Why do I need WD?

jmtandem wrote:
I suspect that is one reason that WD is not recommended as well as the fact that the front axles are very heavy on most pickups empty. And the trucks are designed to carry the load in the rear --loading the rear axle. I speak from experience as I have experimented with WD and just towing on the ball and there is no difference, in fact it handles slightly better on the ball because it is loading the rear axle. The think that the only thing a WD hitch will help with in braking is that about 20 percent of the redistributed tongue weight using WD is added to the trailer axles and that weight could add some traction to the tires when braking. I suspect it is a minimal value and depends on the tires, brakes, and pavement conditions how much it really helps. If the trailer is towed level there is no nose dive even if the trailer brakes do not lead the tow vehicle's brakes.

This is exactly the point I was trying to make. Trucks are always nose heavy. Diesel trucks like mine are REALLY nose heavy. Manufactures can only hit a happy medium with weight bias when building them. Much like toy haulers the manufacture does not know how much weight any truck is going to carry at any point in time. If they build a 50/50 truck then when someone put a ton of weight in the back, things are really going to get ugly for the manufacture just like it did with the Corvair.

I have a 2500 diesel truck and tow a relatively light trailer for my truck. The last thing I want to do is transfer more weight to the front of the truck. It's got a ton of it there already. The more weight up front the more the TV wants to nose dive during hard braking because it wants to crush the suspension.

With all this said, I agree with everything jmtandem has said. But he makes two very important remarks:

#1. It's VERY important to have as level of a TV and trailer as you can get while towing. This will prevent the trailer from lifting the front of the TV or dropping the front of the TV under hard braking.

#2. Have some good trailer brakes on the trailer. Good trailer brakes will keep the "snake straight." The more lead you have on the trailer brakes the better it will keep everything in line in a panic stop.

I too am not against any WD. When I towed with a 1/2 ton pickup it was very important to keep the rear of the truck from sagging too much. Worked GREAT and I loaded it hard because of the pickup I had at the time. I have a heavy diesel now and there is just no reason to transfer any weight with "MY" setup.