fairly far on the camper, so it would probably be a reduction of somewhat less than 2:1. I have read that moving the battery to the back bumper is completely legal to do, but can be bad for the health of the battery since it would be a jouncy ride back there. I'm not tempted to put the battery in the camper due to the venting issue (and potential for leakage), plus there's not really a good place to do this midships or aft of the axle. We just did a camp this past weekend with it... I weighed the rig at a truck scale. Our GCWR was well within limits with what we had... 9660lbs. I think I overhitched it though as the front axle had more weight than the back (don't have the numbers handy right now). I imagine that putting a link in the bar's chain would have addressed that issue. (edit: Acadia's GCWR is 10,250lbs) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mouseketab.....Carol 1,261 Posted April 3, 2014 Report Share Posted April 3, 2014 . I'm not tempted to put the battery in the camper due to the venting issue (and potential for leakage), plus there's not really a good place to do this midships or aft of the axle. Mine is that way from the factory, inside a battery box underneath a closet inside my camper. With the venting built in. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
geoffdaddy 33 Posted April 3, 2014 Author Report Share Posted April 3, 2014 Mine is that way from the factory, inside a battery box underneath a closet inside my camper. With the venting built in. I'm sure it could be done as I've seen those fully sealed battery boxes... it's just that in our camper there's not really a good place inside to mount one, other than the front storage compartment which would kind of defeat the point. There are a couple of other compartments further back but I hate to use those up with a battery. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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