Towing Issues

[Grandad53]

Ok....confession time. I don't know a lot about hitches and towing. The dealer sold me and hooked up my equalizer 4 point hitch on my 2016 FR Vibe 268RK. The trailer looks like it is level but my F250 looks like it is squatting a bit in the back. On a recent trip, it was bucking like the old horsey in the front of the grocery store. Much could be blamed on lousy road surfaces but I was hoping that it could be made better. Think I should take it back to the dealer and what do you think about maybe suspension air bags to keep my pickup from squatting? Would that help the ride? The stupid TT only has storage in the front right over the hitch! Bad design but I don't want to load a lot of stuff inside my TT at the rear on the floor! What is a rookie to do?
TIA!

[Wobbles]

My first thought was how do you have the TT and TV loaded. I have an F150 with the same hitch and only get that when the road is bad.

I am interested hearing from seasoned members about this...

[Grandad53]

Well I do not have a way to weigh how much I have loaded in my pickup or how much weight is on the tongue of my trailer! This is probably important but, alas, don't know how to go about that.

[Bluepill]

A properly set-up W/D hitch with a properly loaded trailer should have less than 1 inch of additional tail drop on the tow vehicle when the trailer is attached.

Search Youtube videos. Lots of good info on proper setup. It's not hard to do.

Your dealer should have a scale to weigh your tongue. Ask if you can watch while they do the setup.

Be sure that you are set up properly. Your life can depend on it. Seriously.

[Wobbles]

Originally Posted by Grandad53

Well I do not have a way to weigh how much I have loaded in my pickup or how much weight is on the tongue of my trailer! This is probably important but, alas, don't know how to go about that.

This from a Blog that a regular member here has posted. Perhaps it may lead you to a basic understanding of "This Thing of Ours"/The weight debate.

Learn To RV: How to Weigh a Travel Trailer

I am still following this conversation to learn about the horsey ride you described so I can make my adjustments.

[lbrjet]

Time to learn about your hitch. There is no set rule on how much droop there is in the rear. The purpose of the weight distributing hitch is to restore the lost front axle weight when you drop the trailer on. Look at the hitch manual and it will tell you how to see if your hitch is set up right by just using a tape measure. There may be nothing wrong at all and it was just the road.


2010 F250 5.4L 3.73
2011 Flagstaff 831FKBSS
Equal-i-zer 4pt 12K

[doc73]

Do you have a 2.5" receiver with the adapter down to the 2"?

[Grandad53]

Doc73, I do not know what that means. I can get a picture of it tomorrow and post.

[doc73]

Is the square hole (the receiver) on the truck a 2" or 2.5" square?

I know some of the newer trucks are coming with 2.5" receivers as did mine. Using the provided adapter allowed way to much slop in the WD setup. I did not have bucking but I had left to right movement.

[Mobilemikey]

My F250 dropped about an inch and a half from factory height with our travel trailer, using an Equalizer WDH. measured out, everything was right. Just got used to the sag. But most definitely get weighed and measured to make sure your hitch is right.

[Grandad53]

Oh, my pickup has the receiver hitch that will take up to 2.5" but it has two sleeves to bring it down to 2".

[doc73]

See my above as an idea if all else fails. The adapter let to much slop for me.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[MainelyUS]

Grandad53
You can get your TT & TV weighed (CAT Scale) at Texas Travel Plaza Haslet, TX
They can weigh TV total and per axle, TT total and per axle plus combination.
They are only 9 miles away...short skip and a jump by Texas standards.
Download the CAT Scale Apps.
We weigh ours at a local "gravel pit"

Enjoy your TT and the great times you will have traveling the country.
I am sure you will get a lot of great help with the FRF.

Happy Trails

[uhduh camping]

My truck sags a little, but I know I have plenty of tongue weight (not overweight). You need tongue weight to reduce/prevent sway. Which is why your storage compartment is in the front.
Now, my truck handles well in most conditions, but on concrete highways I get the porpoising you speak of. I have gotten this effect with all of my setups. I travel one highway in particular that's really bad. It's 4 miles that I now go 30 mins. out of my way to avoid. I can even feel the porpoising in my daily driver. Does your porpoising carry on for a while after hitting a hard bump like bridge expansion joints or does it quickly subside? If it quickly subsides I would say your setup is most likely OK.
From what I have read on these forums I would not take it back to the dealer. It seems they are hit and miss on getting proper setups. The best thing you can do is read the manual, read it again and set it up yourself while reading the manual. This will help a you learn a lot about your hitch. What to watch for, what bolts needs to be torqued often, these sort of things are important for you to know and understand.

[updhaul]

Since you ask, it might be a good idea to return to dealer after calling first so that service can review proper setup with you and recheck bolts on the hitch head and the L brackets on your tt that the bars rest on. If you have manual, you could try adjustments yourself. Try to review manual, having the large wrenches, and sockets with long torque wrench will help in future if you don't have them already. Some sag is normal at rear wheel well measurement of tv with goal to minimize lift on front axle of tv as well. If all else fails they seem to have real people answering their support line.

[asquared]

What you are describing is called porpoising. That can be alleviated by a better hitch adjustment. You need to get weighed period. Go to a local cat scale to get weighed. You have several nearby. here are your nearest 3 locations. It is usually $9-12 for first pass and $1-3 for each reweigh at the same scale in a 24 hour period. You will want to bring a long stick or broom handle to reach the truck height button. When asked for a truck number tell them private vehicle. Some will want you to make up a number... pick your favorite number it doesn't matter.

The truck should have all occupants, gear, and pets in it that will be in it when towing plus full tank of fuel. The tt should be loaded (mine has the usual stuff minus food when weighing). When weighing you will want to do a minimum of 3 passes. These can be done in any order.

1st pass is truck only. Front axle on scale pad 1, rear axle on scale pad 2.

2nd pass is truck plus tt no wdh. Truck same as pass 1, all tt axles on scale pad 3.

3rd pass is truck plus tt with wdh. Truck and tt same as pass 2.

Use the first and 2nd passes to determine total TT loaded weight and tt tongue weight. Ideal tongue weight is 12-15% of loaded tt weight.

Use the 1st and 3rd passes to determine efficacy of your wdh. Goal is to get the front axle as close to unloaded weight as possible without going heavier. We used to bring tools, hitch in the parking lot, make an adjustment, reweigh and repeat until correct. When getting the truck only weight, we park the tt in a near by truck parking spot so we don't hold the scsles up. Same thing for wdh connecting/disconnecting/wdh adjustment.

It is best to do this yourself. Most dealerships do not set wdh up correctly.



The other thing to look at is tires. What are you running? Do you have LT or P rated tires? What are they rated to carry? What are they inflated to? What tupe of tread (ie mud tires typically have more bounce when towing).

[Joe_GA]

Unfortunately, you can not trust the dealer's work. When I was a newbie and got my first bumper pull, my rig towed horribly. I went online and got the instructions for the hitch because the dealer didn't even give me the ones that came with my hitch. I no longer remember the specifics, but the chain brackets were to be a certain distance from the ball. I measured and found they weren't even close. I had to drill new holes in my camper frame.
Get the instructions for your hitch and make sure it is set up right. Also make sure you have the right weight bars for your hitch weight. Here's where weighing your rig is also helpful. Never assume the dealer did it right!

[BandJCarm]

One tidbit above concerned me.

Did you say there are TWO sleeves to reduce 2.5" to 2"?????

If so, I'm confused. I have one of those too, all new GMC HD's are 2.5"..... but there's no way two sleeves could fit inside to reduce it. If there are, they are not normal sleeves made for that purpose...........either that, or there's something out there I'm not aware of.

I only use mine for pulling boat and ATV trailer now........but I went to TSC and got a 2.5" hitch that fit the receiver without need for a sleeve. I couldn't stand the rattling, and it just felt loose........and I couldn't live with that. But that's just with a smaller trailer. With a TT, the jumping around might be way worse.......

[doc73]

The movement in mine started to oval out the hitch pin hole. I also got a 2.5" shank and scrapped the 2". I use the 2.5 adapter for my pintle hook / tailgater stopper.

[MainelyUS]

Our 2016 2500HD has the 2.5" receiver and a 2" receiver adapter as standard equipment. See pics