(Camp Addict does NOT accept payment from any company to review or endorse their products.)
Q: What's a trailer without a trailer jack?
A: A worthless trailer! Ha ha.
(Unless it's light enough to lift by hand.)
A trailer tongue jack does the important job of lifting and lowering the front of your trailer. This allows you to connect and disconnect it to/from your tow vehicle.
However, some of us are strong and some of us are not very strong or physically capable.
Therefore, manual trailer jacks are not easy to raise and lower for certain people.
Having the best electric trailer jack for your trailer makes hitching up much easier than hitching up with a manual jack.
Electric is easier especially if you have a weight distributing trailer hitch that requires you to lift the tongue AND the back end of your tow vehicle repeatedly.
Either way, life will be MUCH easier if you have an electric tongue jack instead of a manual tongue jack.
This page will teach you about both types and how to properly use them.
You will also learn how to connect and disconnect your trailer as well as safety when doing so.
Looking for a new tongue jack? Click the button below to read our reviews of both electric and manual tongue jacks.
There are two categories of RV trailer jacks. Electric trailer jacks and manual trailer jacks.
Manual trailer jacks usually have a hand crank you use to raise and lower the hitch of your trailer.
Electric trailer jacks usually have a switch that you flip that draws power from your battery to raise and lower your hitch.
The former, obviously, and through personal experience, is much harder to use than the latter.
However, the primary benefit of the manual jack is that it COULD be less prone to breaking since it is a simpler device.
The power trailer jack could fail electrically or mechanically.
The electric trailer jack will also require installation or some know-how as far as wiring goes.
Some trailer jacks come with a 'foot', some do not.
In most cases, you can purchase a foot (see the box at the very bottom of this page).
Why might you want a foot?
So that if you are unhitching on soft ground, the trailer jack's leg will not sink down as easily.
Or you can simply place wood blocks or a solid Lynx Leveler underneath.
(Beware, some wood will split under the pressure of the jack leg.)
A power tongue jack is a jack mounted at the front of a trailer (on the 'tongue') that raises and lowers the front.
It uses 12-volt DC electrical power, usually from the trailer's onboard battery, to electrically extend or retract the trailer leg.
You raise or lower the front of the trailer for a couple of reasons.
To hitch and unhitch the trailer from the vehicle towing it.
And also to level the trailer front to rear.
A power tongue jack requires very little effort to use.
You simply press a button to make the jack raise or lower.
A manual tongue jack requires a person to 'crank' the jack up or down, which can be pretty labor-intensive.
We think that power trailer jacks are the way to go for most people.
The ease of use is just such a stark contrast to using a manual jack.
There are pros and cons to electric trailer jacks.
For those with any type of physical body issues, an electric trailer jack is 100% the way to go.
It's easy to install, easy to use, and it's the easiest method of lifting and lowering your trailer hitch.
Manual jacks obviously take more muscle power than electric jacks do. (Electric jacks take zero muscle power.)
You might consider a manual jack if you have a lightweight boat trailer, or small camper, with very little tongue weight, and don't mind working your arms and back.
Here are some pros and cons of manual trailer jacks:
A manual trailer jack is a simple crank device.
It uses gears to manually raise and lower your hitch.
This type of jack CAN break, however.
Camp Addict Kelly's manual trailer jack was recently on the verge of breaking (as was her back) and so it was replaced with a Husky RV electric jack.
Still, for simplicity's sake, a manual trailer jack is the way to go.
There's nothing much more to break than gears, outside of bending and breaking some part of the device.
Both electric and manual trailer tongue jacks come in different weight capacities, so which is right for you?
It depends on how large/heavy of a trailer you have.
But that's not the only weight to take into consideration. Let's explain...
A trailer tongue jack is designed to lift the front of the trailer, so you first need to know how much your tongue weight is. (How to determine tongue weight.)
The most accurate way to determine trailer tongue weight is to, well, weigh your trailer.
Or you can spitball by figuring out what 15% of your trailer's maximum weight is, as tongue weight SHOULD be no more than 15% of the weight of your trailer.
OK, so you have your trailer tongue weight (or a rough idea of what it is).
What next?
If you have a weight distribution hitch that uses spring arms, you will likely need to raise both the front of the trailer and the rear of your tow vehicle.
This in so you can get the spring arms onto their brackets.
So not only is the tongue jack lifting the weight of the front of your trailer, but it is also picking up the rear of your tow vehicle.
How much does the rear of your tow vehicle weigh?
You could weigh it, or you could look up the weight of your vehicle online and figure that about half of that rests on the rear axles.
You aren't going to be lifting the entire weight of the rear of your vehicle, but this gives you a rough idea.
Now you've got some idea of what weight you will be asking your trailer tongue jack to lift.
So, yeah, you might want to have a heavier duty trailer tongue jack just in case.
Better to have a jack designed to lift more so that it doesn't run the risk of breaking because you were lifting too much weight.
Amiright?
How does one go about hitching up and unhitching a travel trailer?
It may seem daunting at first, but it's pretty simple.
There are things to know to do it correctly and to NOT have an embarrassing situation.
Or even a situation that hurts someone.
Even seasoned pros have screwed up the process and have had hairy moments.
Let's look at the general 'how-to' of hitching and unhitching a trailer.
It's a good rule of thumb to not interrupt someone who is hitching up or unhitching.
Often people have a routine that they follow to hitch/unhitch.
Disturbing them during this time can cause them to forget a step. Good neighbor etiquette is to leave them alone until they are finished.
Beware! If you have a 7-pin connector (pictured on the right) that connects your tow vehicle to your trailer, it may continue to pull power from your vehicle to charge your trailer batteries as long as it is connected.
This means that if you keep your 7-pin electrical connector (or 7-way plug) connected to your vehicle while the vehicle is not running, for a long period of time such as overnight, you may end up with a dead tow vehicle.
It's a good practice to detach the trailer's wiring harness from your tow vehicle.
If you have a battery monitor you can check if there is a draw or not to be SURE there is no draw.
If you are not completely sure, detach your 7-way plug.
So you are now armed with knowing these things:
They are pretty simple things, but an electric one makes your life so much easier.
Read on if you are in the market for a new jack.
We will show you what we found to be the best jacks available out there and why they are the best.
The rest is up to you!
Authors: Kelly Beasley & Marshall Wendler
He-llllo. I'm the co-founder of Camp Addict, which my biz partner and I launched in 2017. I frigging love the RVing lifestyle but in December of 2020, I converted to part-time RV life. Heck, I lived in my travel trailer for over 5.5 years, STRICTLY boondocking for pretty much all of it. Boondocking is a GREAT way to live, but it's not easy. Anyway, I'm passionate about animals, can't stand campgrounds, I hardly ever cook, and I love a good dance party. Currently, I can be found plotting and scheming whether or not to start collecting farm animals (or plotting my next RV trip!) at my beautiful new 'ranch' named 'Hotel Kellyfornia', in Southern Arizona.
Camp Addict co-founder Marshall Wendler brings his technical expertise to help explain RV products in an easy to understand fashion. Full-time RVing from April 2014 - December 2020 (now RVing about 50% of the time), Marshall loves sharing his knowledge of the RV lifestyle. Marshall spends the majority of his RVing life boondocking. He is the part of Camp Addict that knows 'all the things'. He's good at sharing his technical knowledge so you can benefit.
As the trucking industry knows, all drivers need durable, dependable jacks to move loads safely and efficiently. Having poor-quality jacks made with substandard materials – or using the wrong jack for the job – can lead to serious injury and even death.
So, what is the difference between a customizable heavy-duty jack and a standard, run-of-the-mill tongue jack, whose main benefit is a low, upfront cost?
The Difference Between Standard Trailer Jacks and Heavy-Duty Trailer Jacks
While standard jacks are usually mass-produced offshore, Premier Manufacturing’s heavy-duty jacks are hand-built one at a time in the USA. The 600 and 700 series jacks are the industry’s heaviest and strongest-rated tube jacks on the market, thanks to 3/16th DOM tubing used for both inner and outer tubes.
The DOM process leaves no seam on the material, so the tubes used for Premier Mfg jacks are known to have the highest weld strength possible. They are rated at 10,000 pounds with a sand shoe, giving the operator unmatched confidence in their construction and performance.
Standard jacks, on the other hand, are constructed with a seam and thin-walled material. This mass-produced jack is likely to bend or fail more often when you need it most. Unlike the Premier Mfg series of jacks, you can’t get replacement parts for it, and they aren’t customizable.
Premier Mfg, however, can offer a jack that fits the customer’s specific needs. Want a mounting plate ten inches down from the top? Not a problem. Want the mounting plate or swivel loose? We can do that, too, all to fit a customer’s needs.
Premier Mfg also offers the 600 series Jiffy Jack. A quick-release system is built inside the jack (no pins to pull and line up) using a steel cage housing. It is spring-loaded with a piece of 3/8 key stock that runs the length of the jack.
When the end-user presses that 3/8-inch lever, it separates the half brass nut in that housing from the Acme screw. Apply pressure, drop the leg down, and then crank. Voilà! To retract the jack back into the housing, crank it off the ground just enough to create some separation and then press the lever. Immediately, the jack retracts.
The entire process saves a tremendous amount of time and keeps the driver away from the reach, increasing safety. It’s an excellent solution for the dirt and asphalt industry.
One other benefit that stands out versus standard overseas jacks is replacement parts availability. Because Premier Mfg jacks are hand-built, all the replacement parts are available in-house. Bend a standard jack, and the only option is to throw it away. Premier Mfg jacks are completely rebuildable.
Premier Mfg’s 800 series jack is our utility jack rated at 5,000 pounds. It has the same features and internal functions as our 700 series jacks, but it uses 1/8-inch square tubing. It is repairable and customizable, just like the 600/700 series.
Premier Mfg specializes in offering incredibly durable, well-built pintle hitches, drawbar eyes, jacks, and other related components for the transportation market.
Our engineering team has created numerous innovative designs for all of our products, including those fighting corrosion (Extended Life) to those that harden with use (Premalloy). Our Saf-Tite line of couplings and pintle hitches can handle your heaviest loads, while our new Saf-T-Latch assembly ensures that the latching system is closed while your vehicle is in motion, all by using a small auxiliary air cylinder that connects to the trailer brakes.
Premier Manufacturing is a private, American-owned company with roots going back almost a century, with the invention of the pintle hitch by our founder Dewey Weiss.
Independent Fleet testing proved successful, with 8 of the top 10 LTL carriers specifying our equipment to handle their trucking needs while moving goods across our great nation.
Reach out to us today and discover more about our line of world-class couplings, pintle hitches, and trailer jacks for you and your team.