Video Transcript for A Closer Look at the etrailer Repair Kit for etrailer and Ram Channel Tongue Couplers

Hi, I'm Matt with etrailer and today, we're gonna be talking about the repair kit for the etrailer and Ram channel tongue couplers. Now, a reason why you might wanna replace this is for a couple reasons. Now, with this sitting out in a lot of different weather conditions, sometimes you're gonna get a lot of debris or water that really get caught up in there. It can really just make it kind of difficult to use sometimes. It might not necessarily be broken, but there is always a chance of that happening because there is a lot of moving components, and rather than replacing your whole coupler, you can just replace this latch, which is gonna be a lot more affordable, and a lot of times, these couplers are gonna be welded on, so it's gonna be a lot of work or you're gonna have to pay someone to get this removed. You'll notice it is a little dingy looking, a lot of that paint has come off, it still works fine, but sometimes it might catch and that's a good reason to replace it, especially if you're working with this on a daily basis.

Now, I have the new one in my hand right here and this is still gonna work for your two inch balls, it even has that same embezzling here on the side, let you know so you don't forget, but let's go over all the pieces we have. So if I just undo this real quick, I'm just gonna turn it, it'll loosen up, for the other way, and we'll go over all the pieces. So right here, we're gonna have the actual latch mechanism itself, we're gonna have the large spring that goes on it, and then we're gonna have this base right here, it will sit right on top. Now for the inner components, we're gonna have this smaller spring, we're gonna have this washer, and we're gonna have this kinda nut catch right here, and then we're gonna have the nut, but let's start taking this off and replacing it. So what we're gonna do is lift up on the latch, put it in that up position, what that's doing for us is loosening everything below.

So I can push up on the base and on this little nut catch here. With that out of my way, then I can grab a three quarter socket and wrench, and just start taking that off. (wrench cranking) You might find that you have a lot of resistance, especially if this is an older coupler that might have some rust in here, just kind of take your time with it. Gonna get this off of here. (wrench cranking) Now I can finally remove it.

So once this nut comes off, all I'm really doing is taking off all these individual pieces here at the bottom, putting that off to the side, and then I'm just gonna wiggle a bit, and that's gonna allow me to pull my latch to the top. Now we can grab that new latch, make sure it's in this position all the way straightened out, and we're just gonna drop that through that hole, and make sure it's just sitting in the right position. Now I'm gonna reach down and I'm gonna grab my new spring, put that on, followed by that base. The way this is gonna go on is gonna be at an angle, so trick to this is pushing up on that bolt some so you can get this to sit in there properly. Just like that.

As you can see, the back end is wrapped around this rod right here, and that's what we're looking for. And from here, we're gonna put everything on in the same orientation as we took 'em off. So I'm gonna put on that flat washer with that flat side closest to that little bend we have, then we're gonna grab that little spring washer, put that on too. You want to make sure you're applying constant pressure to this, it's just gonna make that a little bit easier, and that lock nut holder here, and then we'll finish it off with this nut. And once you get that hand threaded on, we'll go back through with the three quarter inch socket wrench and tighten it a little bit more too. (wrench cranking) Just keep tightening until you can't anymore, and right now, we're gonna give it a little test to see how it's fitting. What I'm really looking for is to see how much play we have. Right now, the transition feels pretty smooth, I'm liking the way it feels. It does have a little bit of looseness here at the very top, so I'm probably just gonna tighten that down just a tad bit more. I'm gonna try it again now with this tightened down some more, and right now, this is feeling a lot better, I like that more. So what I suggest doing at this point is just hook it up to one of your balls and just taking it out on a little quick drive, probably around like a parking lot, anything like that just to make sure it's gonna safely latch on, then get out afterwards and check it out to make sure it still looks good, and if it does, then that will complete our look at the installation of the repair kit for your etrailer and Ram couplers.