93Cobra2771 wrote:
Campin LI wrote:
Campin LI wrote:
BarneyS wrote:
Campin LI wrote:
WDH's rely on the trucks rear end sag to work. If the truck is leveled first by airbags, adding a WDH will do nothing because you have no rear end sag to lever up. Snip...
Not quite. The WDH will work no matter if there is rear end sag or not. Sag is not necessarily an indication that a WD hitch is needed. You could replace the springs on the rear of a truck with solid steel bars and prevent any sag at all but there would still be weight removed from the front axle and possible overloading of the receiver and rear axle by the addition of a heavy tongue weight. The WD hitch will help correct that situation.
I agree with most of the rest of your post except that I feel the use of air bags is normally not necessary at all when a WD hitch is properly sized and used. Thank you for your contribution to the discussion. :)
Barney
Agreed. It's a simple system with complicated mechanics. In trying to simplify a response, I ended up explaining it inaccurately. Thanks for pointing it out.
I'm finding that this towing forum can get very technical with mathematics, which is fine but not reality for a travel trailer. On this you are technically correct but you did remove a real variable to make your point. Trucks do have springs that compress under load and a WDH does rely on the squat to work. Without squat, you only have rotation. Depending on how long your truck is and how much tongue weight there is, the back may not rotate down all that much and if that is the case, most WDH will not be able to adjust much at all. 1 chain link or 1 washer is an inch. What if you only need 1/2 inch adjustment?
You don't have to have squat for a WDH to work. What you have to have is a hitch adjusted for the angle between your truck and your TT.
With my bags aired up, I have ZERO squat in my truck's rear suspension compared to unhooked. However, I have the hitch adjusted so that the front goes back down where it's supposed to.
I'm not sure what your question is about WDH adjustment without squat - you aren't adjusting a WDH to change the height of the rear, you are adjusting to change the weight transfer (and subsequently, the front height of the TV). I can assure you, I was able to easily adjust the amount of weight transfer on my truck with a washer or two, in 1/4" increments. A person could go even less with thinner washers, I'm sure.
Where you can run into trouble is if your particular WDH is made for less angle between the TV and the TT. Especially if you have a sloppy receiver in your TV. In those cases, some have made shims to go on top of the hitch assembly (or in the receiver assembly) to cut out those few degrees of slop.
Hey, don't blame me for removing squat!!! Barney took that away when he removed the springs and put in a steel bar :B I think we are all saying about the same thing, just different ways. I'm not used to the technical way it is usually presented on this forum is all.
Just wondering - when you used the airbags to raise the back of your truck to it's unhitched height, basically, you raised the horizontal reference point for the loaded hitch without WD attached. Your front end theoretically should raise by the same amount because the load on the ball is still the same, provided you adjusted to keep the trailer level. If you brought the front end back to the same height as before you had airbags, did you transfer more weight forward to get it there. I know we are talking inches or maybe 1/2 inches but I'm just curious.
