At almost every site I have been on I always come across a few vans that raise their jockey wheel off the floor and let the legs take the weight. Surely the van should only rest on three points, the jockey wheel and the two road wheels, the legs should only act as steadies as their name suggests?

You will be looking next time your away, I bet you spot a few now

This has been debated on CT 'til it palls.

There are a few very die hard members who seem to think that it will harm the jockey wheel or some such nonsense. They even ignore plain instructions in the handbooks of their own caravans.

It's not helped by a tendency for some to refer to steadies as 'jacks', especially north of the border. As is pointed out by the majority, 'jacks' are a totally different thing built with the strength to raise a whole (or half) a vehicle, whereas steadies are just meant to stop the thing tipping forward or back whilst the main load is taken by the three or for TA's five wheels.

I think it may have originated from white box dealers removing the jockey
wheel from forecourt display models to dissuade thieves.
Removing or raising the jockey wheel is an affectation there is nothing to gain,
from the practice it lessens the efficiency of the steadies, and looks silly.

Whilst debating which model of van to buy last year we often spent time walking around the campsite during the evening to see what was on offer. During one such stroll we got talking to a middle age couple who had a few months prior invested in a new Triton 430. The only complaint they had, and one that was remedied by their dealer - twice I might add - was the fact that they had already broken rear steadies and considered that Eriba were cutting corners (no pun intended) and manufacturing these steadies with far too little strength. As you can probably guess already, these steadies kept breaking during the jacking up to level the van process.
I said to the owner that it was my understanding that steadies were not to be used as jacks but at that time, not having a van of my own, couldn't exactly prove it and had no handbook to refer to. Now that I do have a van of course, the handbook states quite clearly that steadies are not to be used as jacks and more by implication than anything else, are obviously not intended to take the entire weight of the van.
I'll keep an eye out for the jockey wheel non-use practice next season and if I come across it shall have a friendly word with the owner to try and establish where this practice originates.

There is a balance to be struck here (pardon the pun) A van should be slightly nose heavy (for towing purposes) referred to as nose-weight.

Once on site and the corner "steadies" lowered weight can be "re-distributed"

While I understand that they are in no way intended to raise the van off it's wheels reason dictates that they must do more than merely "steady"

My 430 Triton has seating for 4 adults rearward of the wheels ..............thus the weight distribution of said 4 adults should be distributed between the wheels and the rear steadies (plus or minus whatever imbalance there may be between front and rear weight)

Allowing 75Kg per person (not unreasonable) x 4 = 300Kg (assume a "neutral balance") at the start and that the weight is evenly distributed between the wheels and the rear steadies comes back to 75 Kg per wheel and per steady to make up the 4 person weight

Assume a safety factor of 100% (normal in engineering safety allowances) then it implies that a single corner "steady" should be capable of supporting at least 150Kg

While not being intended to be a lifting point the so called "steady" must be capable of more then merely stopping the van from rocking on its wheels ...................

The only reason I can think of for raising the wheel is to make it easier to fit a TV aerial clamp to the stem although I manage to fit mine quite well with it down.