Tongue Weights

[mcbrew]

PLEASE, don't ANYONE post their extensive personal experiences in a concise and clear fashion if it IN ANY WAY conflicts with my HONEST OPINION. We need more advice that agrees with what I think. Anything else just seems dangerous. IMHO.

[Thomas G.]

Originally Posted by mcbrew

PLEASE, don't ANYONE post their extensive personal experiences in a concise and clear fashion if it IN ANY WAY conflicts with my HONEST OPINION. We need more advice that agrees with what I think. Anything else just seems dangerous. IMHO.

Yea, it happens every time the subject involves safety in some form. Same on other forums.

[Raz]

Perhaps the result of the aforementioned beer and tequila?

[honda03842]

Carol,

I think speed is an issue with sway, but there is no proof that I've read that towing in Europe is more dangerous than the USA because of their lighter tongue weights. Many believe it to be the case but for the life of me I can find no U.S. statistics on how often sway occurs, the speed it occurs at and the tongue weights when it occurs.

People have come forward about balls popping out of couplers but there seems to be very little 'coming forward' about sway, speed and tongue weight.

It's easy to say Europeans don't have sway because they drive slower yet France has the highest possible tow speeds, higher than any state.

As requested here's the list of states with 55 mph trailer speed limits; it amounts to 16 states, almost 1/3rd of the USA including DC.

AL, CA, DE, DC, CA, HA, IL, ME, MI, NH, NC, OH, OR, PA, SC, VA,

As well 18 states have speed limits of 70-75 mph. Actually Montana's trailer speed limit is not 80 mph for trailers, but rather 65 mph, sort of middle of the road.

http://www.towingworld.com/articles/TowingLaws.htm,

Just for the record, France, as countries go, is not a small country, There are 27 countries in the European Union and France is the largest country and representing 1/6th of the European Union in area. No state in the United states has a speed limit as high as France's trailer speed limit.

We all have feelings about RV trailer towing and it's potential dangers. My feeling is that the reality is better than we imagine. Do problems occur? Yes, I'm sure but I suspect much less than we imagine.

[RogerDat]

Originally Posted by honda03842

Carol,

I think speed is an issue with sway, but there is no proof that I've read that towing in Europe is more dangerous than the USA because of their lighter tongue weights. Many believe it to be the case but for the life of me I can find no U.S. statistics on how often sway occurs, the speed it occurs at and the tongue weights when it occurs.

People have come forward about balls popping out of couplers but there seems to be very little 'coming forward' about sway, speed and tongue weight.

It's easy to say Europeans don't have sway because they drive slower yet France has the highest possible tow speeds, higher than any state.

As requested here's the list of states with 55 mph trailer speed limits; it amounts to 16 states, almost 1/3rd of the USA including DC.

AL, CA, DE, DC, CA, HA, IL, ME, MI, NH, NC, OH, OR, PA, SC, VA,

As well 18 states have speed limits of 70-75 mph. Actually Montana's trailer speed limit is not 80 mph for trailers, but rather 65 mph, sort of middle of the road.

http://www.towingworld.com/articles/TowingLaws.htm,

Just for the record, France, as countries go, is not a small country, There are 27 countries in the European Union and France is the largest country and representing 1/6th of the European Union in area. No state in the United states has a speed limit as high as France's trailer speed limit.

We all have feelings about RV trailer towing and it's potential dangers. My feeling is that the reality is better than we imagine. Do problems occur? Yes, I'm sure but I suspect much less than we imagine.

Not surprised there are not statistics on sway. How would it get reported?

If someone gets out on the great plains and discovers their trailer has sway issues in a strong cross wind they slow down. And then probably (hopefully) do something to address the problem.

If trailer sway leads to a reportable accident it's more than likely that it would be described by the end results. Trailer jackknifed, or broke free of hitch or a generic lost control. Even if sway was a contributing or primary factor in that end results I doubt it would be categorized by that.

List of states is most welcome, as always thanks for the positive contribution.

[john warren]

i just try to pick it up,, if its hard to lift,,, it should be close on my 13 scamp.
with what your saying , put your bikes on the rear of the trailer

[John_M]

Originally Posted by mcbrew

PLEASE, don't ANYONE post their extensive personal experiences in a concise and clear fashion if it IN ANY WAY conflicts with my HONEST OPINION. We need more advice that agrees with what I think. Anything else just seems dangerous. IMHO.

Amen.

Won't be long until the mods have to shut down another thread that was started with good intentions.

[GPJ]

Going back to the topic at hand, here is a link to a University of Bath paper on caravan stability. It's a bit of a read, and like most research makes a number of assumptions and takes a few shortcuts that perhaps would be better done other ways (ie. changing tow vehicle mass by adding weights at the back of the vehicle rather than distributing it evenly), but it is a pretty good analysis with actual experimentation too. They do consider tow ball loading, stabilizers, trailer mass, vehicle mass and more. Note that their large caravan is actually very small/light by North American standards.

For those that want to jump to the conclusions, practical advice for owners and designers starts on page 58. Anyone following this and similar threads will be familiar with much of the advice, but it is nice to find it derived from actual experiments.

Here is the link: http://people.bath.ac.uk/en8cjk/Caravan.pdf

[Carol H]

Thanks Norm for providing the list of states with 55 mph towing limits. It confirms my point that we in NA do not have anything like a National Towing Speed Limit as the speed limits vary across the US and the majority of states allow towing well over 55 mph.

Thanks also for Montana's actual law. Does anyone know if that is fairly new? Montana has come up for discussion here before and looked for one less than a couple of years ago and came up with nothing and actually talked with a highway patrolmen in Montana about it and funny enough he didnt mention any law either. Regardless happy to see that even red neck Montana has started to recognize that speed does kill.

I find your comment but in regards that "there seems to be very little 'coming forward' about sway, speed and tongue weight. " Seriously - take a look back Norm - the topic was indeed primarly about those issues until once again.......

I am also pleased you have clarified why it is that we have such opposing views in regards to what may or may not be safe towing practises and what level of risk we are willing to take. I suppose someone is going to step in and suggest there is a scientific study that highlights the difference in how people process information. Some prefer to make decisions based on historical information, rather than gut feelings and imagination. Right brain left brain will no doubt come into it.

As indicated to you Norm in my response to your PM to me the other day on this topic. I am indeed more cautious than you when it comes to safety as a result of real life experiences. Some of those experiences I would not wish on my worst enemy. And as I indicated to you those incidents were all the direct result of well educated professions in their fields deciding to go with a gut feeling that their way was better rather than following time tested best practices.

Suspect most will be happy to hear I AM All Done! sorry I actually only use the IMHO in order to try and avoid this type of ****.

[Thomas G.]

Just as a point of reference, I noticed that the 2013 Escape has a trailer stability function built into its regular stability control system. This functionality may be a big help in the future for towing.

With AWD or FWD, the new Escape will come with the full complement of Ford's latest nannies, including torque vectoring control, curve control, hill start assist, electronic brake assist, roll stability control, trailer sway control, and torque steer compensation. Curve control uses the ABS to "correct" impending oversteer or understeer in tight, fast off-ramps and the like, in both the FWD and the AWD versions.

Read more: 2013 Ford Escape First Look - Motor Trend

[GPJ]

Originally Posted by Thomas G.

Just as a point of reference, I noticed that the 2013 Escape has a trailer stability function built into its regular stability control system. This functionality may be a big help in the future for towing.

Read more: 2013 Ford Escape First Look - Motor Trend

Here is a link to an explanation of how Ford's trailer stability function works. Aside from applying opposing braking on the tow vehicle, it can reduce engine power ie. slow you down. http://media.ford.com/images/10031/T..._SuperDuty.pdf

In Europe, some trailers have stability equipment built in to the trailer itself - essentially applying the trailer brakes in sync with trailer sway oscillations to bring sway under control.

[Carol H]

Originally Posted by GPJ

In Europe, some trailers have stability equipment built in to the trailer itself - essentially applying the trailer brakes in sync with trailer sway oscillations to bring sway under control.

GP I saw that on the site that Andrew posted (or maybe not that one) and wondered if anyone had any first hand experiences with its use. I hadnt seen anything like it here.

How long have they been putting that system on the trailers? Is common to many trailer manufactures or just certain brands and sizes?

[GPJ]

Carol:

I have been reading about experiments with these for years, but first noticed them in european brochures only a couple of years ago. I haven't read any user reports as of yet, but then again, I haven't really been looking for them.

THey are actually produced by the chassis manufacturers - ALKO being the most prevalent, so they should be available for most caravans. ALKO produces about 90% of european caravan chassis.

Here is a YouTube link to the system as used in Australia: ALKO ESC (Electronic Stability Control) 2012 - YouTube

These systems work by applying the trailer brakes independently of the tow vehicle. One could argue that with our electric brake controllers we can simply reach down and apply the trailer brakes, but these systems react far more quickly than we can, and when we are fighting for control it is difficult to pull a hand from the wheel to control the trailer brakes. As for using the vehicle and trailer brakes by applying the foot brakes, as the driver in the video points out, sometimes that is the worst thing we can do.

Let me know if you find any user experiences out there.