Mwolfe450
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Re: Can't stop sway
I have a 15 screw shortbed f150 also. I'm towing a 31' prowler with mine. I had serious sway issues when I first purchased the trailer. Dealer had set my blue ox sway pro up really bad. In my case they had no weight on the rear of the truck. I have one trip so far with no issues after lowering my hitch height and taking links out of my sway bars. I've noticed wind gusts moving the truck and trailer around slightly, but not swaying, more as a whole unit. I find that turning the sway control off in the truck makes me more at ease when towing. Even towing my 16' box trailer I shut it off. I don't like it, maybe it's in my head, but the truck seems much better with it off. I found having the rear of the truck taking some extra weight helped me. I don't have my truck set level when towing, It's slightly lower in the rear. I've also found on a gusty day 5mph will really change how things ride. It took me some tweaking and trial runs to get dialed in. It sounds like it might be in your hitch setup. Best of luck!392Views0likes0CommentsRe: New truck, New trailer, TONS of sway!
Finally had a chance to adjust things. Aired up truck tires to 45psi, adjusted ball height, and took 4 links out of sway bars. It's a totally different trailer now. Tows night and day compared to dealer setup. I even took a few small highway runs with one more link and one less link in the bars to get an idea of the difference. Also filled the fresh water tank to help with some weight in front of the axles. Almost all sway is gone, only a little wiggle when passing or being passed by a truck which I would expect with that much trailer. I feel safe driving now. So I had a combination of high nose, light tongue, and way to much weight distribution. I'm learning a lot!!381Views0likes0CommentsRe: New truck, New trailer, TONS of sway!
Wow. Thanks for all of the input. I haven't had time to mess with the setup, I am hoping to do so soon. I understand I am at or above the limits of the truck once the trailer is loaded. I towed it home empty, with nothing in it. So I towed an 8k trailer with a 950lb tongue weight trailer and it was bad. I understand weight capacities are glorified on trucks, especially 1/2 tons. I have towed 10k with the truck and had no complaints, but that was an open trailer, much different than a 32ft sail. I also feel some people have responded thinking the truck had no suspension left with the trailer. In fact, I felt it had way to much travel left for being at capacity. When I took some resistance out of the bars it certainly helped. Not sure of tires on the truck but they're oem goodyears definitely not e rated, I'll guess lt tires. Payload on the truck is 2060lbs. Yes that's including passengers which is less than 550lbs. So I have 1500lb carrying capacity being conservative in the truck. The trailer would generally be towed fairly light for small weekend trips and full hookup sites. The dealers setup had the trailer level to slightly nose up. I will set the hitch up according to instructions and nose the trailer slightly and re try it. Then I will add tongue weight and try again. Lastly I will hitch it up to a v10 250 and see how that is. will the 250 pull it better, absolutely. If I'm still not comfortable in the f150 I will get a different trailer. I guess my original question in my first post was what might make it so squirrelly empty? Would prowler sell such an unbalanced trailer? Or can a poorly set up hitch cause that much sway?264Views0likes0CommentsRe: New truck, New trailer, TONS of sway!
The nearest scale is about 30 miles from me and I'm honestly nervous going that far in its current setup. Just curious if anyone had similar symptoms with the hitch setup or trailer size. I'll admit it's more trailer than I was looking for but for the price I paid I was hoping I could make it work. I'm not looking to go cross country with it, but I need to be safe also. I have access to an old Reese system and also a f250 I can hook to it for comparison. Really trying to make the f150 work with it though.297Views0likes0CommentsNew truck, New trailer, TONS of sway!
I recently took delivery of our 2015 Prowler 32pbhs trailer and towed it home with my 2015 f150 ecoboost pickup. The dealer I bought it from also sold me and installed a blue ox sway pro system. The ride home was downright scary on the highway. A 5 mile trip was about all I could handle staying in the right lane, well some lane and some shoulder, well below the speed limit. I even had a few panic and grab the brake box slide moments to straighten back out. I got it home and thought they set the bars too tight. The rear of the truck felt unplanted and very unstable. Today I hitched back up and went for another ride with less tension on the bars, which helped the truck feel more planted, but still had way more sway than I was comfortable with. I plan on re-installing the hitch myself, and also getting everything weighed up but I need to figure out what issues I might be faced with. The trailer is a touch over 8k empty, and has a tongue weight of 950lbs. The truck is good for 10,700 pounds, so I know I am at the higher end of my truck's capacity, but still within it, especially with the trailer completely empty. Any research I found made the hitch seem like a good unit, and the truck seems to carry the weight ok considering what I'm towing. Any thoughts, or insight is greatly appreciated. Matt14KViews0likes103Comments
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