When we bought our GeoPro, neither of us had ever hooked up more than small boat or utility trailers. We could usually move them around by hand and never had to worry about leveling. We’ve had to develop a simple process that works for us. For folks in a similar boat, we are sharing that process as a checklist in hopes that it provides a starting point for your own system.
Hooking Up
- Make sure the wheels are chocked and camper steps are up.
- Run up the stabilizers and remove any blocks.
- Lower the tongue jack to raise the tongue and provide clearance for the hitch ball.
- Back-up until the hitch ball is just under the receiver on the trailer tongue.
- Lower the tongue onto the hitch ball and lock it. Bump the Tow Vehicle a tiny bit forward if necessary to get the hitch to seat firmly.
- Insert the hitch pin.
- Install the sway / weight distribution bars. If you have bars or chains, lower the tongue jack about 6″ to make installing them easier. This will push the hitch up and little.
- Hook up the chains (make sure they are crossed underneath the hitch).
- Hook up the trailer connector to the Tow Vehicle.
- Raise the tongue jack fully and stow the removable foot if you have one.
- Pull forward or backward to remove pressure from one set of chocks. Remove them, then back up and remove the other set of chocks.
Un-hooking
Un-hooking is a little more complicated because you have to ensure the camper is level, especially if you want the fridge to work properly. Basically, you level side-to-side first, disconnect from the Tow Vehicle and then level front-to-back and lower stabilizers at the end.
- Pull or back-in to your camping spot. Give yourself two feet of wiggle room front to back.
- Check for level from side-to-side (we do this from the black trim on the front of the camper using a 24″ level).
- Determine the ‘low side’ and put blocks or Anderson levelers in front of or behind the wheels and pull onto the leveling blocks. Recheck level from side-to-side.
- Chock the wheels on the front and back.
- Lower the tongue jack all the way. Again, lower the tongue jack while still connected to the Tow Vehicle about 6″ more to make removing sway bars or chains easier.
- Remove sway bars or chains.
- Raise the tongue jack until you can disconnect the hitch lock and remove the hitch pin. Lower the tongue jack until the tongue is above the hitch ball.
- Disconnect trailer connector from Tow Vehicle.
- Disconnect trailer safety chains.
- Pull the Tow Vehicle forward away from the trailer hitch.
- Check level from front-to-back. We do this on our water heater cover.
- Raise or lower the tongue jack until the trailer is level front-to-back.
- Lower front and rear stabilizers until JUST snug. These are NOT to be used for leveling.
- Install your hitch lock if you’ll be leaving camp.
- Lower the camper steps and start camping!