[bstark]

Jerry; sorry to hear of your new rig's problem. Thanks for clearing up the mystery of the "lost camber"! What a stupid way to make a common old sagging frame sound scientific. It sounds like they're trying to make these things into some sophisticated wonder that requires careful calculations while in the build process therefore making a screw-up more understandable.

Having to support the trailer at it's extreme ends to allow it to sag in the middle and then weld plates along the inside of the frame to keep it that way is a testament to how crappy it was put together in the first place.

Consider what they are admitting when suggesting this: "yep, that frame is drooping at the ends which means that 1/ the stacked rectangular frame sections we've been bally-hooing as the strongest in the industry, well, maybe they're not. 2/ the welding of those sections was done in-correctly by Lippert while the frame was supported incorrectly and they inadvertently welded it with drooping ends. 3/ We failed to properly inspect the frame upon it's delivery to the factory and should have detected this problem by either identifying the already existing "droop" or the sporadic weldment pattern that would allow it to do so."

You are very correct about losing considerable carrying capacity by having to weld plates to "freeze" the flexing of that frame. That one plate that is 1/2" by 4" by a full ten feet long is a pretty heavy chunk of steel!

The next thing we'll be reading here is Lippert suggesting people show up to have this repair done with full tanks and a pet elephant aboard to help create more sag in the middle when the ends are jacked up!

I've been hoping for some time that "Quality Control" would come to the RV industry but seems unlikely to ever happen given these problems keep re-curring over and over again.