WDH - how much does it reduce tongue weight?

Golden_HVAC wrote:

MargaretB wrote:
Sorry if I"m boring you. I mentioned it here to illustrate what the tow vehicle can handle. I know it's been explained before, but I'm not asking about that here - I'm asking if a good WDH effectively reduces the weight of the hitch. If the vehicle is rated for a 600# hitch and the WDH reduces that from 780# to 548#, is it safe to pull with that vehicle - that's all I want to know.

Yes you are boring me.

If your vehicle can only handle 600 pounds on the hitch, it should not be towing a trailer more than about 5,000 pounds.

Once you find a trailer less than 600# of "Dry" hitch weight, yes you can re-distribute some of that weight off the rear axle onto the trailer and front vehicle axles.

So I was reading a scale read-out on a guy who carefully measured the weights of his trailer while on a CAT scale. It has 4 parts, with the front axle on one section, the rear truck axle on another section, and the trailer axles on one of the other sections. (the CAT scales are designed to weigh 40' - 65' long big rigs up to about 110,000 pounds).

With the WD bars off, then the measurements where made and paid his $6. Then the WD bars tightened, and the trailer took on another 30 pounds. The front axle also went up by about 60 - 75 pounds.

That is all you can expect the WD bars to do with your trailer, not a 30% change. I am guessing that a salesman for the trailer company 'claimed' that 30% can be moved off the hitch? That is sort of an exaggeration. Like saying 'up to 30% can be removed' - well if you started with 1,000 pounds on the hitch and moved 80 pounds to the trailer axles and 185 pounds to the vehicle front axle, you have removed 'up to 30%' - well maybe only 26.5% but it still was up to 30%. Sales double talk. .

With your lighter weight trailer, less weight will actually be moved to the trailer axle, and much less moved to the tow vehicle front axle.

You also need to consider the towing vehicle's length to the trailer length. You don't want to tow a 28' long trailer with a short wheelbase truck or car.

You also need to consider that most cars and F-150 and 1500 series trucks and vans use passenger tires, and those are not so great for towing. Passenger car tires lack the sidewall stiffness of LT tires.

Good luck with your purchase! And don't listen to the salesman's claims that 'this truck or car can tow anything' - usually it is wrong, unless you are driving a dually pickup with a tow package. .

I heard one story about a couple considering a travel trailer, and sitting inside heard the salesman in the next trailer over trying to complete a sale. "Don't worry, your Explorer can tow this trailer, I see it has the optional V8 engine in it". Explorers do not make great tow vehicles, especially the ones built before 2002.

Fred.

Fred,

JFYI and I'm not disputing what you are contending, but on the road trip we are currently on I took the opportunity it do day to day weigh ins each right after fueling with the only change being for the second one I raised the "L" brackets on my Equal-i-zer hitch one hole to transfer more weight off my TV RA to the TV FA. While these were not straight apples to apples conditions since they were 1 day apart very little changed and the overall weight difference was only 20 lbs.
Front TV axle
1st weigh in - 3920
2nd weigh in - 4020
Rear TV axle
1st weigh in - 6100
2nd weigh in - 5920
TT axles
1st weigh in - 6960
2nd weigh in 7020
The dead tongue wt. was 940lbs so one hole on my particular TV/TT combo resulted in 180 lbs xfrd off the rear axle of the TV (19%) and 100 lbs put back on the TV front axle and 60lbs add to the TT axles (20 lbs lost somewhere between the two weigh ins.

Subjectively I could actually tell an overall improvement on how well my combo behaved after moving those "L" brackets up one notch, which sort of suprised me since I didn't think I would see any noticeable difference.

Larry