Parking in high wind!

[homelesshartshorns]

I understand when parked in high wind, parking headed into the wind or with wind behind you is ideal. What if your parked and on jacks with wind from the side. Should I keep jacks down or pull them up and rock with the wind?

[Devilishjim]

Good question Now if a person had long beams to tie to stabilizers ?  I personally think stabs down would be best to keep it from trying to go over.

[I'mdonewiththis forum]

Definitely keep the stabilizers down. The more it rocks with the wind the easier it will tip.

[Mr. Camper]

Personally, I'd rather take the time to save my wife and I along with any grandkids with us.  The RV can be replaced...we can't be.

[Devilishjim]

3 hours ago, Mr. Camper said:

Personally, I'd rather take the time to save my wife and I along with any grandkids with us.  The RV can be replaced...we can't be.

Sure you can just ask my ex-wives!  Yeah if the wind was blowing hard enough to put doubt in your mind I'm sure they would abandon ship. I think ?

[homelesshartshorns]

My question was directed to have best options for my equipment in a blow. If the rig is blowing away I would be asking Jesus for help. I was curious about bending jacks or best way for my equipment to ride out a blow.

[I'mdonewiththis forum]

In my feeble mind the best way to ride out a blow is to have my truck connected to the trailer with the truck at 45* or more to the trailer.

[GlennWest]

A storm came up here Wednesday and had us rocking. We couldn't leave. Too rough outside to hook up or get to vehicles.Rain was horizontal. Everything is fine but a very unnerving time.

[rynosback]

I agree with

1. landing gear down

2. Truck connected at an angle

3. Fill you holding and dump Tanks for better center of gravity and it will take more to push you around.

4. The best situation is to avoid all together, but sometimes it does not work out that way.

[Alie&Jim's Carrilite]

When we were in Eastern NC, we got smacked with hurricanes every other year or so.  What I did was put the slides in if possible, fill all the tanks like mentioned above, and load the rear levelers and front gear as much as possible.  

I would run the nose gear all the way up lowering the nose until I could put the rear stabilizers most of the way down on 12 x 12 pads, then run the front back up with the landing gear also on large pads until the front was slightly high.  This unloaded the suspension significantly and reduced rocking.  The large pads also help the 5th wheel from sinking or making depressions into the ground when rocking. 

First Carrlite 5th wheel was 15k and actually got moved around once.  Our current is around 17 empty and it never budged in 80-100 mph winds.

[Kirk W]

I would keep the jacks down. I can't recall ever having heard of someone having leveling jacks bent by a wind storm and if they did, I don't think that I'd want to be in the RV when it happened. I suspect your motorhome would tip over before the jacks bend.

[sandsys]

When we faced 70 mph winds in Quartzsite in our Winnebago View we pulled the slide in and turned the vehicle to head into the wind. We didn't have jacks then. When the wind changed direction, so did we. An advantage of a Class C with no toad in the open desert.

Linda Sand

[Second Chance]

4 hours ago, rynosback said:

I agree with

1. landing gear down

2. Truck connected at an angle

3. Fill you holding and dump Tanks for better center of gravity and it will take more to push you around.

4. The best situation is to avoid all together, but sometimes it does not work out that way.

X2. In order to bend the landing gear/stabilizers, the rig would have to be scooted sideways, backward, or forward. Rocking back and forth won't bend them as the force is downward on the leeward (down-wind) side of the rig. Ballast down low (filling tanks) is good, too. If you're not already still hitched up, I wouldn't venture out in extremely high winds to do so. We've weathered 60 - 65 MPH straight winds from various directions and only experienced moderate rocking - and our fiver only weighs about 14K lbs.

Rob

[JimK]

There is nothing more frightening than being in an RV with high winds.  Fortunately I have only had that happen a few times.  The first was one of the worse....a hurricane on Hatteras.  The sirens blasted, the winds picked up, there was no where to go and driving was worse than sitting still.  We pointed into the wind, braced the jacks and waited it out.  It was a looong night and it was still blowing the next day.  In Death Valley, high winds hit and I got behind a class A.  That helped a bit the first night.  The next day the winds were worse and I found a parking lot at Zabriskie point that was sheltered.  When the winds let up I returned to the campground and found that a 5th wheeler had been lifted off the jack, moved a few feet and dropped onto the ground.  I had my 3rd worse experience in Mojave.  The winds were variable up to about 50 mph so there were less than my other two experiences, but there was no where to park in the campground except broadside to the winds.  Temps dropped to the low 30s but I could not run the furnace since the wind was hitting that side of the camper.  Another very long, cold night with no sleep.

In all three of my really bad experiences, I was parked in the open.  Maybe that was better than being in the woods with falling trees and limbs.  After my experiences, I pay attention to reports of extreme bad weather both for driving and for camping.  I also look for a backup plan. 

[Kirk W]

1 hour ago, JimK said:

In all three of my really bad experiences, I was parked in the open.  Maybe that was better than being in the woods with falling trees and limbs.  After my experiences, I pay attention to reports of extreme bad weather both for driving and for camping.  I also look for a backup plan. 

1

That brings to mind an incident when we were campground hosts at My Old Kentucky Home State Park. When we arrived the campground manager told us that the host usually stays on #5 but that we could have any site we wished. We chose #7 for the nicer view. About a month later we were out of the park when a major thunderstorm hit with violent winds. The park has many very tall trees and those winds broke large limbs from several of the trees, but the one over #5 got our attention. The limb was about 6" in diameter and perhaps 15' long and when it fell the but end went completely through the roof of a fifth wheel parked there, stopping with the small limbs protruding through the roof and the but resting on the floor of the RV! Since that time we have been very cautious about parking under large trees in bad weather.

[JimK]

Unfortunately it does not just take bad weather.  Limbs can fall and trees split open in perfectly decent weather.  One of my favorite campgrounds was permanently closed and the trees cut down because they had become overgrown and old.  I guess that campground is finally open again, but I have not had the interest in taking a look.  It will be decades before the trees return in any decent size.

[rynosback]

8 hours ago, Kirk Wood said:

That brings to mind an incident when we were campground hosts at My Old Kentucky Home State Park. When we arrived the campground manager told us that the host usually stays on #5 but that we could have any site we wished. We chose #7 for the nicer view. About a month later we were out of the park when a major thunderstorm hit with violent winds. The park has many very tall trees and those winds broke large limbs from several of the trees, but the one over #5 got our attention. The limb was about 6" in diameter and perhaps 15' long and when it fell the but end went completely through the roof of a fifth wheel parked there, stopping with the small limbs protruding through the roof and the but resting on the floor of the RV! Since that time we have been very cautious about parking under large trees in bad weather.

I try not to park under trees.  I prefer a wide open lot.  But I am also 13" 6' and am always looking high so I do not hit tree branches. I have had to cut a few of them to get into my site over the past completely of years.

[Ray,IN]

Back to your question; jacks down makes your RV more stable even though the footprint is smaller than your wheelbase. If a wind hits that rocks your RV, you then have 4 jacks on the ground and 4 wheels on the ground.

[I'mdonewiththis forum]

I just may find out how things go today. I am in Lone Star, Texas and there are strong to severe storms south and west of up heading towards me. The weather channel is saying their rating has us at a six out of ten chance of things going bad......

[ms60ocb]

We weathered a cross wind in MN last year in the dark. My wife's advise was get our shoes and clothes on.

Today we are hoping the storm hits in the tail end

From north of Austin TX

Clay

[Kirk W]

10 hours ago, Ray,IN said:

Back to your question; jacks down makes your RV more stable even though the footprint is smaller than your wheelbase. If a wind hits that rocks your RV, you then have 4 jacks on the ground and 4 wheels on the ground.

1

Totally agree. I also keep potable water full and at least 1/2 fill both black and gray water tanks to lower the center of gravity. I'd retract all slides to keep wind from getting under them and lower the TV antenna. If possible, park downwind of something large and durable that will help to block wind for you. 

[Smitty77_7]

For those with Class A's that have air leveling, it's a bit different. 

Yes to the points above about:

-Pointing the rear toward the prevailing wind direction

-Bring in slides

-Full water, and we do about 3/4 black, and 3/4 grey to allow some usage 

-As we are air leveling, I dump the air to lower the coach as much as possible (about 4-5" lower then average leveling heights).

And I'll share that on another thread that takes about Jacks up or Jacks down during storms. Many thought that by having the jacks up, the coach suspension could slightly lean from the wind force, allowing some of the force to glance slightly up. Where as leveled with Jacks down, it was more of a vertical forced wall that it would hit... (I could see the virtues of both. And will share that during Microcell burst last year in North Dakota, that we did see Fiver with jacks down tipped over. We also had two sites away from us, a 34-36' Class A gasser, and he had his Jacks up - you could visibly see his coach rock to the side some from the stronger gusts. Very possible that little bit of leaning was enough to help ease some of the wind force up and over his coach. (He did lose his rear AC shroud in this 15-20 mins of rocking and rolling.). And please note. The fiver that was tipped over was in a different campground about 5 miles away. And by looking at the volume of down trees as we drove thru the campground, compared to the many broken limbs only in our campground - suspect they had much more of the force of the winds from this microcell burst. So sure not saying the reason the fiver was tipped over was because the jacks were down... 

Just wanted to share from the other thread, the thought process of Jacks up might help let some of the direct wind force scrub off and over the roof, if coming from the side. 

I for one, hope to avoid areas where needing to do all of this is required:)!

Travel safe, and best to all,

Smitty

[I'mdonewiththis forum]

Well, I didn't find out much today. Other than one tornado warning (radar indicated, no confirmation), we only had extremely heavy rain and maybe 40 mph gusts from the side while set up.

[elliott-maine]

Slides in, jacks down was the way we faced a 40mph with 60mph gusts one night.  Worked well for us.

[Mike and Claudia]

George:

Don't you still have your wheels?

Move that thing!