When unhitching your camper trailer, there are a few tweaks you can make to ensure it’s just that little bit safer. Because when you think about it, if you do it the wrong way, your camper trailer can either back down the hill on its own or roll forward to crash into the back of your pride and joy.
Neither of which we want to happen.
So have a quick read through these easy steps and if you’re already doing it in this order, good job. But if not, make sure to commit them to ye olde memory bank so you can have a safe one every time.
Step 1 – Chock the wheels
The first step is to chock your wheels. Make sure to chock both the front and back so your camper trailer can’t go either way.
Step 2 – Engage the trailer handbrake
The next step is to engage your trailer handbrake, ensuring it’s fully applied. Don’t just pull that lever up half-baked. Pull it up properly and firmly to make sure it’s really working.
Step 3 – Unplug the electrics
Now that you’ve got two things looking after your camper trailer (the chocks and the handbrake), go ahead and unplug the electrics. Don’t forget to put them up and out of the way.
Step 4 – Get the jockey wheel ready
Next, get your jockey wheel ready so that it can take the pressure off the tow ball. When you’re positioning your jockey wheel, the trailer may try to go for a walkies either forward or backwards on its own. To help prevent this, spin the jockey wheel around so it’s resting sideways. This adds some extra friction making it harder for the wheel to get a roll on.
Step 5 – Wind the jockey wheel and unhook the ball
Give your jockey wheel a good wind and unhook your tow ball. RVSafe has a good tip, which is to ensure you don’t leave the coupling latch up when you’re not using it as it wears out the spring.
Step 6 – Finally, the chains
The final step is to release the safety chains. You should always leave this step to lucky last. Why? Because the safety chains are our last line of defence when we pop the tow ball off.
For more tips and advice on towing safely, head on over to the RVSafe website and take a squiz.
