Complete Guide to Moving Your Mobile Home - Page 1
INTRODUCTION
Don’t let the word “mobile” in mobile home mislead you. While they are transportable, it is anything but easy. This book was designed to help you understand the moving process, give important suggestions on how to have a successful move, tips on saving money and grief in the process, and explain how to successfully put your home back together.
Unlike an RV, which can be easily moved from point A to point B, a mobile home move requires careful planning, professional help, and an understanding of the turn-key process. While the move can be very expensive, even worse can be the cost if you do it poorly. The damages can range from complete loss of the home to poor installation which causes persistent problems over the life of the home.
There are currently, to our knowledge, no other books on how to move a mobile home. That might explain why so many people have no idea what they are doing. You’re the smart one; you bought and are reading the book on the subject. As a result, your move should be a smooth one. A lot of them, unfortunately, end up like disasters because the customer was completely reliant on the transporter or, even worse, tried to transport it themselves.
Mobile homes are moved very rarely. Most mobile homes have only been moved once, when they were brand new, from the factory to where they sit today. It is unlikely that you will move your home very often. So it is important that you take the time to do it right on those rare occasions that you move the home.
Good luck and good reading.
Frank Rolfe and Dave Reynolds
MobileHomeParkStore.com
THE BASICS OF HOW A MOBILE HOME IS MOVED
Many people are amazed when they see a mobile home, which can be up to 80’ long and 18’ wide, being moved down the highway. How can they do that? Well, believe it or not, they were designed to be moved. Unlike when someone moves a stick-built house that was never intended to be moved down the highway, every mobile home comes off the factory floor on wheels and ready for its first outing. The design has been tested and refined almost continuously since the first mobile homes were engineered in the 1940s.
The way a mobile home is built, and ultimately transported, begins with the chassis. Just like a car, a mobile home has two or more steel beams that run the entire length of the home, from front to back. To these beams are connected the axles and wheels on the underside, and the floor on the top side. At the front of these beams, at one end, is the “tongue”- the “hitch” of the mobile home that the transporter pulls from and connects to his or her truck. The tongue looks like a huge steel “V”, with the hitch connecting at the sharp point of the “V”.
One of the first differences you will see with a lot of mobile homes is how many axles and wheels they have, and where they are positioned. Every manufacturer seems to have their own design. The number of axles and wheels, logically, is somewhat determined by the weight of the home; the heavier the load, the more wheels to spread that weight. But often you will find some manufacturers use more axles and wheels than others, so you should not be concerned at how many your home has; as long as it is the number that it was intended to have by the manufacturer.
Mobile homes, although they were designed to be moved, were not designed for ease of move, and many of the interior, and exterior, features do not move well without reinforcement or removal. Like a spacecraft being towed to the launching pad, moving the mobile home is not good for it. The home would rather not be moved at all, even though it has the basic capability.
There are several basic steps to moving a mobile home. This will give you an overall idea of the process.
PREPARATION FOR MOVING YOUR MOBILE HOME
The transporter will have to make ready the home to be moved. Assuming the home is already sited somewhere else (of course, if coming out of the factory, no preparation is necessary), the home will have to be separated from its earthly home and made road worthy. The first step is to remove the “skirting” on the home – the material that hides the underside of the mobile home from view. The next step is to remove the utility connections to the home – water, sewer, electricity, gas, cable tv, telephone – any and everything. If the home has decks or carports attached, these will need to be detached as well. Then the home is cut loose from the “tie-downs” (which we will cover in the installation chapter), and jacked up in the air so that the axles and tires can be installed. While the axles and tires are being installed, the “tongue” will be attached. Some tongues are bolted on, and some are welded on. Normally, they are found already attached in older homes and covered in skirting material, or underneath the home lying on ground, where the last transporter left them.
Once the home is in the air, on its own wheels and axles, and with the tongue on, it is ready to be pulled down the road.
Note: If you have a mortgage or loan on the home, you should review that paperwork to ascertain what notices and / or insurance requirements will be required by your lender. There may be stipulations that the home cannot be moved or that a certain minimum insurance be required by you or the mover.
THE MOVE
The transporter will proceed with the home at a fairly low rate of speed for two reasons. First, it is dangerous hauling something this big, and he wants to keep control of this load. Secondly although he will probable have a truck behind him to warn other drivers of his enormous girth, he is equally concerned about areas of road that are too narrow to accommodate him, or two low to clear, such as a bridge. If he goes slow, he has more time to assess the situation and potentially pull over and stop. The final reason is that the home could sustain damage at a high rate of speed if the wind peels back the exterior material or breaks windows, not to mention what can be broken on the inside. If you are going to drive behind or in front of the load yourself, you will probably go nuts traveling at 50mph in a 70mph zone.