I went to Glendale, CA (west of Pasadena) to see the travel trailer yesterday morning. It was a 2 1/2 hour drive. The couple who were selling it are very nice. I fell in love with the trailer as soon as I stepped inside! We made a deal, I paid them, got the paperwork taken care of and we hitched it up and I took off.
I had a bad feeling tho that something was gonna go wrong on the way home. I had a lot of freeways to travel across LA and out to the desert. Luckily traffic wasn't too bad. I took it slow all the way. I was gonna get back too late to take it to the storage place so I was just gonna head home with it. I decided to stop at WM by my house because I needed something to put the front jack on once it was unhitched. So I got a stand and some leveling blocks and headed home, just a mile away.
I went thru an intersection that I know has a big dip in it so I slowed way down to go over it. When the trailer hit the dip, all hell broke loose including the trailer!
It came off the hitch! Luckily the chains held and the emergency brake cord worked but then it still ended up slamming into the back of my jeep before it stopped. I got out and the bottom of the jack was imbedded in the pavement. Luckily, no one was behind me. A guy at the gas station across the street came right over and then a motorcyclist stopped as well as a guy in a car. The first thing one guy told me was the ball on my hitch was too small. When I told him how far I had towed it, he was shocked! The three of them lifted the trailer back on the hitch. Then the guy in the car offered to follow me home and help me get it set up. So we made it there and got the support jacks down. The front jack is bent pretty good. When it first happened, there was smoke coming out of the top of the jack so am not sure what was burning. I will need to get it somewhere next week to get it all inspected and fixed. One of the chain hooks is broken too. Other than, that, I didn't notice any other damage to the trailer or my car. Just my nerves were shot!
On a positive note...it was a total miracle that this did not happen while I was on the freeway in LA!!! That would have been a total disaster.
I hit quite a few potholes that easily could have popped that hitch off! I am SO lucky that this happened when and where it did!! I am still having anxiety attacks thinking about all this but it could have been so much worse. I will go to Home Depot later and pick up a larger hitch ball. I have a 2 inch ball and it needs a 2 5/16 ball.
I will take pics later and post them. The inside is SO nice! It is a 2013 Forest River Evo 14.5 ft trailer.
