Ultra-Fab Phoenix 4000 tongue jack

I just wanted to follow up on this thread after using the Ultra-Fab Phoenix on a few trips. It is just as advertised, extremely fast! It cuts hook up/unhook time by a lot. I had to get used to the speed because it made using the Smart Jack feel a bit like watching paint dry (sort of kidding!)
We will see how it holds up over the long haul, but if you were considering this jack I would definitely recommend it.

Henry, how did you ground it? Did you just pick a spot to drill a hole and ground it there? The SJ is apparently self-grounded - only the 12V red wire runs out of it.

Edit: I guess the chassis ground bar is the appropriate spot. It's another 6 or so feet aft of the junction box.

@Chris Turner posted:

Henry, how did you ground it? .... Edit: I guess the chassis ground bar is the appropriate spot. It's another 6 or so feet aft of the junction box.

It had a red and a black lead (unlike the SJ's single red). I just put an eye on the black and attached it to one of the wire clamps that was already on the frame.
So far, so good.

My hookup to the "frame ground" buss worked after I installed it, and I thought I was finished. But today when I went to hook up the trailer, it didn't work. I think I'm going to put a bolt and wire clamp on the frame, similar to your example, and use that as a ground.

Thanks for the info!

Chris

@Chris Turner - Please keep us posted!

I moved the grounding point to the frame per your example, and it still did not work.

My wife and I took the Lance to a music festival over Labor Day weekend, so I had to use the manual crank to hook and unhook the trailer. I found that it wasn't terrible if I used a breaker bar, even though because we use the Andersen hitch, you need to go up and down an extra time to tension the chains.

In what I hope is the final chapter of this story, I called the manufacturer and recounted my story to a service department rep. He sent me a replacement jack, and I made the switch yesterday. Before taking the old jack out, I hooked jumper cables up to it from my car battery. It did not work, to my relief.

The new Phoenix jack is in and working. My only concern is that the jack does not retract as far as I think it should - around 6" of the silver tube remains exposed when the jack is lowered all the way. I see a line of grease, however, at 2" above the end of the tube (4" farther down), so it seems that I must be able to retract it further for when we are on the road. I have not yet been able to figure that part out.

The bottom line was that the problem was with the jack and not with a poor ground. Thanks!

Chris

@Chris Turner posted:

I moved the grounding point to the frame per your example, and it still did not work.

My wife and I took the Lance to a music festival over Labor Day weekend, so I had to use the manual crank to hook and unhook the trailer. I found that it wasn't terrible if I used a breaker bar, even though because we use the Andersen hitch, you need to go up and down an extra time to tension the chains.

In what I hope is the final chapter of this story, I called the manufacturer and recounted my story to a service department rep. He sent me a replacement jack, and I made the switch yesterday. Before taking the old jack out, I hooked jumper cables up to it from my car battery. It did not work, to my relief.

The new Phoenix jack is in and working. My only concern is that the jack does not retract as far as I think it should - around 6" of the silver tube remains exposed when the jack is lowered all the way. I see a line of grease, however, at 2" above the end of the tube (4" farther down), so it seems that I must be able to retract it further for when we are on the road. I have not yet been able to figure that part out.

The bottom line was that the problem was with the jack and not with a poor ground. Thanks!

Chris

Hi Chris - Not sure if you ever straightened out the retraction issue on your jack. I was wondering if calibrating it might get it working correctly.
On the 3rd page of the instruction manual there is a section
"CALIBRATION METHOD TO SET TRAVEL LIMITS"
https://ultra-fab.com/wp-conte...RUCTIONS-r051519.pdf

Maybe that might help get it to fully retract?

Henry