EVALUATION OF ANDERSON & STABLELOADS

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06-21-2014, 04:51 PM

BPofMD

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EVALUATION OF ANDERSON & STABLELOADS

Product Evaluation of Anderson 5th Wheel Hitch & Anderson 5<sup>th</sup> Wheel Hitch & Torklift StableLoad

A while back I promised an evaluation the above 2 products. I finally got the chance last week. We left Friday for a campground up in Pennsylvania – about 4 hours away from home. The route took me over most all kinds of roads except dirt . On the way up I did NOT engage the StableLoads because I wanted to be able to compare them to not using and using. As the hitch also was new, that way it let me insure that it (the hitch) didn’t interfere with the evaluation.
I really couldn’t believe how differently the hitch acted compared to my old Reese 14K. The ride was so smooth it was like I wasn’t towing at all but just had a lot of weight I was carrying. Missing was the bucking and bumping of the trailer hitch pin in the jaws of the Reese. Didn’t need any lubrication on the ball either, so no grease on me. If I even get NEAR grease, I have it all over me!
Hooking up was not the problem I thought it might be. I was able to center the ball onto the coupler in no more steps than with the Reese…. maybe fewer. I did have to lift the trailer a little higher to get the coupler to get over the top of the ball. The same with un-hooking. That wasn’t a problem for me, the RV had plenty of jack to do it.
All the way up I kept mentioning to Penny (wife) on how I had to keep a close eye on the speedometer as I was missing the noise that the Reese made and because of the smoothness of the hitch towing. There was quite a bit of traffic so I didn’t want to use cruise control.
One other nice thing for me was the fact that the ball wasn’t so high that I couldn’t close my sliding bedcover (Peragon Retractable Aluminum Truck Bed Covers - Family Owned. American Made.) after getting the trailer set up at the campground.

On the return trip Tuesday I engaged the StableLoads. That was a slight problem for me. I don’t know if it was because they were new or because I even tried to used them on the front of my (stock) rear overload springs. The spacing was right at the minimum for using them so I had to use the hitch to lift the truck’s rear enough to engage them. But once I did that everything seemed ok. I hit some pretty good bumps and road surfaces that gave them a chance to work. I can’t say that the ride wasn’t THAT much different than the ride up was however. My truck only has about 60,000 miles on it and most of that is with the RV attached. Could be that the stock overloads do a good enough job. Knowing what I know now, I probably would not purchase them but as they are now installed, I’m not planning on removing them. In all fairness, I don’t think that ANY aftermarket overloads would have made that big a difference to my ride. My truck did come with the trailer tow package so perhaps my rear springs were sufficient.
If anyone has any questions, I’d be happy to answer them, if I could.

Bud (BPofMD)
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06-21-2014, 05:29 PM

senix

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Great review! Watching that Anderson setup. Would love to shed some weight.

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07-29-2014, 02:43 PM

BPofMD

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UPDATE ON STABLELOADS:

After my evaluation of the StableLoads above, the President of Torklift International, Jack Kay and I have been talking. He recommended and I confirmed that the version that I had installed (7310) were probably NOT the ones I should have used. He volunteered to replace those with version A7200 that fit in place of the factory pads on the UPPER overload springs. The new set came in this morning and it took me only an hour (or less) to install them. I don't leave on the next camping trip until Monday (Aug 4) for New York. I will up this review after I return the following week. Meanwhile here's two photos on the driver side with the A7200's installed.

FRONT DRIVERS SIDE:

REAR DRIVERS SIDE:

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07-29-2014, 05:56 PM

BossGasser

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Thank you, Bud

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07-29-2014, 06:04 PM

nojoke327

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Regardless of ride quality, how was the ride height affected with the lowers engaged. I know withy top overload blocks that I made my rear was raised almost 3/4"

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07-29-2014, 06:50 PM

senix

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Makes sense that there would a different set when you have the overloads.

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07-29-2014, 07:08 PM

BPofMD

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Quote:

Originally Posted by nojoke327

Regardless of ride quality, how was the ride height affected with the lowers engaged. I know with top overload blocks that I made my rear was raised almost 3/4"

Ride HEIGHT wasn't really affected at all. But remember that those were the wrong ones for my ride.

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EVALUATION OF ANDERSON & STABLELOADS

EVALUATION OF ANDERSON & STABLELOADS

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