Got in a hurry finishing up a landscaping project today and didn't latch the trailer onto the ball. Block wall, 15 yards of dirt, etc and I have a huge utility trailer I've been using to haul it all over the last few weeks of spare time. So I was fired up at finally taking the misc. rock, dirt and weeds to the dump. Put 1000lbs of it at the very back edge so I could easily push it off at the dump.
As I got to the stop sign leaving my neighborhood, the unsecured trailer tongue popped up and snubbed up on the chain so hard I thought I'd been rear ended. I could see the trailer was loose in my mirror, and hit the gas to keep that tongue from punching through the tailgate (my rear load and tandem axles meant the tongue was waving around about waist high). The yank caused it to hit me a good one. Trying to mitigate the damage, I tried to match the trailer's natural deceleration with the 80's speed, finally driving half off the road to get the trailer to slow down by dragging in the gravel and weeds. All this time the tongue was describing lazy figure 8s ranging as high as the back window and I knew another expensive hit was on the menu if I used the truck to slow it down.
When I got it stopped, the trailer had hit only the one time but I was really bumming as i walked back to survey the damage - sure the tongue on that 1800lb trailer (w/o the load) would punch deeply into the sheetmetal. The cruiser gods were clearly on duty. The heavy hit was right on the aluminum "diamond plate" piece on the stock bumper and right on its strongest point - the curve at the top. It nearly punched through it and bent the lip on the trailer's tip to aptly demonstrate how hard the hit was.
So, got lucky on this one and I'm going to leave the part in place as a "stupidity reminder".
DougM
As I got to the stop sign leaving my neighborhood, the unsecured trailer tongue popped up and snubbed up on the chain so hard I thought I'd been rear ended. I could see the trailer was loose in my mirror, and hit the gas to keep that tongue from punching through the tailgate (my rear load and tandem axles meant the tongue was waving around about waist high). The yank caused it to hit me a good one. Trying to mitigate the damage, I tried to match the trailer's natural deceleration with the 80's speed, finally driving half off the road to get the trailer to slow down by dragging in the gravel and weeds. All this time the tongue was describing lazy figure 8s ranging as high as the back window and I knew another expensive hit was on the menu if I used the truck to slow it down.
When I got it stopped, the trailer had hit only the one time but I was really bumming as i walked back to survey the damage - sure the tongue on that 1800lb trailer (w/o the load) would punch deeply into the sheetmetal. The cruiser gods were clearly on duty. The heavy hit was right on the aluminum "diamond plate" piece on the stock bumper and right on its strongest point - the curve at the top. It nearly punched through it and bent the lip on the trailer's tip to aptly demonstrate how hard the hit was.
So, got lucky on this one and I'm going to leave the part in place as a "stupidity reminder".
DougM
] and the mud flap was coming off next weekend anyway. A little "alignment" on the flare and Pristine is good to go. Whew.
. At least you had chains, I've seen a few trailers flipped in the ditch. From my boss and fellow contractors I learned to always cross your chains under the trailer tongue to help catch it if it gets loose, and to wind up the chains to shorten them to just long enough. I'm amazed I never forgot to lock something down from all the 5am hookups in cold rain or calf-deep mud. And yes, always pin that latch down.
D-
