Lessons Learned - Comfort Ride and X Factor on a 2022 310GK

crv0262

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Jun 21, 2022
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Location
Schwenksville, Pa
I spent the past two days installing the Roadmaster Comfort Ride 2570 and a Pair of MOR/ryde XFactor Cross Member Stabilizers in my 2022 Solitude 310GK-R. The 5th wheel has about 3500 miles on it. I was replacing a MOR/ryde CRE 3000 set up with the comfort ride.

This swap out took about 14 hrs. The second side went much easier then the first side as I worked through the project
The Good:
1. Between the Instructions and You Tube Video, this is a fairly straightforward Installation. I used a pair of jacks and a pair of jackstands, and have a full compliment of 1/2 Impact Drivers and sockets, so I found there were no specialty tools needed other than a torque wrench
2. The Axel Hangers on the 310GK are nicely re-inforced. This did surprise me and caused me to make a couple of adjustments to the installation instructions. This included
- Needing to trim back the center spacer on the Comfort ride so it would fit between the hangers. I needed to cut about 3/16 off the spacers so they would slide into place.
- Because of the gussets on the Front and back Leaf Spring Hangers, I had to use longer (3 1/2") 5/16 bolts for the XFactor to connect to the leaf spring front and back hangers
3. Everything just about bolted up cleanly, with very little file or clean up work needed to get it put together.

The Bad:
1. The trailer only has about 3500 miles on it, and I had greased the leafspring wet bolts at least twice (once after our first trip, once prior to our trip from Pennsylvania to Florida) - However, 5 of the 8 leaf spring bushings had substantual wear. One was complely gone the other 4 had worn through on one side. There was some grease in all the bushings, but they did not hold up - These bushings looked to be brass.
(Note to Self - Grease all the wetbolts (now there are only 4) prior to each trip)
2. The design of the XFactor bolt on Approach, when installled on the Front and rear leaf Spring hanger, requires you to either remove the tires to grease the wet bolts, Or replace the grease zerks with 90 degree zerks or a 90 degree end to your grease gun. The design has the wet bolt nuts on the inside and therefore the grease zerk is on the outside facing the tires.

Glad I did the upgrade - Will be interested in seeing if I can feel a difference with the slipper springs and shocks on the 5th wheel
 
I spent the past two days installing the Roadmaster Comfort Ride 2570 and a Pair of MOR/ryde XFactor Cross Member Stabilizers in my 2022 Solitude 310GK-R. The 5th wheel has about 3500 miles on it. I was replacing a MOR/ryde CRE 3000 set up with the comfort ride.

This swap out took about 14 hrs. The second side went much easier then the first side as I worked through the project
The Good:
1. Between the Instructions and You Tube Video, this is a fairly straightforward Installation. I used a pair of jacks and a pair of jackstands, and have a full compliment of 1/2 Impact Drivers and sockets, so I found there were no specialty tools needed other than a torque wrench
2. The Axel Hangers on the 310GK are nicely re-inforced. This did surprise me and caused me to make a couple of adjustments to the installation instructions. This included
- Needing to trim back the center spacer on the Comfort ride so it would fit between the hangers. I needed to cut about 3/16 off the spacers so they would slide into place.
- Because of the gussets on the Front and back Leaf Spring Hangers, I had to use longer (3 1/2") 5/16 bolts for the XFactor to connect to the leaf spring front and back hangers
3. Everything just about bolted up cleanly, with very little file or clean up work needed to get it put together.

The Bad:
1. The trailer only has about 3500 miles on it, and I had greased the leafspring wet bolts at least twice (once after our first trip, once prior to our trip from Pennsylvania to Florida) - However, 5 of the 8 leaf spring bushings had substantual wear. One was complely gone the other 4 had worn through on one side. There was some grease in all the bushings, but they did not hold up - These bushings looked to be brass.
(Note to Self - Grease all the wetbolts (now there are only 4) prior to each trip)
2. The design of the XFactor bolt on Approach, when installled on the Front and rear leaf Spring hanger, requires you to either remove the tires to grease the wet bolts, Or replace the grease zerks with 90 degree zerks or a 90 degree end to your grease gun. The design has the wet bolt nuts on the inside and therefore the grease zerk is on the outside facing the tires.

Glad I did the upgrade - Will be interested in seeing if I can feel a difference with the slipper springs and shocks on the 5th wheel

The wet bolt bushing wear is not new or a surprise. This has been a topic of discussion on here and elsewhere on the Internet. I have a couple posts about this very thing on these forums, and when I challenged Lippert about their design to use these bushings, not a single engineer would speak to me. I instead got a pile of bushings and wet bolts so I could swap the out when needed. Mine all wore on a single side too basically and I greased mine before every new outing, so its not just you, know that up front.

Cant wait to hear how the new kit works on your Solitude and the ride quality change…

Jason
 
Are there bushings for the Comfort Ride springs where the bolt to the existing spring hangers?

Yes, the Comfort Ride does have bushings, they appear a bit thicker, and they do expect you to use wet bolts, although they are not supplied. Because the Leaf Springs are not bound in the center (they slip/float on a Pad), I will be curious if this enables less stress on the bolts as the springs are not fighting against the housing and the second spring, like they do in a CRE 3000 set up with a center equalizer.
 
Are you happy and pleased with the Roadmaster system?
I'm considering this upgrade?
Did you notice a difference in the ride at all?
 
I wanted to post an update to this thread. We did a 6500 mile trip with the 310 and we were really happy with the ride in the trailer. I believe the slipper system worked extremely well as we had no loose/rattles showing up as we moved from campground to campground.

When we got home after the 6500 miles. I pulled one of the spring hangers to check the wear on the bushings/wetbolts. It happened to be a wetbolt that I had greased. The bushing looked brand new and the bolt had no wear. I am happy with how the system worked, especially since the original bushings were shot after only 3500 miles
 
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[MENTION=48929]crv0262[/MENTION]
Thanks very much for the update. Good to hear all is working out very well with the improved suspension.

6,000 miles - nice trip!
 
The wet bolt bushing wear is not new or a surprise. This has been a topic of discussion on here and elsewhere on the Internet. I have a couple posts about this very thing on these forums, and when I challenged Lippert about their design to use these bushings, not a single engineer would speak to me. I instead got a pile of bushings and wet bolts so I could swap the out when needed. Mine all wore on a single side too basically and I greased mine before every new outing, so its not just you, know that up front.

Cant wait to hear how the new kit works on your Solitude and the ride quality change…

Jason

Update on the wet bolt conversation. So my 2023 397TH Momentum is not wearing out the suspension bushings like my previous 381M did. The bushing material is different, and I have 22K miles on the 397th, and I only had 2 bushing needing replacement. On my previous rig, I was replacing them every 1200 miles. So something about the rig, and the new bushing material is very different in a good way.

I just installed the comfort ride on my tri-axle this weekend, and will be pulling to Orlando on I-95 in just about 10 days from now and will update on the ride changes. I did pull it about 120 miles after I installed it, and it sure seems like it makes a solid difference :). I chose to keep my CRE3000 + Comfort ride, keeping the original springs.
 

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