I purchased my 100 a few months ago and will be towing with it for the first time this weekend. I loaded up a rented trailer and need to figure out my tongue weight as not to overload/under load it. I have stock rear springs with a slee 30 mm spacer and the rear has squatted about an inch and a half. Can anyone give a good guesstimate of weight given the little information? Thanks
Tongue weight question
- Thread starter SGS1
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Trunk Monkey
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Depends on the trailer and what you put in it.
APKhaos
Unfixing the unfixable
1.5" drop with an empty trailer won't tell you much. If you got that drop with the trailer fully loaded I'd suspect you might be a bit light on tongue weight.
The rule of thumb is that the tongue weight [ie the weight on the hitch ball] should be around 12% -15% of the gross weight of the fully loaded trailer. Much less than that and it might be an exciting ride, especially if the trailer has surge brakes rather than electric brakes. Bottom line is that you need to weigh the trailer fully loaded, then adjust the load to achieve 12-15% of the gross weight at the hitch. Anything else is a wild a$$ed guess.
The rule of thumb is that the tongue weight [ie the weight on the hitch ball] should be around 12% -15% of the gross weight of the fully loaded trailer. Much less than that and it might be an exciting ride, especially if the trailer has surge brakes rather than electric brakes. Bottom line is that you need to weigh the trailer fully loaded, then adjust the load to achieve 12-15% of the gross weight at the hitch. Anything else is a wild a$$ed guess.
- Thread starter
- #4
It is a rented uhaul trailer with surge brakes and the 1.5 is fully loaded. Im guessing the trailer is coming in at 5000 lbs and my goal was about 600 on the tongue. I know there is no exact science to this but how many inches of squat am I looking or to get around the 600 lbs mark. Thanks
you can use a bathroom scale to measure tongue weight as in this link Measuring trailer tongue weight with a bathroom scale
holy crap, i thought the bathroom scale thing was a joke. thats awesome
We've found that you definitely need some tongue weight pullin a load. If not, the trailer will get squirrly in a hurry especially with a short trailer. Been there, done that and wont be goin back.
I like to measure the bumper height, and then step on the bumper and measure it again. I weigh 185, so I have one data point. If I am looking for 350 tongue weight, I'd expect about twice as much droop.
One thing I have found is that you need to be careful about staying off the bump stops when towing with the 100. I still have the stock springs and it is really soft in the rear and easy to get into the bump stops when towing.
Pete
One thing I have found is that you need to be careful about staying off the bump stops when towing with the 100. I still have the stock springs and it is really soft in the rear and easy to get into the bump stops when towing.
Pete
i would not "expect" twice as much droop as the spring rate changes as it compresses, however in theory if you had two people that weighed 185 step on the bumper at the same time you could measure the droop and expect the tongue weight to be about 370 lbs at its measurement.
i mean no disrespect at all pete as i have never thought of this technique before. it sure beats the heck out of the bathroom scale technique.
- Thread starter
- #10
Thanks for everyone's input, this morning I moved some things around and generated about 2.25 inches of sag from normal riding height or an additional .75 inch from from my initial question. Glad to report 300 miles later and arrived safe with no trailer sway or poor handling of any kind. I was actually impressed how the LC pulled.
