Auto level system problems

[JeremiahM]

Is it just me, or this system crap, it's the LCI unit, standard on most all the units. Took the camper out this past weekend, and spent what seemed like an hour getting the stupid thing level, and then again when we got back home. Honestly wish it just had complete independent control, or the old manual crank jack, we always had our TT level and completely setup in less than 10 minutes, it was like NASCAR watching my wife and I and me with the impact setting that TT up. Anyways, I can't find any instructions on it, and it's 4 point system, 2 front, 2 rear. Any pointers, because I'd go up on what I thought was one, then the other side would activate and begin moving as well after so many strokes. Lights flashing on the buttons and all kinds of crap, what happened to a simple controller. I got level here at bome, and did re-zero it, maybe that will help. Please, any sugestions, that think had me wanting to pull my hair out, and I don't get frustrated easily

2016 Jayco Eagle 5th wheel 339flqs

06-6.0l, CCLB 4X4, studded, reworked heads, egr gone, cab reroute, blue spring mod, 6.4 banjos, updated dummy plugs, stand pipe, and stc fitting; New oil cooler, New ipr, New icp, atlas 40 FICM, powermax turbo, and Geerhead tunes, 325/65R18

[Grumpy]

Manual is right here.

Ground Control® 2.0

[Rustysocket]

Mine works great. I read the manual and push the auto level button. You can run it in full manual mode as well. You don't have to use the auto level feature.

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[JeremiahM]

Well then lol... Just asking, how well does y'all work on non level ground. That manual did make some sense of things, wish the rig came with the instructions. I tried google, but was unable to find any, apparently I wasn't using the right key words

06-6.0l, CCLB 4X4, studded, reworked heads, egr gone, cab reroute, blue spring mod, 6.4 banjos, updated dummy plugs, stand pipe, and stc fitting; New oil cooler, New ipr, New icp, atlas 40 FICM, powermax turbo, and Geerhead tunes, 325/65R18

[BuddyRay]

LCI also has an App for That. They have an app in both the Apple store and the Google store. It puts all documentation for all Lippert products on your phone. Search the app store for Lippert.

As someone who spent many years designing user interfaces (UI) for personal computer software, I have to agree that the UI for this Ground Control unit is NOT intuitive. You really do have to read the documentation. I even made a cheat sheet and put it inside the controller door. There are a LOT of shortcut key presses, for example (If I remember right) you press the down and right button at the same time to quickly return a 5th wheel to "hitch height". To do the same thing with the menu takes 5 or 6 button presses.

But once you get the hang of it I think you'll love it - it saves SO MUCH work and it really is quick and efficient. But you may have to read that manual before then next 2 or 3 trips before you get the correct order of things memorized.

[Rustysocket]

The biggest thing you have to work with on uneven ground is making sure you have enough total stroke within each jack to level the rig. You would have that same issue in manual mode however.

You can increase the available stroke to each jack by placing blocks under them. If your rig is not levelling it will tell you where it ran out of stroke. First. Retract the rears completely to reset the hall sensors. Put some blocks under the jack(s) that ran out of stroke and then hit autolevel.

My dad was having issues with his and cussing about it. He wasn't letting it do it's thing and then if it gave him the out of stroke message he would just push auto level again so it was kind of a cycle. You have to work with the limitations of the stroke of the jacks on uneven ground, and in his case the slope of his site was causing the rears to run out of travel. In that paticular site if he puts 4" of legos underneath the rears they now have enough travel to level the rig and it works everytime.

I have read of some cases where the actual sensors in the underbelly of the rig that determine level were not mounted securely. If you are having random failures or things work intermittantly I'd look further into it.

I hope you get it figured out because it really is a nice system once you learn to work with it rather than against it.



Also: on the inside of my propane door is a large sticker with the operating instructions for the levelling system. I'm not sure why Jayco put it there but thats where I found it. Check yours too as I found it helpful. If you don't have one I will take a picture of it for you and post it.

[tularockstar]

Three things that we learned about this Auto Level system:

1. Do your own ZERO calibration of all legs yourself first.

1. Know how to manually reset the jacks, when you get error messages on the panel. We found a way to reset them, which is pain in the a** but it works.

2. Before you hit the Auto Level button on the panel, manually extend the rear jacks down to about 2 inches from the ground/jack pads. Then, hit the Auto Level button. We found this to work well (most times) without getting an error.

Originally Posted by JeremiahM

Well then lol... Just asking, how well does y'all work on non level ground. That manual did make some sense of things, wish the rig came with the instructions. I tried google, but was unable to find any, apparently I wasn't using the right key words

06-6.0l, CCLB 4X4, studded, reworked heads, egr gone, cab reroute, blue spring mod, 6.4 banjos, updated dummy plugs, stand pipe, and stc fitting; New oil cooler, New ipr, New icp, atlas 40 FICM, powermax turbo, and Geerhead tunes, 325/65R18

[dalebra]

Grumpy pointed you to the manual for the Ground Control 2 and I'm pretty sure on your 2016 you have the Ground control 3.
Ground Control® 3.0

The only issue I had early on was the out of stroke. But like the others said that can be taken care of by using blocks under the jacks.

For a site that you back in to and it's down hill I don't drop the front very much and let the jacks extend quite a bit to get unhitched. That way when you are unhitched it will lower the front end down more to get it close to level before dropping the rear.
Follow the instructions starting on page 4.Step 3 is important, "DROP FRONT JACKS" This operation uses force on each of the front jacks to determine they are in contact with the ground. So each are independent as to where they are in their stroke. I then use the "Front Up" button to take the load off the hitch. Unhitch, pull away. On pretty level ground I put at least 4" of block under rear jacks. Push "Auto Level" Close the door, open a beer and sit back and watch. Works everytime for me!

[JeremiahM]

Originally Posted by Rustysocket

Also: on the inside of my propane door is a large sticker with the operating instructions for the levellin system. I'm not sure why Jayco put it there but thats where I found it. Check yours too as I found it helpful. If you don't have one I will take a picture of it for you and post it.

It's there lol, now I feel dumb.

I also printed the instructions for the 3.0, because that is what I have, thanks y'all, I think I'll take the advise, and chill with a beer next time. And I did level it here at home and re-ZERO, so hopefully that helps too

06-6.0l, CCLB 4X4, studded, reworked heads, egr gone, cab reroute, blue spring mod, 6.4 banjos, updated dummy plugs, stand pipe, and stc fitting; New oil cooler, New ipr, New icp, atlas 40 FICM, powermax turbo, and Geerhead tunes, 325/65R18

[eldermike]

Mine has worked very well once we quit trying to level more than design limits from side to side. Pull up on blocks on the low side and use blocks to limit down travel on Jack's and it's very easy to get level.

[Clayton4971]

After reading some of the complaints with the leveling systems that were put on at the factory I decided to go down to Bigfoot in White Pigeon Michigan and put their system on. Been almost three years now and have never looked back. Last year on our way out west we blew a tire so we decided to replace all with good year G614 the system lifted all four tires off the ground made it easy for the tire store [emoji4]


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[schiguy]

Out of habit I throw a couple of leveling blocks under each leg just for the fun of it now. I had an issue with the rear legs being "out of stroke" the first time, but I have had no issues since. I have actually become quite the fan of the auto-level system.

[eldermike]

Originally Posted by schiguy

Out of habit I throw a couple of leveling blocks under each leg just for the fun of it now. I had an issue with the rear legs being "out of stroke" the first time, but I have had no issues since. I have actually become quite the fan of the auto-level system.

Yep, this is the solution, I did the very same thing and the out of stroke messages went away.

[Cdash]

Originally Posted by schiguy

I have actually become quite the fan of the auto-level system.

Me too!! It has made setup pain free!!

Only one out of stroke error in our first year of using it and that was an extremely unlevel site. Could have undid it all and added 1 more block under the rear, but it errored out really close to level, so we just left it. The outdoor kitchen was at chin height, and I'm 6' 2" if that tells you anything about the site.

[schiguy]

We had to drag the steps my DW uses inside to the outdoor kitchen in order to reach. I am only 5' 9".

[bigskydoc]

I'm sure this doesn't help the OP, but my autolevel system has been perfect. Pull up to site, disconnect from TV, press auto-level, toss some blocks under rear jacks, and proceed to other tasks (letting out slides, hooking up to power etc.) Before I am done with other tasks, the trailer is level.

Twice I had the same problem. I dropped the front feet too low with the manual adjustment before disconnecting from the TV so didn't have enough travel in the system to drop the nose low enough. I had to reconnect to the TV and bring the feet up.

When I'm done camping, I press the two buttons and it automatically retracts the rear jacks and raises the nose right back to the appropriate level for hooking back up to the TV.

Even on non-level ground, I simply haven't had a problem. Just put some extra levelling blocks on the down-hill side.

[JeremiahM]

Certainly gonna try, got a week long dry camp in Just a few weeks, I do feel better about it after reading the feedback, and now that I recorrected zero, I think it'll also help, those *****s at the local camping world (which has a terrible rep) zeroed it right in front of me while we were in the parking lot, and never even put a level on it. On to figuring out the battery situation now, thinking of trying to go get four 6-volt golf cart style batteries, and using them instead of getting two more of the 12 volts like it has.

06-6.0l, CCLB 4X4, studded, reworked heads, egr gone, cab reroute, blue spring mod, 6.4 banjos, updated dummy plugs, stand pipe, and stc fitting; New oil cooler, New ipr, New icp, atlas 40 FICM, powermax turbo, and Geerhead tunes, 325/65R18

[Rustysocket]

Just one other thing to point out. If your going to be playing with your system to test it out. The return to hitch setting is really a _return to where you started from setting _ for lack of better words.

When I first got my rig. I had read so many people frustrated with the levelling system. I was actually fascinated with the how it worked so I would put it in different out of level conditions to see how the algorithms worked to solve level. For a while I was not getting it to return to my disconnect height and it was then I realized that each time I would hit autolevel, the starting point for that run became the new return to hitch data point.

Now that I am comfortable with it I use the return to hitch function and am very happy with how it works.

I do hope you get the system working to your satisfaction, it's not perfect and there are times I wish it had a bit more stroke, but I just kind of mentally assess how far out of level it is and throw down legos if necessary.

[JetTech]

Originally Posted by Rustysocket

Just one other thing to point out. If your going to be playing with your system to test it out. The return to hitch setting is really a _return to where you started from setting _ for lack of better words.

When I first got my rig. I had read so many people frustrated with the levelling system. I was actually fascinated with the how it worked so I would put it in different out of level conditions to see how the algorithms worked to solve level. For a while I was not getting it to return to my disconnect height and it was then I realized that each time I would hit autolevel, the starting point for that run became the new return to hitch data point.

Now that I am comfortable with it I use the return to hitch function and am very happy with how it works.

I do hope you get the system working to your satisfaction, it's not perfect and there are times I wish it had a bit more stroke, but I just kind of mentally assess how far out of level it is and throw down legos if necessary.

Great info to know! Thanks! That'll save a bit of hassle and nuisance!

[TexasRT]

I always see people talking about using blocks under their jacks but I never see anyone mention dropping the jack extensions before atemping to level. I admit have only used mine on fairly level ground so far, but I just drop the jack extensions to as close to the ground as possible and hit auto-level. I have had no issues so far. Actually I just installed the new wheels and tires for our unit, and just for grins I decided to see if the jacks could lift the unit off the ground. I put it in manual mode and it did it with ease. All four tires off the ground with no problem. Maybe I just got lucky and got a good setup.