Parking Wedge?

[Boxite]

Reading thru the Caravan Practices pages at WBCCI I found the following guidance: "Pull trailer onto the parking wedge. Then if something should go wrong, the trailer will roll away from the tow vehicle."

What am I missing? What is a "parking wedge"?

[xrvr]

Probably talking about a wheel chock. Sounds like good advice to me, thats how i did it. Put the chock in front of a wheel on each side of the trailer. No moving forward then.

[Boxite]

The advice appears to be cautionary toward a safety item. I don't see how pulling onto a chock will do anything for safety...especially since the wheel should be chocked both forward and aft.

What else could they mean?

[WhereStream]

I place a "wedge" fore and aft. You never know ...

[Rocinante]

No idea, but I gotta say, same as above, we chock trailer wheels in both directions so the trailer goes nowhere when we unhitch. Last thing we want is a trailer galavanting off down the hill away from us after we disconnect everything!

[Steamy1]

May be talking about the Anderson levelers, which are a wedge.

[Rocinante]

Maybe? We love the Anderson levelers. However, we wedge those so the trailer won’t roll back down, and as a margin of safety we also chock any wheels not leveled.

[PKI]

So, it says pull onto wedge. A bit or a lot are options. Not wrong to add a wedge behind to stop additional roll. The intent is as stated, a practice to use stored energy to keep the coach from rolling forward into the tow vehicle. Being trapped between two big vehicles would hurt. As an example of alternate ideas, we park so the vehicle next to us is downhill. Then their door can't swing into us. We don't park down hill from the shopping cart storage. Using stored energy is a good practice. Just don't forget to release energy with caution. Pat

[AWCHIEF]

I would not be surprised if that “guidance” was not written 50 or more years ago. Many years before the Anderson brothers were even born. This is not something that needs to be over thought or debated endlessly by kitchen table internet engineers and philosophers.
Wedge = wheel chock. Terminology has changed over time. The club is slowly changing to catch up to current times. The caravan guidance and rules are still many years behind times and technology. There are some new and progressive caravan leaders coming on board in the next couple years. I would expect to see the “guidance” updated with their arrival.
In the mean time use common sense and chock fore and aft. Safety First.

[rmkrum]

Our practice is to position and level the AS left to right, then install the wheel chocks that go between the dual axles, tighten them so the AS cannot move at all.

Then we start unhitching.

On departure, fully hitched, stabilizers up, all utility ground tackle disconnected. Tow vehicle shut down, in park, brakes on. Then the chocks get released and pulled.

Learned a long time ago, if the airplane isn’t ready to move under human control, it stays chocked so it can’t move. Airplanes on the deck of an aircraft carrier can easily get outta hand if they are not chocked and chained down all the time unless someone is in the cockpit and riding brakes...and the brake pressure is pumped all the way up!

Seen a few incidents when that was not done exactly right. Someone unloaded an F-8 onto the helo deck of an oil tanker one time. I’m sure the dude riding brakes that forgot to pump up the pressure had a serious laundry problem as he went off the flight deck toward the Oiler’s helo pad and the water!

Another fine Charley Foxtrot in the Gulf of Tonkin...

Yes, the aircraft, and the kid came out fine, although well shaken. I’m sure that the serious butt-chewing he got from his boss after all was sorted was epic!!!

[Boxite]

Originally Posted by rmkrum

Our practice is to position and level the AS left to right, then install the wheel chocks that go between the dual axles, tighten them so the AS cannot move at all.

Then we start unhitching.

On departure, fully hitched, stabilizers up, all utility ground tackle disconnected. Tow vehicle shut down, in park, brakes on. Then the chocks get released and pulled.

Learned a long time ago, if the airplane isn’t ready to move under human control, it stays chocked so it can’t move. Airplanes on the deck of an aircraft carrier can easily get outta hand if they are not chocked and chained down all the time unless someone is in the cockpit and riding brakes...and the brake pressure is pumped all the way up!

Seen a few incidents when that was not done exactly right. Someone unloaded an F-8 onto the helo deck of an oil tanker one time. I’m sure the dude riding brakes that forgot to pump up the pressure had a serious laundry problem as he went off the flight deck toward the Oiler’s helo pad and the water!

Another fine Charley Foxtrot in the Gulf of Tonkin...

Yes, the aircraft, and the kid came out fine, although well shaken. I’m sure that the serious butt-chewing he got from his boss after all was sorted was epic!!!

LOL. That reminded me of time I watched a Lockheed JetStar roll into a Falcon jet in Houston. The Nos 1&4 engines are just parasites on that airplane with Nos 2&3 the only ones with full accys such as hydraulic pumps. A new mechanic with more attitude than experience insisted that the regular crew was unnecessary and that HE would taxi the airplane to a new position on the ramp. He started No 1 and then No 4 and motioned to the marshaller to remove the chocks... and he shoved the thrustlevers forward....and WHOOO-HOOO ... the scrambling ramprats and crunching aluminum was spectacular!

Sorry for the hi-jack of my own thread... but it pays to know the proper procedures and that's the reason I was wondering what the heck the Airstream Caravanning guide instructions mean.