NHTSA Complaint #11616356 — 2018 HEARTLAND ROAD WARRIOR

The rear spring shackles that hold the leaf springs and axle to the frame of the trailer broke off of the frame while going down the road. I took the RV to Clyde's Frame shop in Pontiac MI. and was told that this is a very common problem with frames made by Lippert because they do not brace the shackles the way they should be to prevent this from happening. I have filed an insurance claim but they have not inspected the damage to the RV yet. Thankfully we were only driving at a low speed and noticed a lot of smoke coming from the back of the RV. If we would have been traveling at highway speeds the rear tires would have blown out causing the RV to become very unstable or cause a serious accident. Also where the spring shackle broke off of the frame it broke a PVC tube that has to gasoline lines in it that run from the fuel tank in the rear of the RV to the generator in the front of the RV. Any sparks could have caused the gasoline to ignite causing a major fire. There were no warning signs, lamps or messages before this happened. We were going straight down the road, we felt a small jerk, looked in the rear view mirror and seen a lot of smoke coming from the rear of the RV.