Share Pics of People Hauling or Towing Something Wrong

[LS Tractor Owner]

Yep, size does matter..... no, no, not THAT way.... I can maneuver my 21 ft long travel trailer into tighter spots than my little 4x8 utility trailer! The little one turns really fast, usually into a Jack knife position quickly!

 

[Oaktree]

To each their own... my retirement present to myself will be a brand new something, so that I can go wherever I want and not worry about whether triple A will come rescue me.

I'm semi-retired, and that thought has crossed my mind as well as a replacement for my '02 Dakota. Maybe I'll live long enough to see the long promised, but yet undelivered Ram Dakota. Fortunately, my present one still has a few good years left in it...I'm pretty underwhelmed by the current crop of mid-sized trucks.

Re: your trailer. Are you aware that short trailers are the hardest to back up? Especially if you can稚 see them until they have jackknifed.

I believe the tongue length has more to do with it than trailer length. I extended the tongue on my first p/u box trailer as it was waaay too short and since have built 3 of them with extra long tongues. New owners commented on how much easier they are to back up and seem to trail nicer than previous ones. I definitely agree with the backing up opinion but have no proof on the trailing.

I have 2 trailers...a 4x8 with a quite long tongue and a 5x10 with a much shorter one. The 4x8 is the most miserable thing to back I've ever had...very easy to jack knife, even when you can see it. The 5x10 is a breeze.
I'd asked here once about whether shortening the tongue on the 4x8 might improve backing, and the answer was unanimously "no" so I left it be.

 

[3Ts]

I think that you will find that the ratio of the towing vehicle wheelbase to the distance between the tow vehicle rear axle and the trailer axle center is what determines how easy it is to back. The towing vehicle wheelbase needs to be less than the rear axle to trailer axle distance and the greater this difference the easier it is to back.

 

[Industrial Toys]

SIZE ALWAYS matters, the way we least want.

Funny, of all the things my Dad drilled into me was long tongue length. We had one trailer made out of a ford p/u in 64 with an almost comical long tubular tongue. Whenever I saw a similar trailer, the people had always cut off the tongue shortly after the side frame rails had been bent in and met the center member.

 

[masscity]

This happened in the late 90's, the father and son worked at the same company as me. The son had a almost new Ranger 4x4 and the Dad had a much older Ford 3/4 ton full size van full of tools for side jobs.

The van was not running and they decided to pull it home with the Ranger and the van on a car dolly. They were going down a slight hill and the van started whipping back and forth and the Ranger ended up in the ditch on it's side and the van still sitting on the dolly on the road edge.

The Ranger wasn't damaged too much.

 

[adam728]

It was in the UP of Michigan though. Anything goes there. I suppose it was about 20 years ago, which also helps (kinda).

Reminded me of something done about 20 years ago in the UP. Drove this tractor, with forks on it, from Atlantic Mine up to Bete Grise.


That painfully long drive wasn't the story. Story was the boss was dropping off a sauna, the tractor was to unload it. Then he wanted the tractor loaded on the ~6000 lb capacity car hauler he brought the sauna building on. Towed by a reg cab short bed Dodge 1500.

I can still picture the painfully flattened tires on the trailer, which had something like 50 psi or more in them.

I can still hear the grinding transfercase as he needed 4-low to get the rig moving a few mph, than muscled it through 4-high and into 2wd.

I can still feel the terror of the whole thing wagging when trying to exceed something like 22 mph.

We stopped at the Gay bar (yup), and I drove the tractor back from there, as it was faster.

 

[Fallon]

When I was working for a company that disposed of paper sludge in the late 90s they had a couple interesting dump trucks. Well just big capacity 4 axle dumps. The hitch on the pup trailers was the interesting part. The tongue was probably 15-20' long. When they would arrive on-site, they would apply the trailer brakes & unlatch the trailer tongue. Pull forward & the tongue extended to double the length. They would manuver around to dump the truck & trailer (pretty much jackknife the trailer so the truck wouldnt jump on the tongue). Then reverse the process to shorten the tongue before hitting the road.

Long tongue was to unwieldy or illegal on the road I suppose. But the long tongue was needed to easily manuver & dump without unhitching.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Maybe also to facilitate dumping of the truck box.

 

[aczlan]

When I was working for a company that disposed of paper sludge in the late 90s they had a couple interesting dump trucks. Well just big capacity 4 axle dumps. The hitch on the pup trailers was the interesting part. The tongue was probably 15-20' long. When they would arrive on-site, they would apply the trailer brakes & unlatch the trailer tongue. Pull forward & the tongue extended to double the length. They would manuver around to dump the truck & trailer (pretty much jackknife the trailer so the truck wouldnt jump on the tongue). Then reverse the process to shorten the tongue before hitting the road.

Long tongue was to unwieldy or illegal on the road I suppose. But the long tongue was needed to easily manuver & dump without unhitching.

Those are also common out west.

Aaron Z

 

[duramaxsky]

When I was working for a company that disposed of paper sludge in the late 90s they had a couple interesting dump trucks. Well just big capacity 4 axle dumps. The hitch on the pup trailers was the interesting part. The tongue was probably 15-20' long. When they would arrive on-site, they would apply the trailer brakes & unlatch the trailer tongue. Pull forward & the tongue extended to double the length. They would manuver around to dump the truck & trailer (pretty much jackknife the trailer so the truck wouldnt jump on the tongue). Then reverse the process to shorten the tongue before hitting the road.

Long tongue was to unwieldy or illegal on the road I suppose. But the long tongue was needed to easily manuver & dump without unhitching.

That's backwards to how it's done. Shorten to maneuver around the job site or run empty. Stretch out loaded to meet bridge length standards for heavy haul. I did it for years.