Casita swaying

[rbryan]

I'm told that sway is primarily caused by low tongue weight. I wouldn't know because my trailer is inherently stable even at higher speeds and I've never had a bit of sway. That's probably because it has about 12% tongue weight and also because of the Andersen hitch.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Alex in LA

Hello everyone,

FINALLY we made it out on our first camping trip! It was awesome, kids loved it, BUT I am a bit concerned at periodic SWAYING of our lovely 16' Casita.
We tow with a 2017 Toyota Sienna and we have a no bathroom, 2 bunk beds Casita model, which should be pretty light. We do have functional electric brakes and they were checked and bearings repacked by professional RV mechanic before our trip. I do not believe we overloaded the trailer at all (maybe 150 lb of extra stuff), however, at speeds over 55 mph, several times, it did exhibit more sway than I expected or was comfortable with (not that I have much experience towing). I must say we probably went over 65 mph a few times, but I believe swaying occurred at as low as 50-55, so I don't think high speed is to blame, although I would be happy to know if most of you don't tow above 55? 60? 65?
We have an anti-sway bar by Reese that was included by the seller, but reading up BEFORE our trip I got a sense that most people here don't see a compelling reason to install one. However, now I am strongly considering it.

Any thoughts, comments, suggestions will be much appreciated.

We just returned last week from a 3,316 mile trip with our Casita. It is 17' and has a full bath, holding tanks, etc. We use a small sway bar that Casita suggests and we bought from Casita. We never had a problem with sway in the wind or with trucks passing us. Casita suggests to not drive over 60MPH. We stay at 58 or so. We do tow with a Yukon Xl so it is a big vehicle. The wind seemed to bother the Yukon more than the trailer. I don't know what kind of sway bar you have but do use it. You should see a big difference.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Bruce H

I wonder why 18 wheeler tractor trailer rigs with 48 to 53 ft trailers don't sway? Weight carried front, middle or rear, No equalizer hitch, no sway bars, nothing but a greased king pin.

I've seen many big trucks sway. In fact we just got home from a 3,316 mile trip from Colorado to Georgia and back. We saw a lot of truckers trailers swaying. In fact a few times it scared me and I slowed down until they were well in front of me. My husband even mentioned it a few times.

[Bruce H]

Originally Posted by Jann Todd

I've seen many big trucks sway. In fact we just got home from a 3,316 mile trip from Colorado to Georgia and back. We saw a lot of truckers trailers swaying. In fact a few times it scared me and I slowed down until they were well in front of me. My husband even mentioned it a few times.

Trucks with double and triple trailers wiggle around because they are connected with a little trailer called a converter dolly, so actually a double trailer is three trailers and a triple trailer is five trailers. I owned a trucking business for 25 years and have pulled bumper pull RV trailers for 15 years. Single semi trailers can overturn, they can slip sideways on ice or rain slicked roads, they can be jack knifed or otherwise be wrecked but they NEVER sway the way bumper pull RV trailers do.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Bruce H

Trucks with double and triple trailers wiggle around because they are connected with a little trailer called a converter dolly, so actually a double trailer is three trailers and a triple trailer is five trailers. I owned a trucking business for 25 years and have pulled bumper pull RV trailers for 15 years. Single semi trailers can overturn, they can slip sideways on ice or rain slicked roads, they can be jack knifed or otherwise be wrecked but they NEVER sway the way bumper pull RV trailers do.

I just know what I saw with my own eyes and my husband did also. You have your opinion and I have what I saw. So I'll stick to truck trailers sway.

[Bruce H]

Look carefully at this small flatbed trailer. The bed is 8 ft. long. The axle is situated under the bed 5 ft from the front. The original tongue is 3 1/2 ft long. That adds up to 8 1/2 ft. from the axle to the hitch ball.



1. If the trailer is loaded with a total weight of 1,000 lbs and 100 pounds of that is on the hitch ball with the short tongue, how much weight will be on the hitch ball when the 10 ft. long tongue is u-bolted to the original tongue making it 15 ft from the axle to the hitch ball? Same load, just add the longer tongue?


Which one will sway less?

[Bruce H]

Now check this picture. The above mentioned flatbed trailer hooked to the Bigfoot trailer. The hitch ball is 36 inches forward of the back bumper. Why did I go to all of the trouble of putting a ten foot long tongue on the flat bed trailer then fabricating a receiver hitch and bolting it under the Bigfoot trailer three feet closer to the axles? Couldn't I have just put a ball on the back bumper of the Bigfoot out at the end of that overhang and used the short tongue on the flatbed trailer? And after my "engineering", what about that tongue weight of only about 60 lbs (5%) on a 1200 lb trailer? Isn't it supposed to be 10 to 15%?


And before you ask, yes, I can back it.

[Bruce H]

How does it pull? You might ask. How safe is it? Is it against the law? How long is it? Do I have an equalizer hitch or sway bars? Why did I do it in the first place? Why not just haul the ATV in the bed of the truck? Do I recommend anyone else do this?



Well so far pretty good. Highway speeds 65 or 70 mph are not a problem. I did put brakes on the back trailer. Six years and somewhere north of 15,000 miles and no wrecks or problems. If I ever wreck it it won't be because of the way it is set up. I can see just a little bit of sway in the back trailer at times. The long tongue prevents violent sway. Not against the law where I go. It is not allowed in Minnesota, Oregon, Washington or Arizona. I plan accordingly. The overall length is 61 ft. I can adjust that some. I had an equalizer hitch on both of the F-150s. When I got the F-350 I threw it away. A couple of things on hauling the ATV: Loading and unloading one of those things in the back of a truck is a dangerous proposition. If something slips or breaks you could have the 800 lb ATV on top you. There have been a lot of people killed trying it. The deck on the small trailer is just a little more than a foot off the ground, much safer loading and unloading. Second: it is really inconvenient to have to unhook the RV trailer in order to get the ATV out of the truck.



No, I don't recommend anyone else do this unless you are pretty mechanically inclined and have quite a bit of experience with heavy trucks and equipment. .

[Borrego Dave]

Sweet set up Bruce, adding brakes to the rear trailer is a nice add on too. A good friend used to pull triples and told stories of them moving around a bit but just that, no sway as we think of with TTs or utilities etc. I had a utility trailer sway violently at 45 mph but it was my fault. I had an extra 800# of Trex decking loaded on the street side of the load. No harm or foul but sure was embarrassing after towing for 50 years, sure wasn't thinking that day .

[ShelbyM]

Cool info about the big trucks, thanks!

[thrifty bill]

Watch a few youtube videos on trailer sway. You will see some accidents with big tow vehicles pulling light weight empty open trailers. Its all about weight distribution. I have an inexpensive tongue weight scale just to double check. Picked it up my last time in Canada, Princess Auto I think the shop was called. Its a chain of autoparts stores.

The laws on towing a second tag trailer behind a trailer vary state to state. Illegal in North Carolina, legal in Missouri.


https://rv-roadtrips.thefuntimesguid...triple_towing/

[redbarron55]

The longer the tongue the more stable the trailer is.
The pin weight, all things equal, is less, but you have to include the weight of the added tongue.
I extended the frame of my Scamp to make the frame wider for a bathroom in the front.
I also added the heat pump up there.
So I extended also to decrease the pin weight on the VW TDI I used to tow with.
We just got back from a 9200 mile trip and used a WDH with sway control and never felt that sway would be a problem.
Belt and suspenders with backup.

[redbarron55]

The most important thing is the center of gravity and like an airplane it must be ahead of the (center of lift) wheels.
It must be reliably ahead of the wheels and things change with wind pressures and outside influences.
It is all a matter of damping and oscillation frequency.
The further forward the higher damping and the influence of speed is to increase the frequency.
The trailer and TV have a resonant frequency and if the speed and activating influence puts the rig at resonance sway will not be damped out and will increase with uncertain results.

[CarlD]

This is a good analysis by JD. Center of gravity location is critical. Also close coupling of the trailer (tongue length) is important. One other factor to consider is the height of the center of gravity. In other words, keep your heavy stuff on the floor. Don't load your upper cabinets with canned goods, water, etc. as it raises the center of gravity. I have a 5 x 10 utility trailer which has been loaded so heavy with crushed stone that the tires rubbed the fenders on some bumps (about 4000 L. I had very quick recovery from an intentional twitch of the steering wheel (my stability test). When I put my 2500 lb BX25 Kubota on it I can't go over 65 MPH which is about 5 MPH below resonance (scary situation). Tongue weight with the tractor is 12-13%.

[Joe Romas]

Let me just ask, were there bikes on the rear of the already tongue light 16' Casita?
Also the 10 to 15% is misleading. 10% can cause problems. The 17' Casita's are about 15% (400#+/-) and are not inclined to sway at all.

[John in Santa Cruz]

FWIW, my 16 SD never had any hint of tendency to want to sway when towed by our tacoma, even when we had packed 4 cases of beverages (water, soda, beer, etc) in the very back under the bed AND had a full water tank.

[Alex in LA]

Originally Posted by Joe Romas

Let me just ask, were there bikes on the rear of the already tongue light 16' Casita?
Also the 10 to 15% is misleading. 10% can cause problems. The 17' Casita's are about 15% (400#+/-) and are not inclined to sway at all.

I didn't have bikes and although I do have a rear hitch to where former owner attached a small generator platform, so far I have no inclination of using it. I did have to swap the battery which is located directly behind the left wheel and I was amazed at how heavy these deep cycle batteries are. Seems like a poor design to put something so heavy on one side of the back of the trailer.

[Alex in LA]

... well, maybe, just a tiny little bit if 2-3" counts.

I am happy to report that we have done another trip and our Casita behaved much much better. Since the last trip that caused this whole post we have changed the hitch to a 2 1/4" rise vs. original 4" rise so that trailer looked level when hooked to the car. Additionally, I placed ALL the items in front of the trailer, on the floor, and a few heavier items in the storage space underneath the bottom bunk. Finally, I noticed that propane tanks sitting up front were almost empty and refilled them.

I did try to add the anti-sway bar but it required welding and my mobile RV guy didn't have equipment with him. However, it looks like it's more of a precaution at this point.

So thanks everyone for your involvement and happy travels!

[Fred762]

WE tow our 2018 17' Casita Independence w full 25gal water tanks + 2 full 20 lb propane tanks + and several hundrd lbs of food and gear routinely ......w our 2017 V 6 Frontier double-cab, long bed 2wd truck..rated at 7200 lbs towing cap w the "factory tow pkg" option. .
WE bought and use the Casita factory-optional anti-sway-bar system (<$100) and have NOT had any sway problems in over 6000 miles of hauling since picking up the new TT at the Rice TX factory in April.
We routinely load on several hundred more lbs of extra gear into the bed of the TV as well. We tow at 60 mph and the truck hardly knows the TT is back there.
We like the long bed truck [bks it replaced a sedan] and carries 5 big adults easily like an SUV, but has way more towing capacity and total cargo capacity to boot. WE put on a Bak-Flip bed cover for security and weather protection and can easily carry both our 8' kayaks on top of the bak-flip when we need to.

[patrick crawford]

Fred, the op was asking about his 16’ Casita. While your experience with your 17’ Casita is interesting, comparing the 2 versions of Casita is one of those apples and oranges things. The 2 are quite different.

p@