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Bolt this wedge onto your Sidewinder to prevent the Sidewinder's king pin from rotating in your Curt A16 fifth-wheel trailer hitch.
Features:
Note: Does not work for 68220 Sidewinder Gen 2 king pins. Use 68203 wedge kit instead.
California residents: click here
Videos are provided as a guide only. Refer to manufacturer installation instructions and specs for complete information.
Hi everyone. Aiden here with etrailer. Today we're gonna be taking a look at the Sidewinder Wedge Kit options that'll fit with our Curt A Series fifth wheel hitches. Now you're gonna get two different options for your wedge kits and for the most part they are the exact same. There's a few differences we'll highlight later in the video, but for now just know that you'll be seeing them both, one from Reese and one from Curt. And those two wedge kits are gonna be accomplishing the same task.
They'll mount on your pin box behind the kingpin, and when we go to hook up to our trailer, it'll slot into our fifth wheel hitch and bind that up to make sure that there's no pivoting or rotation happening in the fifth wheel hitch, allowing our Sidewinder to work as intended giving us that better turning with a more clearance with our cab. And holding these up in place, you can see why they're a nice option. These are gonna be custom fit with a flare out on the wedge kit here to match the flare on our Curt A series fifth wheel hitch. What that's gonna do is a number of things. One, it just gives us a more secure fit but it spreads that force out a lot more evenly throughout the whole fifth wheel hitch and the wedge kit.
That's gonna disperse the force and just help this last longer overall. With the more universal style designs that probably came with your Sidewinder, it's going to be more of a rectangle shape and it's putting a lot of pressure on just a single point on the wedge kit. By spreading this out, we're going to be giving our fifth wheel and our wedge kit a lot more life and helping to bind it up a lot better. Getting into the differences that we mentioned earlier, the Curt is going to have a carbide black powder coat finish. It gives us this more matte textured appearance.
And then the hardware it comes with is going to be a split lock washer and all of that hardware is going to be zinc coated. Moving over to the option from Reese, that one's going to be standard powder coat finish and it gives it this more glossy black look. The hardware that it comes with is going to be more of a conical washer and then it comes with some loctite pre-applied on those bolts. What it really comes down to is your personal preference on those differences. Functionally, they're gonna do the same thing and they're gonna mount up the same way.
They have the exact same slotted holes spaced out the exact same way and this indentation underneath will be the same for both of those wedge kits. That indentation is where our bolts actually feed through and then it'll mount up with this flat side facing or touching the pin box underneath. You do get some adjustment with that hand knob on your pin box but it's nice that the holes are slotted to allow for some further adjustment if needed. And it's worth mentioning that if you don't have an A series fifth wheel hitch, there are other wedge kit options out there for other hitches. And for the most part between all those different options the install process is gonna be pretty much the same. Speaking of that install process, one of our experts, Kevin actually took one of these out earlier and mounted it up and showed how it installed. So let's check out that process with him now. So here we have a trailer with a Reese Sidewinder. Here's the generic like rectangle shaped Sidewinder wedge kit that's typically gonna come with your Sidewinder. If you look back here, you can see the rotary wheel and what this does is it allows our wedge kit to kind of move back and forth so that we can kind of fine tune exactly where it needs to sit. So if I pull this pin out and I turn it, so turning it counterclockwise here, if I'm facing towards the trailer it's gonna push it forward more towards the king pin and then if I put it back clockwise, we can get it kind of back towards the trailer. Now one little tip I do recommend doing is once you find that sweet spot of where this needs to sit so that it properly aligns in the head of the hitch, go ahead and just mark it. So like our neighbor today, they've already marked it. You can kind of see it, it's a little bit scratched up just from connecting to the hitch but there's a yellow marker on here, so that way you know exactly where it needs to sit every single time. You can easily put it back to where it needs to be and pop your clip back in. But let's go ahead, we'll take this off and show you how to put on a new one. So here is our old generic Sidewinder wedge kit. If you see right here, it has one less tab on it, on this part. This is gonna be facing towards our hitch cuz it's gonna kind of overlap the head a little bit and then it'll stop right about here. So with our new one, we're gonna copy that as well. We'll have that facing towards our hitch. And I'm gonna go ahead and just reuse the same bolts. So we'll go ahead and get down under our pin box. And right here is that little plate I was talking about that we can bolt into. Go ahead and place our wedge up here. Just hand tighten on in for right now till it is fully set and then we can use our wrench. Once we have 'em pretty tight we can go ahead and torque 'em down. (torque wrench beeping) Also, gonna go ahead and back this one up a little bit. This is a little bit larger than our last one so we're gonna need to push it out of the way. We'll hook up to our kingpin and then we'll go ahead and slip this into place, get it in the right position. Now we're hooked up to our hitch. We can go ahead and start turning our rotary wheel and get it fully locked up in position here. Pretty tight. All right, once we got it in a position that we like, we can go ahead and slip our pin back in place and we're good to go. Hopefully seeing that install from Kevin was a bit helpful seeing that these installs are pretty straightforward and helped highlight the benefit of a custom fit option, seeing how well it fit into the fifth wheel hitch. Again, it really comes down to just finding the right one for your fifth wheel hitch. If you don't have an A series fifth wheel hitch be sure to check out our website and find the right one for you. And it's nice that if you do have an A series fifth wheel hitch we've got two options to choose from based on your preferences. But that'll do it for a look at the Sidewinder Wedge Kits for our Curt A series fifth wheel hitches. Thanks for watching.
Average Customer Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars (28 Customer Reviews)
Bolt this wedge onto your Sidewinder to prevent the Sidewinder's king pin from rotating in your Curt A16 fifth-wheel trailer hitch.Put the wedge on Grand design turning point pin box, the wedge fits perfectly on the Curt a16 fifth wheel hitch.
Customer and product support is better than great as well as prices, service and available selection. Being new to 5th wheel hitch requirements I was able to get all the info needed on type and additional parts required. Received everything on a timely basis, had it installed locally without any problems what-so-ever. This is a great company by any standard and sure to be the next in retailer success. They have covered all the basis in what it takes to be not just a good retailer but truly a great retailer.
I really like the Turning Point hitch as I can go a full 90 degree when backing in. After a scarry incident happened on the interstate highway, the wedge moved, even after being torqued to specification. So on the long hauls towing two trailers, I would feel safer with wedge removed.
Finally got the correct wedge for my si dewinder.
Works perfect on the Curt Turning Point hitch.
The universal wedge that came with Turning Point Pin Box on my Grand Design Fifth Wheel did not properly fit the Curt A16 hitch. I ordered this wedge per the advice offered by the etrailer expert. It works perfectly.
etrailer has the best service compared to many different companies that I have ordered from. Within minutes of placing my order I received confirmation from them, soon after that my order shipped. The product arrived exactly when expected and the product is exactly what I wanted. Thanks to everyone on the etrailer team. I will definitely order from you again.
Works well with the 5th wheel king pin
Fits perfectly for my Curt A16 fifth wheel hitch
Required for Curt A16. Original Reese sidewinder lockout moves too much.
Perfect fit for my Curt A16 hitch!
Item was shipped right away and was as expected. I will try it out in a few days. The customer service at etrailer is awesome, very professional and has never disapointed me yet even with the holiday season.
Works perfect with turning point hitch
This is a piece of steel, so little to go wrong, but did exactly as it was supposed to.
When you are THE BEST in the market what shouldn't be expected. GREAT SERVICE, TRANSPARENT SHIPPING & GREAT COMMUNICATION.
Product is working well.
It works fine.
Perfect!
Excellent service and advice! Thanks for your help.
Great service with nothing but positive outcome.
Thank you.
Fits well update later after use
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William S.
4/11/2020
the wedge is was still doing well .