Do you like to travel by motorhome in your Travel Trailer (TT)?

You know, the freedom of the road, hearing your kids laugh around a campfire at the local RV complex.

Really get away from it all … after all, isn’t that what RV’ing is supposed to be? Totally relaxing … totally fun.

Like you, millions of RV users will be towing their TTs on the road this summer. Many of them will not hitch properly to the truck. What this will cause is a terrible or uncomfortable experience that will make people afraid to tow.

Problems when towing a travel trailer

• They can have a very heavy tongue

• They are often towed with a lighter tow vehicle.

• The owner may not balance them very well.

• Many travel trailers tow without a proper weight distribution hitch (or your hitch is not adjusted properly)

Heavy weight of the tongue

Did you know that your travel trailer will have 10-15% of its total weight on the hitch ball? Many VR users are surprised to find that the weight of their tongue is higher than they think. Many RV users are based on the weight of the brochure that it can say that the weight of the tongue is approximately 500 to 600 pounds.

The problem with this is that most of the dry tongue weights in the brochure do not include the two 30 pound propane tanks and the heavy deep cell RV battery. These items alone can add 100-150 pounds to the weight of your trailer tongue.

Lighter trucks

Many people are trying to save money on tow vehicles that save fuel but can still tow quite heavy trailers. This is great, but many of these trucks cannot carry 700-1000 pounds of tongue weight directly onto the tow ball without assistance. The back of the truck sags too low and the truck and trailer handle terribly.

Unbalanced trailers

RV owners often don’t load trailers properly. Remember that if you load heavy items in the rear of the trailer, take the weight off the tongue at the front. This is bad. You don’t want to take too much weight off the tongue of the trailer. Load your heaviest items toward the center toward the front of the trailer as much as possible and keep your lighter items toward the rear of the trailer.

Weight distribution hitches are not used or are used incorrectly

A weight distribution hitch is a special hitch designed to help distribute the heavy weight of the tongue from the rear of the truck to all axles of the truck and trailer. These marvels of technology do a lot of GOOD things for you.

1. Restore the front (steer) axle to factory geometry (no more lights pointing to the sky)

2. They balance the load on all truck and trailer tires.

3. They give the driver more control

4. Improve truck and trailer handling.

5. They give you a much more relaxing trailer

Conclution

Remember that towing should be fun and a weight distribution hitch can help take much of the stress out of the trailer. Most travel trailers have a very heavy tongue and will need one of these special hitches to tow safely.