tilt bed trailer

stevep3916 · Feb 7, 2019

hello, I have a 20 ft. tilt bed trailer . I need to haul 863 bobcat to dealer. I have a question about balancing trailer. Trailer was bought to haul this machine and can do so with no problem. I have hauled hay, and tractors and lots of trucks and cars. Always had to load something long like extended cab truck, pull up to stops on front of bed, chain down. Now with bobcat should I balance weight just a little in front of wheels? Axles are pretty far back on this trailer, it is tongue heavy to begin with. I have never pulled skid steer before, it weighs 6,800 lbs with out bucket. Have hauled 5,000lbs hay (5 1,000 lb rolls easy enough. Pull truck is 94 ford f 250 4x4 idi turbo. thanks for your consideration.

Redlands Okie · Feb 7, 2019

Bumper mount hitch you need about 10 to 15 percent of the weight on the hitch. Goose neck about 20 to 25 percent on the hitch. As far as actual location on your trailor for the load one would assume a bit in front of the axles with the center of gravity.
Several factors that makes it hard to give accurate info over the forum.
Length of trailor
Axles location on trailor
Length of bobcat and its center of gravity.
Probably forgetting something else.

Would personally prefer it to be a bit tongue heavy than to much weight on the back of the trailor. To much weight to far back and things can go bad fast if it starts to wag back and forth.

seachangeexcavation · Feb 7, 2019

Agree with Redlands, I tow a 10k skidsteer often on my tilt deck and typically line up the center of the skid steer over the front axle. Put just a tad more of the weight on my bumper and you only load something too far back once...

Fallon · Feb 8, 2019

What kind of tilt deck? If it's a gravity tilt, they pivot right between the rear axles. Makes for easy balancing. Drive forward until it tilts flat & its "ballanced". We want 10-15% tongue weight so you drive forward a little bit more passed balanced to get that.

Generally you want as much weight as close to the axle(s) as possible too. Weight at the far ends of the deck will amplify sway more than weight over the axles.

The rear part of a gravity tilt deck isnt really usable space. Weight back there is far from the axle & throws off proper hitch weight.

I liked my gravity tilt, but at 16' it was way to short. I ended up with a 22' deckover power tilt. Surprisingly not much more price wise, but the axles are further back for better balance & more usable deck space. The steeper deck angles make driving on & off a hair harder though.

Reb954 · Feb 8, 2019

Typically I try to find the center point of weight for the object being hauled. To do that I first measure from the ground up to two points on the trailer, one at the very front of the trailer and one at the very back. As an example we will say there is 1" difference between front and back. Now load the object being hauled so it is roughly centered weight wise over the center of the axles. Take those measurements again. Move the load back or forward on the trailer until you get the 1" difference front to back. Straight above the center of the axles is the center of the load. Make a mental note of where that is for future loadings.

Once I have the center of load I measure the height from the trailer tongue to the ground. Then move the load forward until the tongue drops one to two inches, tie down the load and go. This method will give you a rough placement of the load on the trailer. If you are pulling the load very far you may need to tweak it a bit.

sandman2234 · Feb 8, 2019

If a truck scale is available close by, weight of each axle empty and then loaded will give you a much better idea of how to load it. The factors everyone is describing has to do with weight and how to balance that.
David from jax

bitternut · Feb 10, 2019

I think some of you guys are over thinking loading your trailers. Every trailer I have ever owned has always towed fine when it was empty. What I do is measure the height of the hitch with the trailer empty and then load the trailer with what ever load and remeasue the hitch height. When I have the load positioned so the hitch is about 3" lower its good to go. Been working for me for over 60 years. It even works fine with my new 23' tilt deck trailer.

Fallon · Feb 10, 2019

bitternut said:
I think some of you guys are over thinking loading your trailers. Every trailer I have ever owned has always towed fine when it was empty. What I do is measure the height of the hitch with the trailer empty and then load the trailer with what ever load and remeasue the hitch height. When I have the load positioned so the hitch is about 3" lower its good to go. Been working for me for over 60 years. It even works fine with my new 23' tilt deck trailer.

My new to me 16' tilting deck trailer caused a code brown on the highway taking it home from auction. I finished heading home via a friends house at 55. Shoveled maybe a 55 gallon barrels worth of snow onto the front of the trailer. The remainder of the trip was fine at 65-70.

I had my 7'x14' double axle cargo trailer do something similar after owning it for 5 odd years. Never had a problem in all those years except for one time on the highway (probably doing 70, 5 under the CO speed limit) when it started to sway. Nothing in except a hand truck & something else (a ladder maybe, I forget, but it was light as well).

Nothing makes you appreciate a good electric brake controller & knowledge of towing physics more than sway hitting out of nowhere. You never take proper loading & balance for granted after that.

I'll use bumper squat on my truck if I have to, but I always measure if I can. The first thing I did after getting my new 22' tilting deck home was load the tractor up & use my Sherline hitch scale to figure out the optimal loading placement of the machine. I measured bumper squat for future reference when I had the right weight. It was surprisingly easy to get way to much hitch weight. That was usually pretty obvious with the back if the F250 way low. Not enough wright looked fine though.

Tomtint · Feb 11, 2019

I also have a 20' tilt. Loading it is a pretty simple task..I drive up whatever I'm loading and watch the back of the truck that's pulling it, once it drops a few inches, it's good to go.

bitternut · Feb 11, 2019

What kind of tilt deck? If it's a gravity tilt, they pivot right "between the rear axles"

Not sure what kind of trailer you have Fallon but my tilt bed trailer has the pivot point about 2 feet behind the rear axle. Mine has an 8 foot fixed deck in front with 15+ foot tilting rear deck.