How to CORRECTLY Set Up a Travel Trailer w/ Downloadable RV Setup Checklist!

after setting up a travel trailer for 8 years now I can tell you I've learned one very important thing order matters there are specific steps that need to be done in a very specific order and if some of these steps are done in the wrong order it can actually cause damage to the components on your trailer over time that's something I learned directly from working with the engineers who manufacture this equipment there's a lot of misinformation about this process we'll talk about that a little bit later but let's get started with the video first things first you arrive at the campground before you even pull into your site walk around the site check for any hazards high and low broken glass large rocks equipment the last campers might have left on site it's also a good time to visualize where you're going to park your trailer in the site so that once it's time to set up you can set everything up how you want okay you pulled into your campsite the very first step to setting up a travel trailer is to grab your EMS or surge protector and plug it into the power pedestal if for whatever reason there's a problem with the power at your specific campsite you want to know this before you start setting everything chances are the campgr is not going to be able to immediately fix the problem at your campsite and they're probably just going to move you to a new site so before connecting to the pedestal make sure you turn the breakers off plug in your EMS or surge protector and then turn the breakers on after you've confirmed good power at the pedestal turn the breakers off and unplug your EMS or search protector remember you always want to have the breakers turned off when you're plugging in or unplugging next just head over to the water faucet crack it open and make sure you have running water again this is something you want to check before you start setting everything up the next thing I'll do is just walk around the RV unlock all the doors and storage compartments and now we're going to check clearances you want to be sure that you're parked in an area where you can open all of your slideouts you also want to make sure that all of your connections will reach these are things like your power cord your sewer hose your water hose and any other connections you're going to need to make for example like the coax line if you have cable TV at your campsite if something is not going to reach reposition your trailer now so that it will by the way guys you don't need to take notes sit back relax enjoy the video at the end of the video I'm going to show you where you can download this very checklist we're covering today okay so we're parked in our site everything works and everything reaches now before we move to the next step I want to caution everybody who has steps that touch the ground if you need to go into the RV for a tool or to use the bathroom or something that's fine just make sure when you leave your steps are up so the pitch of the RV is going to change once we start leveling the trailer and that can cause damage to your steps or the door if it's closed so you want to keep ground contact steps up until we reach the point in the process where we can safely lower them the next thing we're going to do before we start unhooking the truck is to level sideways now there's a couple different ways to level a travel trailer the old school way of leveling is to drive up on blocks while using something like a bubble level to confirm when your trailer is Level side to side there's nothing wrong with this old school way of leveling but it is a little bit timec consuming it may require adding or subtracting blocks which means you're driving up and off the blocks a couple times until you're actually leveled there's also leveling ramps that give you the ability to inch up and down on the the ramps until you're Level side to side this is a little bit quicker but you still have to stop and continuously check the Bubble Level the quickest way and what I use is a combination of leveling ramps and the beach Lane Wireless leveler this is just a battery powered unit you install in your trailer you can just put the phone in the dash cradle and stop driving once the app tells you that you're Level side to side so I'll put a link down below to the beach Lane leveler video that we already made if it's something you're interested in checking out now we are Level sideways before you get out of your truck go ahead Eng gaug your emergency brake and then go ahead and add your wheel chalks to the trailer I would personally recommend chalking both sides of the trailer so you're going to need four chalks now if you use leveling ramps they already come with chalks that kind of go underneath the ramp and lock everything into place so you'll only need to chalk the other side now we're at the point where we can start disconnecting the truck before we disconnect the truck though I want to take a quick second and discuss putting blocks underneath your tongue jack some rvers do this some don't most of the time it's not necessary but generally speaking if the ground is considerably pitched down towards the front of the trailer meaning the trailer would roll forward if un chocked blocks may be needed because your tongue jack is going to max out before it gets to level on the other hand if the ground is fairly level or pitches up at the front of the trailer most likely you won't need to put blocks underneath your tongue jack visually understanding if you're going to need blocks underneath your tongue jack is just something you get familiar with over time and it's not something I want to spend a lot of time on today however I will put a link to a video down below that gets into this idea a little a little bit more detail the trailer is chalked so it's safe to disconnect the truck at this point in time go ahead and unlock your coupler remove your power cord your emergency brake cable and sway bars but do not disconnect your safety chains yet if the trailer starts to roll after it's disconnected the safety chains will stop the trailer once you remove the trailer from the hitch and confirm that the trailer is not rolling now you can go ahead and remove your safety chains now before I move the truck I'm putting away my sway bars and my sway bar tool this is not a necessary step I've just left them on the ground way too many times so that's just something I'm going to do right now and while I'm here at the front of the RV I'm just going to go ahead and open my service valves on my propane tanks like the previous step this is not mandatory to do right now but I'm already here so I'm just going to do it now and it will save time later next I'm going to move my truck now depending on the campground there may be more room behind the trailer there may be an off-site parking lot that you can put your truck in but if you are going to keep the truck in front of the trailer make sure you pull it far enough away that you can safely walk between the truck and the trailer your shins will thank you later and then I'll connect my trailer power cord and EMS unit to the campground power pedestal so remember what we covered earlier turn the breakers off plug everything in and then turn the breakers back on you don't technically need to connect the power right now I just do it so it's done plus it's going to come in handy in a later step next I'm locking my EMS to my power pedestal I'll also put a pad loock on my tongue both optional of course but it's something I always do now we can complete the leveling process by raising or lowering the tongue jack until the trailer is level front to back you can determine this by using a bubble level or an electronic level like I discussed earlier and next I'm lowering my stabilizer jack so manual scissor Jacks should be lowered until they touch the ground I initially lower them with a drill and this adapter which I'll link to down below once they touch the ground I'll stop I'll grab a ratchet just give it about another half turn once you see the RV starting to lift stop and you're done there's kind of a happy medium here you don't want to blatantly start lifting the RV but you also need to put some pressure between the ground and the trailer or they're useless the reason I do this now is because the Grand Design owner's manual tells you to stabilize your RV before you open the slides this may be something you want to check in your owner's manual as well but putting the stabilizers down now at this point in the process isn't going to hurt anything if your manual doesn't mention it as you can see I have rubber feet on the bottom of my scissor Jacks instead of the standard metal foot this is a product from RV snap pads called Snap jacks instead of popping onto the landing gear like Snap pads do you just replace the metal foot of your scissor jack snap Jacks are a really cool add-on accessory for travel trailers because the rubber foot is larger than the metal foot it has more surface area which means they won't sink into soft or wet ground and they provide noticeably more stability these pads are made from recycled tires so they do a couple different things they won't gouge or rustand your driveway and of course they protect your landing gear from getting beat up they only take about 5 minutes per Jack to install I will put a 10% off link Down Below in the video description if it's something you're interested in getting for your trailer okay so next I'm installing my X chocks something worth noting here despite the name X chalks these are not technically chalks they are stabilizers they lock the tires together so there's less movement when you're walking around the inside the RV you should never use x chalks as Standalone chalks so I reached out to an engineer at Lippard I'm not going to read the entire email you can pause the video if you do want to read it but do not install X chocks until your trailer is both level sideways front to back doing so prior to leveling front to back creates rotational forces that over time can increase wear on your axles this is the recommended point in the process when it's okay to install X chocks now the RV is level it is stabilized we can go ahead and open our slide outs earlier if you remember we already connected to shore power so whoever is in charge of opening up the inside can now turn on the air conditioner the fridge or any other devices that use AC power the next steps are optional but something I always do I pull the fuse on my tongue jack I used to have a tongue jack that would operate on its own plus there are a lot of curious fingers at campgrounds and moving the tongue jack up or down while the stabilizer Jacks are down can turn into a really messy situation really quickly I'm also covering my tongue jack with a 5 gallon bucket there's been situations where tongue Jacks have shorted out in heavy rain plus you can hook the chains on the handle of the bucket to keep them off the ground these last two steps with the fuse in the bucket again are not mandatory you can always remove these steps from the the checklist if you want to now the trailer is done moving so you can safely lower and set up your ground contact steps so next I'm going to start setting up my Campground connections now there is not a specific order you need to do these in however there are some things to note within each individual process let's start with the water connection first my water connection consists of a splitter an adjustable water pressure regulator a taste pure filter and then the hose if you want a little more information on the products that you're going to need for all these different hookups I'll put a link down below that gets into a little a bit more detail on the product side of things next we're going to connect our water lines from the campground to the RV but do not turn the water on yet you can damage the switch valve if it's moved while there's water pressure in it so with the water off switch to either your city water or your fresh tank fill setting once you have your valve where you want it now you can go ahead and turn on the water just a note if you choose to fill your freshwater tank be aware that in a few minutes you're going to see water coming out of your overflow valve underneath your RV that means the tank is full and you can go ahead and turn your water off but something to be aware of while you're setting everything else up and another note if you're using your pressurized City Water connection instead of your fresh tank fill go ahead and check your water pressure regulator at this point depending on who you talk to you're going to hear a lot of different opinions on what pressure you should run at most of the water pumps put in the RVs from the factory run at 45 PSI I think it's safe to stay around 40 to 50 psi Max but something worth noting is depending on the pressure at the campgr you may have to make an adjustment to your water pressure regulator at this point so while your plumbing lines are pressurizing and or your water tank is filling up we can go ahead and move to the next couple steps if you have a site with a cable TV connection or you need to set up your starlink antenna you can go ahead and set those things up right now open your stov toop Hood vent if you have one that needs to be manually opened we haven't turned on our water heater yet and there's two good reasons for this first if you're using the gas power for your water heater you're just going to be wasting propane by turning it on before you actually have water in the water heater second if you have an electric power option on your water heater you need to make sure that there's water in your water heater tank before you turn on that electric power option an electric water heater element can burn out in a matter of seconds if it's turned on and there's no water in the water heater tank remember we filled the freshwater tank already but with the pump off we have not moved that water from the tank to the plumbing lines or the water heater tank that's the water pump's job so go ahead and turn it on after a few minutes you'll notice that your water pump turns off that means means there's water inside your water heater and your lines are pressurized if you're overly cautious and want to perform a backup step just quickly burp the pressure valve if water comes out you are good now you can turn on the gas or electric side of your water heater next we're going to install the sewer connections I always do this after I'm done touching my freshw connections go ahead and put on some rubber gloves but remember do not open your waste tank valves these should remain closed until it's time to dump your tanks so my sewer connection consists of the camc rhino flex hose underneath the hose I used the Camco side Winder to keep the hose going downhill and there are some campgrounds that require you to keep your sewer hose off the ground so these are definitely nice to have then I have my clear elbow at the end of the hose where it connects to the campground sewer you should also put a few gallons of water back in your waste tanks along with your treatment if you didn't do that at the end of your last camping trip having that buffer of water is going to prevent anything that's going into that tank from sticking to the bottom of the tank after I'm done setting up my sewer connections I'll remove my gloves immediately wash my hands and the next couple of steps are not really order specific this will include things like setting up your ground mat your tables your chairs your dog fence your grill or anything else that you carry with you congratulations you have successfully set up your travel trailer but there are a few things that I want to share with you guys that I've learned over the years we have a dry erase board on our fridge I make it a point every time we arrive at a campground to get the names phone numbers and addresses of the local hospitals should there be an emercy and if you travel with pets it's also a good idea to get the names numbers and addresses of local vets this next thing I learned the hard way so I also want to share it with you one of the campgrounds we recently stayed at lost power not the end of the world but two things happened that made it a pretty big problem for us first it happened on the day we were tearing everything down to leave the campground and the second thing is the campground was on a well that means there's no power to the well pump so after that happened I made it a point to add to my checklist every time we arrive at a campground I'm putting water in the freshwater tank in case of emergencies and we can access that water because the water pump works on 12vt power another thing you may notice is after a little bit of time once your trailer starts to settle and the tires start to cool down you may have to readjust your stabilizer Jacks once I'm done setting everything up I'll just walk around the RV with the wrench and make any adjustments to those stabilizer Jacks if it's necessary tips like these are Little Gems that sometimes you learn the hard way sometimes you don't realize until you've been camping for a while but I would love to what you guys are doing outside of the standard setup process I will put a link Down Below in the video description to all the products that we talked about in this video as well as a link to this very checklist that we talked about today once you download it you can modify it to meet your RV your equipment and your lifestyle I hope this video helped you guys out please like share and subscribe and we'll see you soon the next thing I'm going to do is just go around [Music] [Applause] and

Channel: RV Tips & Travels

Views: 41,185

Keywords: rv tips, rv modifications, rv upgrades, rv life, rv how to, rv maintenance, rv travel, travel trailer, rv tips and travels, rv living, camping hacks, rv diy, travel trailer tips, rv tips and tricks, rv living full time, rv lifestyle, rv hacks, rv accessories, rv must haves, rv camping, rv gear, full time rv living, travel trailer tips and tricks, rv essentials, rv setup checklist, rv set up checklist, travel trailer setup for beginners, rv park set up, rv set up

Id: ermDoIB-y7s

Length: 14min 28sec (868 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 17 2024