Scary Towing Sights This Week...

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beemerphile1 wrote:

cm11599ps wrote:
...What are the laws for towing? Could these rigs get ticketed for being way over their capacity?

In most states the maximum allowed by law is 80,000# for the entire rig and 20,000# for each axle. Manufacturer tow ratings have no legal status. Manufacturers do not make laws.

A LEO can cite any vehicle if it is unsafe in the opinion of the officer but the officer may be required to defend the action in court.

Actually 20k axle or 34k tandem or 80k gross has nothing to do with how much weight a lessor rated truck can legally carry. Those are max loads allowed on a road surface. We also have bridge weight formulas that differ but they also have nothing to do with how much weight a lessor rated truck can carry.

PA has some of the oldest weight regulations on the books and they say;
Maximum axle weight of vehicles.
(a) General rule.--No vehicle or combination driven upon a
highway shall have a weight upon any axle in excess of the
lesser of the manufacturer's rated axle capacity or the
following applicable weight:

(snip..bridge law formula/single/tandam/etc)

(c) Gross weight.--No vehicle or combination shall be driven
with a gross weight in excess of the sum of the allowable axle
weights as set forth in this section, nor shall any vehicle or
combination be driven with a gross weight in excess of the sum
of the manufacturer's rated axle capacities."

Texas says;
4. tires that carry a weight heavier than the weight specified and marked on the sidewall of the tire,..."

or from Utah;
(b) The tire load rating shall be marked on the tire sidewall. A tire, wheel, or axle may not carry a greater weight than the manufacturer's rating.

Many states may have a "weighing for a overload condition" statute. The ones I've seen say the same thing about axle and tires being exceeded.

rockhillmanor wrote:

Fizz wrote:
Note to OP and others
Never critisize somebody elses settup. Chance are a dozen readers have the same settup and will defend it to the death, right or wrong.

Yup, just like this guy will NEVER admit he has tire roll. :B
Or in fact has ANY control while driving down the road.
Wouldn't want to be near 'him' on any road.

That's pretty much what I saw, only worse in both cases. When I left the campground I handed in my vehicle passes and checked out. I got in my car and was about to take off when I saw one of these scary rigs coming out of the CG behind me. He obviously didn't even bother to check out of the CG either because he was ready to go right past me.

I had two options at this point. Option one was to floor it to stay ahead of him. Option two was to let him pass and follow him along for the 5 minutes it took to get out of the park and onto 2 lane road. I opted to follow him but I made sure I was way behind him.

We both hit the two lane road and I still stayed far behind him. Luckily he got stopped by a red light and I was able to pull up alongside him while he was stopped. The light turned green and I breathed a sigh of relief as I saw him in my rear view mirror.

Recently I saw a F 250 4x4 with big tires pulling a trailer like ours on a drop hitch and no WDH or sway control. We stayed back because every time a truck passed them or they tried to change lanes the trailer would start to sway and would get the truck shimmying along with it. It took a good mile for him to get into the slow lane because he would start sliding over, the rig would start wiggling and he would straighten it out until it stopped, then he would start moving over again.
The truck was big enough but between the drop down hitch, over sized tires and no sway control, it was a accident waiting to happen.

I was at an event and one of the vendors was camped in a travel trailer. We passed them on the highway on the way home and it was a damn scary sight. They were towing the travel trailer with a Dodge Ram van. The front tires were practically off the ground! The tow vehicle might have been good enough for the weight, but the hitch setup certainly wasn't correct.

I had an F-350 with proper hitch to tow my travel trailer. The F-350 was probably overkill, but the price difference between an F-250 and F-350 isn't much.

cm11599ps wrote:
...What are the laws for towing? Could these rigs get ticketed for being way over their capacity?

In most states the maximum allowed by law is 80,000# for the entire rig and 20,000# for each axle. Manufacturer tow ratings have no legal status. Manufacturers do not make laws.

A LEO can cite any vehicle if it is unsafe in the opinion of the officer but the officer may be required to defend the action in court.

Baptism by fire...what doesn't kill you makes U stronger LOL

I remember towing our 17 foot runabout with 1971 Toyota LC.
The cruiser would pull it...but the the brakes were always smokin'

Then we towed the boat with a 1988 Mercury Cougar.
I think since the car was uni-body it started bending the back down.

Thems was the dayz...
Of course we never drove very far back then.

We have friends who have been longtime RV'ers.
They lost their first Nomad TT to a home built hitch welded up by their son (who was a welder by trade)
This happened maybe 17-18 years ago.

With today's towing technology, available equipment and of course deep pockets there's not much excuse to risk life and limb.

2cents...

Towed for many years a 21' FunFinder at roughly 6,000 lbs. with my Hemi Jeep Commander rated at 7800 lbs. A friend towed a 28' FunFinder at 6900 lbs. with his Hemi Jeep Commander. Both rigs have been cross country many times, I've since moved to a 5er, but, he's still towing his FunFinder. The Hemi is a towing engine and the GC and Commander's outfitted with it, from at least '08, were rated at 7800 lbs. A good WD hitch to keep the Jeep level was all that either of us needed (loved my Equal-i-zer). Heavy duty engine, axles, suspension, brakes and frame made the towing a breeze and very stable even with a borderline wheelbase; never had a "white knuckle" tow with ours. I wouldn't go over 26'-28' with a GC, but, IMHO, if outfitted correctly, they make fine towing platforms.

Perhaps the folks the OP saw needed a WD hitch, or if they had one, maybe they needed to set it up correctly, but, nothing wrong with the package (Jeep and 28' TT) as long as all the numbers fall in the right range and with fiberglass ultralights, that is easy to do.

Couple years ago, we sold our 27' Airstream International to a couple that bought a new Dodge Charger to pull it. We discussed this with them and they assured us that a company in Canada set up the Dodge to tow the weight. It was a very scary sight when they drove away. They were both retired LEO's...

Our 23 foot trailer has a GVWR of about 6,100 so even it was fully loaded, we would only be at 85% of the weight rating for our Grand Cherokee.

Trailer sway hasn't been an issue with our old 19' trailer or this one.