Adding outriggers is the best solution/protection I believe the group has found. 

With mine, the frame actually broke at the point of the Suspension bracket as well as the floor joists breaking loose. Outriggers were added and the frame was sistered with another 1.5" tubular steel placed under to stiffen up. 

I had the extended warranty (which I rarely do) and it was covered. 

He began to explain to me that it's done on purpose, but as I rolled my eyes and said "You're not really believing I'm falling for that!" He stopped and we went into it a bit further.

He explained that the tongue beam is pasted through the cross beam making it a solid beam from ball hitch to side frame beam. Good news if true.. I really can not yet confirm, just to much snow/ice to lay down there and get some good dimensions. Believe the tongue beam would be about 1/8-3/16 smaller in height. 

He further explained that as the welding happened the beam softens from the heat and caused the slight tilt upward. Well, couple of issues with that and we discussed further.. Mainly I don't consider 3/4" slight..

By sight only I can see that the weld to the side frame has the tongue beam just a tad lower, meaning the entire beam is tilting up and there just wasn't enough care to set it level before welding it.. 

Mine seems to be just a craftsmanship issue. He did explain to me (and why he came to me) that he has encountered several 'bent' tongue frames. Two main reasons have gave: Overloading & misuse of a Load Leveling hitch. First one we all knew, second I had feared to be true.

Thank you. 

When you ran the calculator, what did you wind up with as front axle load with the trailer attached and no wdh compared to the front load without the trailer?  

My concern from a couple of reports I've seen would be that the Taco apparently has a pretty stiff front suspension which is not showing much change in ride height when you load the trailer on the hitch. If that is the case its going to be difficult to use front ride height to know how much load you have there, but that doesn't necessarily mean you wouldn't be better off using a wdh if the front end is getting light without it. 

Remember that its the front of your TV that is controlling turning as well as a large part of your braking action, and if its getting light there the tire contact patch can't do its job controlling the rig. Regardless of what the ride height is, for safety you really want the front axle loading while towing to be pretty much the same as it is when not towing.  The calculator will tell you what that loading is if you have it set up right and/or you can run through a scale to get it. 

This would be 4 weeks into it being submitted, they asked for specific pictures. 'Everything' we shot today, we did before, but now it's by their request.. We 'again' confirmed a 3/4" upward pitch in the tongue frame. This is from the weld at the trailer cabin to the ball coupling mount. 

By the time sequence of the Cabin frame issue, I figure Mid-January I'll be asked to bring the trailer in.. 

I wish to thank him once again for presenting to us and hope others use it as well.

I'll think about how I want to start another thread on what I have learned and how I will set her back up. Right now, I do not see the WDH going back on. With only 1/4" difference in wheel well height, I'm no longer seeing the need. I think, as many do, I jumped to quick not understanding a WDH. Thanks to you folks I now do.

I can not say enough about my Dealership and the efforts put forward on my behalf. Cold Springs RV has been a blessing! 

I'll dig deeper once it's back home. My dealer is already checking with FR of possible remedies. Once here I will invest age further to learn materials involved and reach out to my builder group as well for their thoughts. They are building with foam and laminating several different materials with success. Even some are fiberglassing and that sounds most interesting to me to inject. 

P.S. I was teasing as well as asking when I mentioned your handle. Happy to see you took it as intended.

I'm sure you've had some delamination in the floor, but have no idea how much or how extensive. I also don't know what the materials are (or were). I know from having drilled a hole or two through our floor that there is some plywood and some foam. The problem is that some foams are susceptible to some glues, so you would probably want to consult with Forest River about glues might be injected there. 

My general thoughts would be to support the floor where it looks like it needs help; drill a couple of holes; then inject the appropriate adhesive. Wait for the cure, then remove the supports.

Okay, can go with this to a point and be comfortable about it.

The bottom line comes down to the amount of flex that occurred and what is left now that it returned.

The floor is nothing more than a SIP. Laminated whatever's over foam. If you've ever laminated or veneered you'd know there is a extreme you can not pass of flex before something cracks. I do believe my sag has gone far beyond that point.

I see my dealer as seeing the same and not giving me my trailer back quickly as proof of such. They also want to see what delimitation has happened. 

It's not just a "It returned to shape" thing. It's more of what happened and how to deal with. 

I see outriggers to hold, yet I see injecting glues to regain the lamination. 

What glues? How much? Procedure? I have clues to how, yet no experience in doing so. That is about to come I figure.

Woud I just stand with "It came be back to shape?" NO! 

I want it to stay there.

With a tag of GlueGuy... Tell me the glue I should be injecting.

   

If you don't see it, all I can say is get some outriggers on there. 

I'm just going to deal with part for now.

What do you see or not see?

No boxed beam. 

Take a closer look and see what you do.

Pay attention to the tongue frame as it comes back. We know this intersects with the longitude beam. Where is it?  Now those two outriggers shown.. I'll be darned if I have those on mine. I think those where just added on mine.

All I'm sayin' here is if you want it to last a lifetime, you may wish to add some outriggers to support. I don't wish anyone I what I have gone through if avoidable! 

And again, for what we paid, and what we have, it's not that much effort to make it so far beyond and capable!

Please, let's turn this thread (or build another) to what we can do so others do not have to endure what I have. If I had known, I would have... 

It sounds like Lippert has already added something under the old (repaired) 2x4x0.1 tube? Probably you explained that but I missed that before or am having a senior moment. Can you clarify what you have right now? 

For the front reinforcement, I just assumed straight 2x4x0.1 longitudinal tubes plus 2x2 tubes under those to make the calcs simpler. I don't have access to my trailer at the moment either so I didn't measure the tongue. But, these can also be run at angles as they do in the A frame, that's not going to make a whole lot of difference  structurally I don't think.  The point is that there is also some significant moment being carried under the front part of the trailer box so the reinforcement ought to extend into that area as well. 

In my research in this failure I read (and watched a video) of how our floors are built. Each said (or showed) metal (believe aluminum) as cross members in the floor construction. This lead to how the heck they would straighten this with tearing up the floor.

Another going through much the same was told that the floor would relax.. My only response to that was "Please let me know how that works out." My thoughts, which I did not state to them were/are basic. Steel in a 8" span, sagging over an inch, is not normal flex it will 'relax' from.

Well, my floor has 'relaxed'... Shall I say returned back very close to normal. Makes absolutely no sense to me. How is this possible?

I come to a few possibilities. 

First being there is no boxed end on these cross-members. That would leave a space for this to happen and only the over-hung plywood (floor composite) is holding the exterior wall between the points of the cross member. If so, the added brackets are now holding the cracked floor.

This senecio to me has credence.

Next is that if there is a boxed beam, it only goes to the frame beam and the entire exterior wall is supported by the floor composite. 

This would be a candeliered wall support. Yet that requires the floor composite to be equal to the cross members.

I don't see this as a possible.

Next, is this. The cross members are metal (?) and did not bend. They do indeed go to the exterior wall and there may just be the boxed beam I hope is there. What happened is the underlay delaminated and dropped/sagged. Sounds good, but let's think about this senecio. The frame pushed upward and the wall stayed in place? Only the underlay moved? Then wouldn't it have torn from the outside wall and show a gap? The whole side skin wouldn't have shifted with it.. The side wouldn't have worked, the skin would have seperated from the roof. 

I do believe I have a bent floor. I need my unit back here to dig in deeper to the damage. 

I state this for you all to think of what else I (possibly all) should be looking at. Hey, what am I missing? 

    

My comment above deals with the steel thickness of the frame repair that has been done to my unit. Please do not confuse this with what Offgrid is recommending to the stock frame setup. All my question of length on the tongue is not due to any laziness on my part, just that my unit is not here as of yet for me to do so. 

Hopes are I will be picking it up early next week.

That puts the two max stress points at the axle and at a point about 58 inches aft of the ball. The stress is about half as much at the 58 inch point as it is at the axle. 

Also used a straight edge (4ft level) and the tongue is straight, no rocking in the straight edge. I'm certain they'll run a longer straight edge along the entire tongue (starting back at the main running beam) to work out where the bend is located.

My guess is at the front cross beam. When your talking 1" over 4ft and the deflection could be along a 4" section of steel beam.. doubt you'd spot that by eye. With that said, the welds looked good and being fairly good now at spotting deflection, I couldn't see it. 

1/4 inch upward in the center is OK. I'd have to look at the deflection limits again but 1/32 could be at or past the axle tube yield point, the axle ends are pretty short. it could also be measurement error, its hard to measure to 1/32 inch tolerance with a tape. OTOH, it wouldn't really surprise me if the axle end bent on the side opposite the frame failure. Whichever part fails first will absorb most of the energy, so if you get an overload on both sides it could easily be that the axle bends on one side first and the frame on the other.

Yeah it does sound like you have a tongue/front frame failure too. 1 inch is a lot. I highly doubt that Lippert builds a crown into rPod frames when it fabricates them. See if you can determine where the bend is. I can't measure mine right now but I will when I get the chance.  

I used to be active on one of the Ford forums and we had some Ford engineers there...they could be a bit firm when they handled complaints...but the information was sound.

Over on a motorcycle forum I am on, one of the main dudes (company owners) is on the forum now and then....but its a small company and a tight user base. I think they just mainly like to read what people are saying and keep up with the state of affairs. Which is a good thing.

Matt wants to be part of.

Matt is my contact at my Dealership for repair. He wants to read want we are doing and how we come to a solution of such. I see his intentions as pure for knowledge, problems and remedies we find. My impression is he could be a very good add.

Background on me:

My past profession lead me into to many negotiations for sales and issues on projects. One of my talents (shall I boost) is reading folks and their expectations/intentions. I was pretty good at it and gave me a good retirement as the result. I have not come across anyone that has proven my intuition wrong, to date. Matt has years of experience and contacts he can not speak of publicly. I get that. I have the same. He asked if I would introduce/pass the group to him.

I am not one to just pass a group to someone just for the fact of growing the group and am concerned as to what is said and passed forward. I do see his intentions as good.

So I ask the group: Should I pass it along to him?

It's 'our' group and I will not make this decision without approval from you.

Matt and I spent a good hour (plus) going over what was done, what he hopes to see and my concerns. 

Matt was quite open to allowing me to check the axle, as I explained what I was doing, to allow input from him or corrections. He was very open! We found the inward to be 1/4" upward and the outbound slide side good. That was weird with that's the side the frame gave. The surprise was the door side was slightly upward. I mean slightly, if I could guess from the measuring tape I was using 1/32'd.. Matt said he would ask about tolerance allowed. Remember, I'm empty.

Te next area was the concerns I have on the tongue. Mine is bent upward by 1". We went through a few ways of checking and confirmed the 1". That is also going to be asked about tolerance. We did a few ideas of testing bend/weight and found 1/4" bend by design. Weight off, 1" bend upward. 

Now this is where I ask those willing to check their tongue angle. I should have gone back to the sales lot and checked some new ones (which I will do). I would 'think', by design, it would be downward as new to absorb the deflection, which 'we' determined as 1/4". 

Talked a bit about how to remedy and again, Matt will ask for their recommendations since I'm still under warranty. 

Same for the lift option I asked about. Adding a 2x2x3/16 5ft long section under the frame balanced on the mount. He will ask for recommendation to avoid any warranty issues. We both chuckled about the OEM lift and doing something better could void warranty.. 

The welds on the frame look good to me, as far as I can tell. I thought the 2ft spacing was a bit much, yet the opposite stager the distance. Something else I would like advise about.

I am 'very' happy about how my Dealer dealt with this and how Lippert stepped up to repair! It's still a very good week in my mind and early next week I could have 'Lily" back. 

P.S. Matt was surprised how much mileage I got out of the stock tires. He comment was towards how much attention I pay to things. Also, my tongue weight as it sits empty was 375#'s. Interesting... I do mean empty, I removed everything believing it would be there a while.. No propane tank, battery, spare tire, anything in the interior, empty. That surprised me! Very important how we load and what we add on that tongue!

  

I am so happy this didn't go sideways! In so many ways.. As it could have. Lippert has a 2 thumbs up and my dealer has three (if I had so). 

It's one of those Good Days!

The word was they were sending someone to take a look, yet they sent a welder and repairs are happening! I'm so happy!

So far what I understand is they are sistering to the frame. What else I don't have details to yet.

So happy to hear this info! So happy to know something is happening! So happy Lippert stepped up. So happy I bought the extended warranty. 

Getting the drift? Pretty happy here!