Taken all the steps to prevent sway. Still swaying. Help!

[KevinBerting]

I'm out of ideas and need help. I have been camping for 8 years in a pop up, and just upgraded to out first TT. I should mention that I drive pretty large commercial vehicles with buckets and outriggers daily and am comfortable towing large, very heavy trailers at work. I'm no rookie, yet I'm feeling at a loss here.

Towing our TT is a white knuckle experience everytime. A little wind or a passing truck is sending me into a fish tailing nightmare multiple times per trip. I have a properly installed and tensioned weight distribution hitch plus a sway bar. I am loading the trailer with as much of the weight low and forward as I can. I just put new tires on the trailer with proper inflation. The ride level is great with the right drop on my hitch. I have trailer brakes that are working well to slow it down as needed on declines. My tow vehicle is a brand new 2017 Ram 2500 with far more than enough tow capacity. Everything in my set up says I should be able to tow this thing easily and comfortably, yet I am constantly on high alert! What else could I be missing?

Our travel trailer is a 2010 Keystone Hideout 26 BH. 26 feet long plus tongue and no slideouts. Dry weight is 5100. I did flip the axles as soon as we bought it, because it sat very low and I wanted better ground clearance. I know this could affect stability somewhat, but considering my larger tow vehicle and WD hitch with sway bar, this shouldn't be causing that big of issues, right? The WD hitch is used. Is it possible the bars are bent or malfunctioning? They are the type with the chains hooking them to the trailer tongue. Could my sway bar just be shot? What else could possibly be going on here? I need to get this trailer moving safely down the road. I can't keep fighting it every trip out.

Thanks for your input. I'll try just about anything at this point.

[mike243]

I tow a 28' with my f150's ,towed for 2 years with 4.2 v6 single cab 6.5 bed and now 5.0 4 door with 5.5 bed.I use 2 sway bars per Husky recommendations of 24' and over should use 2.on 2 lane roads I would never need them but on 4 lanes it works great,just remember to unhook them for backing into places.Having pulled a lot of trailers over the years too much tongue or tail weight will cause holes in the seats,fancy hitches can help but the sway bars have been doing it longer and cheaper,I'd start at the scales before I spent any $ or time on up grades,good luck and I think its some thing simple

[Acdii]

Sounds to me more like an improperly setup WDH than anything else. I tow a longer trailer with a SB Screw F150 without sway issues.

First things first, Know your trailers TW. With that knowledge in hand, make sure you have the proper weight spring bars for the hitch. No need for a fancy hitch either, a Reese round bar with one sway bar is all I use and it works fine.

Level the trailer, measure the top of the hitch. Measure the truck wheel well openings on level ground. Setup the ball to be level to 1" higher than the trailer. The RB hitch has adjustments for the ball angle, this is key to setting it up correctly. The angle of the head determines the amount of spring pressure applied to the ball. The manual will state the measurements needed to get the correct angle.

When hitched up and properly configured the front wheel opening should be very close to unladen height with a level trailer, and the spring bars parallel with the trailer frame without excessive curve. If this is where you are at, and still have sway, then chances are there is something mechanically wrong elsewhere with the trailer.

Now here is something that I have yet understood. Some guys with F150's with the built in sway control have had sway issues no matter what they did, until they disabled the electronic sway control. If your Dodge has it, try turning it off and see what happens. Sometimes the normal movement of the trailer interacts with the sway module and causes the module to induce what it thinks are corrections and is actually causing a sway. Weird.

[Downwindtracke1]

By using the off road example, I was only trying to illustrate the action of a trailer with a raised center of gravity. Such as the OP and I were dealing with. When I say sway, I don't mean the rhythmic side to side action. Proper hitch weight and an adequate rear suspension are the cures for that. Rather a one time rapid weight transfer. It's been 50 years since Physics 12, and I only squeaked by then, so can't give you the proper terms. Instead of swaying side the side to the music at the dance, you fall over on your side.

[BarneyS]

When going off road, I do not know any RVers who worry about any sway at all. The speeds are too low for sway to begin. Your earlier statement can only apply to an RV at highway speed - hence my reply.
Barney

[Downwindtracke1]

You are right about extra weight on the front helping, but you are missing the fact it's a twisting motion that's causing the grief with a lifted trailer. Without a WDH, the ball will work side to side as well. There are limits to how far, most off roaders either resort to Australians style hitches or carry a spare coupling to replace the bent one for when the 4x4 and the trailer are in very different planes. The friction bar will only help with tailwagging, a lateral motion. Unless of course you mount a couple of friction bars vertically , like sea legs. It likely could work, it sure would look pretty weird.

[BarneyS]

Downwindtracker2 wrote:
Here's a mind boggler. A WDH will induce directional instability . Remember we are talking about true sway, not the tail wagging. This is a twisting motion. Say the when trailer lurches to the right, then the WDH is going to transfer that motion to the right corner of the TV, suddenly your TV is now pointing to the left. From experience,all blood in your hands gets squeezed out as you tighten your grip on the steering wheel.

Snip...

Not quite right! It is not the WDH that is causing that. It is the normal reaction to the tow vehicle to the forces of the trailer on the ball. That would happen whether there was a WD hitch in use or not.

The use of a WD hitch will lessen the effect a bit however since it restores some of the lost weight on the front (think steering) axles of the truck resulting from hitching up the trailer. This allows the truck to steer somewhat normally instead of being light in the front.
The common use of a friction sway control will stiffen up the connection at the ball somewhat which will also help reduce the motion you describe.
Barney

[Hannibal]

Yes it will Downwindtracker2! The lightest bars you can get away with will give the best tow. If the trailer sits the TV down 2" in the rear and the bars raise it back up 1", it'll probably tow well. If you tighten the bars up trying to get the TV to sit like it does empty, you'll likely induce some squirrely steering. If your TT sits your TV down more than 3" without the bars, my opinion is you don't have enough TV with or without WD. Soft tires and aggressive tread or even new deep tread on HT tires can leave you squirming all over your lane with wind and worn pavement. If you load 500 lbs behind the rear axle of a vehicle not built to handle it, you'll feel the same squirrely steering without a trailer at all. Air bags will raise it back up to empty height but might even make the steering disturbances worse.

[Downwindtracke1]

Here's a mind boggler. A WDH will induce directional instability . Remember we are talking about true sway, not the tail wagging. This is a twisting motion. Say the when trailer lurches to the right, then the WDH is going to transfer that motion to the right corner of the TV, suddenly your TV is now pointing to the left. From experience,all blood in your hands gets squeezed out as you tighten your grip on the steering wheel.

I use a Equilizer hitch. Because I run on gravel, I didn't want a heavy spring between the truck and trailer. On gravel, ideally you want soft springs and lots of travel in your springs. So when I got the hitch, I got a 400# bars. The sales brochure said 410#, a bit of a lie, and the tag said 460# dry. I'm sure hitch weight is more.

Tires will affect your steering experience. My brother and his wife loved the Jeep Cherokees, they leased them so they had a few. After the first one which had Michelins , the next one had Goodyears. My sister-in -laws asked what was wrong with this new one?

I chuckle at these young guys and all their steering add-ons on their big Rams and their squishy mud tires.

[tjschaefer]

I too have the same problem with my 2015 Expedition. I have tried everything. I've purchased a new WD hitch which helped a little but didn't cure it. The trailer doesn't wag like a dogs tale, the two units together bob and sway in the lanes of the highway. I do use cruise control and it has bobbed and weaved enough to set off the anti sway system on the truck and auto apply the brakes and shut the cruise off. I've also been told that my factory tires (2 ply) might be spongy and that the new Expeditions now have independent rear suspension that might make a difference. I've raised and lowered my chains on the WD hitch, I've ran out of things to try and I'm not going to keep throwing large sums of money at the problem.

[Hannibal]

steve-n-vicki wrote:
I know I'm gonna get flamed by all the towing experts , 2004 F150, 1840 payload ,13500 GCVWR, 8400 tow capacity, bilstien shocks, trailer has 6200 gvwr (it weights 5500) the TT has spread axles, when I was using the friction sway control it was a white knuckle ride for 100 miles ,the next day I forgot to hook up the friction sway , in fact I left it in the bed of the truck, I was pulling into a 25 mph head /crosswind and rain , the TT was moving around, no sway but it was following the ruts in the road but it was not affecting the truck at all , it behaved and stayed behind like it is supposed to, since then the friction sway has been in the storage building , before you tell me a semi will blow me off the road , the TT moves about 6 inches or less when one passes

I had the same path to perfection with a '94 F150 towing a 21' dual axle TT. Started with dealer recommended WDH big enough to tow a double wide. Not a good tow. Bought an old short shank Quality S WDH with light trunion style bars. Better tow. Then left the bars off one day. Towed like a champ. So with our current F250 and 32' TT, I use a Reese HP 800 lb trunion style with no sway control. Tows like a champ with about as much movement as you're getting. Some wagging around back there from wind gusts is normal and will happen with any hitch. Once you get used to it, problem solved.

[KevinBerting]

Thanks again everyone. You have given me so many more possible solutions than I had thought of. Going to the scales Saturday. First things first. I'll let you know what we find out. Then I guess we'll go from there.

[KevinBerting]

I agree, I'd get weighed and see how much you have on the tongue.

We did an axle flip on ours and haven't had any issues, but if you're out of alignment that would cause you some grief for sure. Something to look at for sure. If you determine weight isn't the cause I'd flip them back and take it for a test drive to see if you're still having issues.

Glad to hear the axle flip is successful in your case. I really like the ride clearance and want to stay hopeful the flip and a good towing experience are both possible.

[KevinBerting]

sbell2003 wrote:
I read most of the replies but could not find out if your truck has air leveling suspension or air bags. Air bags and air leveling suspension can cause this issue. The air bags take up the weight instead of letting the weight distribution hitch move some to the trailer and some to the front wheels. My previous truck had air bags which I could not use because it would make the rig very susceptible to wind.

No air bags.

[steve-n-vicki]

I know I'm gonna get flamed by all the towing experts , 2004 F150, 1840 payload ,13500 GCVWR, 8400 tow capacity, bilstien shocks, trailer has 6200 gvwr (it weights 5500) the TT has spread axles, when I was using the friction sway control it was a white knuckle ride for 100 miles ,the next day I forgot to hook up the friction sway , in fact I left it in the bed of the truck, I was pulling into a 25 mph head /crosswind and rain , the TT was moving around, no sway but it was following the ruts in the road but it was not affecting the truck at all , it behaved and stayed behind like it is supposed to, since then the friction sway has been in the storage building , before you tell me a semi will blow me off the road , the TT moves about 6 inches or less when one passes