Options for heavy duty pin box

[BPepper]

I have a Travel Supreme toy hauler and I am currently looking for a new pin box. Who makes a pin box in the 26,000 to 30,000 pound rated capacity. I haven't had any luck in my searching. Thanks

[Chad Heiser]

2 minutes ago, BPepper said:

I have a Travel Supreme toy hauler and I am currently looking for a new pin box. Who makes a pin box in the 26,000 to 30,000 pound rated capacity. I haven't had any luck in my searching. Thanks

Do you want a standard extended pin box or do you want to switch to a straight down pin box (assuming you tow with an HDT with the 5er hitch at or near the back of the frame)?

If you want a standard extended pin box, then I am partial to MorRyde.  I have had several of their pin boxes and have been very happy with them.  

If you are looking to switch to a straight down pin box to shorten the gap between your HDT and trailer then Jack Mayer at RVHLifestyles has a very nice one.  It is a direct replacement for DRV pin boxes and has a higher capacity than their stock MorRyde pin boxes.  Assuming the bolt pattern on your Travel supreme is the same, it would be a nice upgrade.  I have one of these on my current DRV and am very happy with it.

[Hewhoknowslittle]

I would check with Jack at RVH Lifestyles. 
He will be able to help you with this. 
Roger

[BPepper]

I'm towing with a hdt and et hitch. I have a trail air pin box currently. My pin box is not made anymore and I'm not sure what the weight capacity of it is. I'm setting up to double tow a car behind the fifth wheel and want to make sure the pin box is capable of handling the weight. I will need a standard extended pin box or even possibly a extended pin box. I have a honda pioneer on the deck of the hdt and dont have the room for a straight down pin box.

[Chad Heiser]

30 minutes ago, BPepper said:

I'm towing with a hdt and et hitch. I have a trail air pin box currently. My pin box is not made anymore and I'm not sure what the weight capacity of it is. I'm setting up to double tow a car behind the fifth wheel and want to make sure the pin box is capable of handling the weight. I will need a standard extended pin box or even possibly a extended pin box. I have a honda pioneer on the deck of the hdt and dont have the room for a straight down pin box.

Then I definitely recommend the MorRyde rubber pin box.  It is a nice set up and is well built.  

[BPepper]

I looked at the MorRyde pin boxes and it seems the highest there rated to is 24k. I need a higher rated box then that. 

[Star Dreamer]

We had RVH Lifestyles make us a custom pin box rated at 32k as our bolt pattern did not match the DRV ones they normally make.  I took accurate measurements, pictures and did an AutoCad drawing for them but your best bet would be to stop by there and let them do the measurements if you need something custom made. Their website has the dimensions of the DRV pin box if it helps.

[BPepper]

Thanks, that's the info I was looking for. If you don't mind me asking what did your pin box cost to have made? 

[Star Dreamer]

1 hour ago, BPepper said:

Thanks, that's the info I was looking for. If you don't mind me asking what did your pin box cost to have made? 

I don't recall the exact amount but it was just a little more than their standard DRV one, which is on their website, because it was a one off, plus we paid for installing it. The old one was pretty lightweight, but the new one was much heavier and glad we let them install it.

[phoenix2013]

13 hours ago, BPepper said:

I'm towing with a hdt and et hitch. I have a trail air pin box currently. My pin box is not made anymore and I'm not sure what the weight capacity of it is. I'm setting up to double tow a car behind the fifth wheel and want to make sure the pin box is capable of handling the weight. I will need a standard extended pin box or even possibly a extended pin box. I have a honda pioneer on the deck of the hdt and dont have the room for a straight down pin box.

BPepper, if you have an ET hitch you don't need anything but a standard steel pin box. The ET provides lot more antichucking action built-in than the gizmos I have seen on other pinboxes to help with that. Also air pinboxes sometime get into "disagreement" with an ET due to the fact that the single airbag in the pinbox is totally out of phase response wise to the four airbags in the ET (short time response vs. long time response). In those situations I had the customers remove the external shock absorber on the pinbox and replace it with a solid length of steel bar, in essence immobilizing the pinbox and then inflate its airbag to maximum.

Edited March 12, 2020 by phoenix2013

[aknavy]

1 hour ago, phoenix2013 said:

BPepper, if you have an ET hitch you don't need anything but a standard steel pin box. The ET provides lot more antichucking action built-in than the gizmos I have seen on other pinboxes to help with that. Also air pinboxes sometime get into "disagreement" with an ET due to the fact that the single airbag in the pinbox is totally out of phase response wise to the four airbags in the ET (short time response vs. long time response). In those situations I had the customers remove the external shock absorber on the pinbox and replace it with a solid length of steel bar, in essence immobilizing the pinbox and then inflate its airbag to maximum.

Isn't he more concerned about the weight capacity vice chucking?  I may be looking for a heavier duty one in the near future as well.

[Jim & Wilma]

Travel Supreme made some well built RVs. In our travels, talking with folks that owned or worked on TS RVs, I’ve not come across anyone that knew of structural issues.  Having said that, all RVs have limits.  

 

I’m not familiar with TS’s Rally Sport toyhauler specs, but I’m guessing you’ve got three 8K axles and GVWR is around 24K.  What are your loads?  Are these loads within the GVWR?  If the pin box is a concern, are you confident the structure supporting the pin box is sufficient?

[phoenix2013]

Travel Supremes were well built trailers, but in the times they were built these class of rigs, even the heaviest were, in the low 20's GVW. As Jim and Wilma suggest the frame is more an issue than a pinbox, although that was not a problem with Supremes, Tetons, Carriages and couple other top brands. All the heavier rigs came with straight down or were small forward tilt pinboxes, again optimized for carrying the loads onto the rest of the frame. Installing aftermarket stuff particularly one that extends the kingpin way forward from the original factory position is not doing the frame any good in the long run. All "standard" pin boxes will handle associated GVWs into the low 20's, also regardless of the model or rig they are all mounted with the same six grade eight, 5/8 bolts.

All use the same kingpins, the difference between the boxes going into more conventional trailers and the "super heavies" (25-35K GVW), the likes of Spacecraft, New Horizon and couple others is the way the kingpin is mounted and the thickness of the "shoe plate" through which the kingpin protrudes into the pinbox and the internal welding method.

Nothing "magical" about pinboxes and lots of BS about liability etc., from welding shops that don't want to touch them. Now I wouldn't want Lippert building these by the same guys that weld their frames.

I built a "super duty" pinbox for a heavy (extra thick shoe plate) and modified others that were all screwed up.

Standard pinbox that needed to be extended by several inches to make the fifth track flat

Moryde pinbox that needed to be extended by three inches to make the fifth pull level (from the lowest position for mounting the pin box). The aftermarket people (or the sales people peddling these) are often not from the right side of the intelligence curve. Both of the boxes you see above were installed without any consideration that even in the lowest mounting position the kingpin on both boxes was going to be way below the 47 inches from the ground. As a result the front axles on both rigs carried several hundreds pounds more weigh that the rear axles. With the fix both axles equalized. Two different shops welded these boxes for me, the welders who did the actual welding had decades of experience and bunch of certificates. 

[phoenix2013]

Here's part two of more education (and less opinion).  What you see below is a forged kingpin which is installed in every tractor trailer in the trucking industry.

It's forged from single blank of steel, very happy to pull 60,000 lbs. loads or more, you can get one for between  $50-$70 bucks. That's too much money for the RV industry (and frankly they don't need anything this good for the weight of typical trailer) so they use a machined pin turned on the lathe from a round rod. Incidentally the dimension for the RV pin vs. the commercial pin are identical with one exception, that nice over-sized mushroom welding flange on top is missing, it's same diameter all the way up. Now comes the fun part, you cannot have any weld on the outside where it protrudes down from the shoe plate, all the welding has to be done inside the pinbox and you do not have that nice big flange to put a nice welding bead around it. So the welders "improvise" by putting all kinds of crap around the pin shank (hunks of angle, hunks of steel plate, etc.), I have some archived pictures of these "beauties" from my past "investigations".

I am not surprised that any welding shop ran by a "real welder" would take one look inside there and have no desire to deal with crap like that. This is not a blanket assessment of all pinbox manufacturers, all I am saying that I have seen few pinboxes built like that.

I spent two months at Youngs Welding transitioning the manufacture of all ETs in their facility. They also manufacture a line of pulling and hitching accessories with goosenecks and king pins. Their stuff is top notch and first class. I am not surprised that Marc and Jack chose Youngs to fabricate for them the pinboxes they market through RVH Lifestyles. 

 

 

Edited March 14, 2020 by phoenix2013