Four Wheel Camper Tie-down Breaks

It happened last year and it happened again this year.

That is the front passenger FWC camper tie-down bolt broke.

I arrived at the SE GTG in Stevenson, AL and noticed the camper was a bit crooked in the bed of the truck.  On the way east I had checked it and it was aligned.

After last year’s bolt breaking, I was carrying spare parts.  I had order spare bolts from FWC but the square under the carriage bolt didn’t fit in the plate that distributes the bolt head over a larger area.  The plate not only distributes the stress it also keeps the bolt from rotating.  The new bolts have spiked washers that can’t be used with the aluminum plate.

I decided to replace the bolt with a like part.

Replacing the bolt and threaded eye that the turnbuckle ties to under the camper is the easy part.  The tough part is reconnecting the turnbuckle.  The problem is that there is not much space for your hand to work the turnbuckle.

I tried new turnbuckles in the front this year withbacking nuts and it creates a bit more work but it kept them from lucening as they did last year.  That was an improvement.

In the picture above you can see the turnbuckle is at an angle and hookedvto the threaded eye at an angle.  Thus this puts angular stress on the bolt and this stress will snap the bolt.  Im going to look at a different method of putting the stress on the bolt across the bolt thickness vs the eye that hangs down and pulling the bolt threads on an angle.

The tiedown system of the FWC is often discussed in blogs and Facebook about the same thing happening.

The problem is that without the 4 jacks there is no way easily to realign the camper in the bed.  So, I just leave the camper a bit on an angle after the bolt is replaced.

There is no problem as there is not much play once the camper is in the bed of the truck.

Brent

macaloney@hotmail.com