Andersen No-Sway Experience
Over all I give the Andersen a thumbs up. Initial install is simple and quick. Its ability to move weight forward on your rig is surprisingly good. It pulls well and handles sway about as well as coul...
Forum Discussion
So you ignore numbers in your job as you do with your personal rig? We're supposed to rely on anecdote as to how effective this hitch is?
"Experience" (anecdote) might be helpful . . but it is beside the point. And the point is in minimizing risk. I run the oilfield. Want me to relate the number of drivers I see who fail to maintain proper fifth wheel lubrication, both in Oversize/Overload and Haz-Mat? Who need not speak/write English to be licensed to do so? Your "experience" speaks no more loudly than theirs, sir. Bad practice is just that.
As you are familiar with load scales, let them speak the matter. Both RMA and BRIDGESTONE have guidelines (.pdf) on how to weigh RV's (See posts or blog by Tireman 9). Let your numbers and experience stand for themselves in relation to one another. Ron Gratz posted this chart several years ago for setting hitch rigging to check numbers that is equally useful.
Establish a proper mechanical baseline -- hitch rigging and tire pressures, axle alignment, brake effectiveness, bearing set, etc -- and maybe your unrelated experience will have some weight.
About the only thing 18-wheeler experience brings to the table is in caution. Minimizing risk is the whole point to threads on towing. Lack of numbers, the before and after, means no one trying to understand risk minimization need listen to Andersen owners. Greaseless and soft ride have no meaning. Lack of caution is all that is on display.
An incredibly inferior trailer design pulled by an almost equally inferior tow vehicle and connected by an obviously unsuitable hitch . . . claims made beggar belief given "professional experience".
Set your numbers, explain your reasoning for changes, and earn some respect. There are those of us with more experience than you. But who understand that any discussion of how effective something is has to be measured, first. Each of those categories mentioned might benefit from what you bring to the table. It is truly the package, the combined rig, that matters. Each part of that three-way relation -- TT, TV and hitch rigging -- has to be understood in context. Which is not anecdotal. It is all driven by numbers.
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"Experience" (anecdote) might be helpful . . but it is beside the point. And the point is in minimizing risk. I run the oilfield. Want me to relate the number of drivers I see who fail to maintain proper fifth wheel lubrication, both in Oversize/Overload and Haz-Mat? Who need not speak/write English to be licensed to do so? Your "experience" speaks no more loudly than theirs, sir. Bad practice is just that.
As you are familiar with load scales, let them speak the matter. Both RMA and BRIDGESTONE have guidelines (.pdf) on how to weigh RV's (See posts or blog by Tireman 9). Let your numbers and experience stand for themselves in relation to one another. Ron Gratz posted this chart several years ago for setting hitch rigging to check numbers that is equally useful.
Establish a proper mechanical baseline -- hitch rigging and tire pressures, axle alignment, brake effectiveness, bearing set, etc -- and maybe your unrelated experience will have some weight.
About the only thing 18-wheeler experience brings to the table is in caution. Minimizing risk is the whole point to threads on towing. Lack of numbers, the before and after, means no one trying to understand risk minimization need listen to Andersen owners. Greaseless and soft ride have no meaning. Lack of caution is all that is on display.
An incredibly inferior trailer design pulled by an almost equally inferior tow vehicle and connected by an obviously unsuitable hitch . . . claims made beggar belief given "professional experience".
Set your numbers, explain your reasoning for changes, and earn some respect. There are those of us with more experience than you. But who understand that any discussion of how effective something is has to be measured, first. Each of those categories mentioned might benefit from what you bring to the table. It is truly the package, the combined rig, that matters. Each part of that three-way relation -- TT, TV and hitch rigging -- has to be understood in context. Which is not anecdotal. It is all driven by numbers.
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