Hitch question

SoundGuy wrote:

naturist wrote:
But the BMW has self-leveling (air bag) suspension.

Which can make the Beemer look pretty by leveling it out but does absolutely nothing in terms of transferring weight back on to the vehicle's front steer axle, the sole purpose of a properly sized and adjusted weight distribution system. :R

Some folks still think the purpose of a Weight Distributing Hitch (WDH) is to level the tow vehicle.

Years ago I had a small single axle trailer with a wd hitch setup. The tongue weight was so low that I had marginal tension on the arms. One trip I decided to leave the distribution arms off and only use the sway bar. On a particular stretch of road the spacing of the expansion joints and the three axles resulted in an harmonic that was like bobbing on closely spaced waves. The tension on wd arms would have prevented the harmonic. We always used the wd afterwards.

Thanks for the info guys, I learned some things.

What you are concerned with is the weight carrying capacity of the receiver on the truck. This is the maximum amount of weight the hitch can carry without distributing weight. Exceeding this rating can result in a catastrophic failure of the hitch.

You'd be surprised how little weight hitches can carry. For example, the factory hitch that came with your 2000 F250 can only carry 500 lbs. These days 3/4 and 1 tons come with higher ratings, but not by much. A F350 today comes with a hitch rated at 850 lbs. Sounds strange, but a WDH could be necessary for a F350 with a 6,000 lbs trailer.

With all of the pluses that you get from weight distributing hitches, especially the ones with integrated sway control, it's a no brainer. A 1 ton can benefit from a WDH even if it's not required.

Like some of have said...it depends.

I towed my 3600LB hybrid with my Chevy Traverse for a couple years. I did not use a WDH with it because it was within the hitch and tow ratings, and I never felt I needed it. I towed at all speeds, in all sorts of conditions, and the trailer never even wiggled while towing. In that case a WDH would have been a waste of my $$.

My heavier (and longer)TT behind my (even higher rated) truck definitely rides and handles better with WDH. I towed a couple times without it, but have to admit the drive is more enjoyable with it.

I think this has been good information. You "probably" don't really need one. Hook it up and see how it looks and tows. While a WD hitch is not always needed, I am a firm believer that you should always have some kind of sway control. I also have not been a great fan of the add on sway bar. Way back, when I started towing, there were problems with sway bars when it came to backing up. And hooking them up was sort of a "take a guess" when it came to how hard you needed to crank them down.

Being rather lazy, I went for a hitch with built in sway control. There are many available today and they come in a variety of prices. Do some research and find one that will work for you.

I towed a white box hybrid with a 4Runner and the wind pushed me around a bit. Glad to have my Equalizer. Now, the Airstream doesn't seem to react to the wind that much but I still use the Equalizer but now mainly for the WD function.

My trailer is just North of 5000lb. I've pulled it with and without a WDH and prefer to pull it with the WDH. I have an F250 4x4, CC with towing and plow packages (bigger springs and additional sway bar). The WDH puts weight back onto the steer axle which makes for a better ride.

4Kellys wrote:
Can't see a reason not to have one. Hence the name weight distribution. Makes perfect sense to me unless you're towing a teardrop maybe!

Simplicity. :B

If I were towing our 4500 lb trailer with a 3/4 or 1 ton truck I'd likely not bother with WD but our 1/2 Avalanche, especially because it has a coil rear suspension instead of a more conventional leaf spring truck suspension, definitely needs it. Hooking up though does take more time with WD, especially because my trailer is sitting on our significantly sloped driveway ... with the tongue jack sitting on a triple stack and I have to extend / retract it several times as part of the process - time consumptive and annoying, but nonetheless a necessary evil. :W

Can't see a reason not to have one. Hence the name weight distribution. Makes perfect sense to me unless you're towing a teardrop maybe!

Like all above replies it depends on what the tow vehicle is rated for.