Trailer Towing question

[Jeff396]

Wow, the cross your straps opinion was one that I got from the trailer rental guy and just about every place I searched on the internet. Many on the internet not only cross their rears but also their fronts as well. After reading your post I guess the determining factor is where the tie down points are on the trailer as compared to the attachment points on the car. If they are slightly outboard you already have your lateral hold built in. If for some reason they were at the same width you might get some side to side movement. I am off to pick up the trailer within the hour. Hopefully it will all become clear when I go to strap down the car.

Jeff

 

[MikePA]

Jeff, all this 'trouble' you're having with trailers, tie downs, etc. is your Vette telling you he doesn't want to be sold! /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

 

[Jeff396]

When I asked her/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif she seemed to prefer that to the mysterious fire option./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Jeff

 

[MikePA]

Jeff, tell ya what. For $10,000 I will drive down, pick the Vette up and drive it back to my place. This will let you forget all about this trailering stuff. No more worrying. No anxious trip and 10 grand too. Whaddaya think? /w3tcompact/icons/eyes.gif

Talking about a fire...that's how I lost my '68. Backfire thru the carb. Poof. Car was totaled. The body was OK, 'cept the underside of the hood, but the engine was shot (327/350). The fire got so hot the heads were warped, or so the Chevy dealer told me (Ammon R Smith - remeber them from drag racing? They're out of business now.). Insurance paid me $4,000. I had only paid $2,100 for the car. Yes, this was a long time ago...1976 to be exact. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

Jeff,

Check this out. I copied it from the "How to" section of the catalog of a towing equipment supplier.

RECOMMENDED STRAP ALIGNMENT FOR RACE CARS,
ANTIQUE or CLASSIC AUTOS AND MOST FOUR WHEELED VEHICLES

Position vehicle on trailer. Move vehicle as necessary to balance trailer for Tongue Weight Distribution.

Attach one (1) pair of Tie-Downs to front end of vehicle at a point below suspension system and in a manner preventing strap movement.
(a) Attach Ratchet end of Tie-Downs to trailer bed attachment hardware.
(b) Activate ratchet and apply equal tension to each Tie-Down strap.

Attach one (1) pair of Tie-Downs to rear end of vehicle at a point below suspension system and in a manner similar to that described above for the front end of the vehicle.

NOTES:

Webbing should be protected against contact with sharp edged parts, hot surfaces and acids. Do Not Use Tie-Down if webbing is cut, frayed or damaged.

To achieve tie-down load rating, all strap components must be in straight line with the direction of pull.

Hardware should have load rating equal to or greater than the rating of the Tie-Downs.

Criss-Crossing of the Tie-Downs should be used only when both ends of Tie-Down strap are securely locked in a fixed position to vehicle component and to trailer attachment point prohibiting Tie-Down movement

In a perfect world if I were towing the same vehicle on the same trailer I would have my attachment points on the trailer floor located in such a manner as to have the staps at approximately a 30 degree angle and 3"-4" to the outside of the attachment points on the vehicle. That will give you the optimum towing tie down strength and security.

Most people make the mistake of trying to secure the vehicle too near to straight down. That's not at all the best way to go. Good luck with your journey. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Jeff396]

Thanks, everything went great securing the car. The oval holes in the frame along with the T hooks made it very simple. I did end up crossing the straps at the rear as the tie down points were at about the exact width of the attachment points on the car. I did end up putting a blanket at the point that they cross and since the frame attachment point on the car is on the bottom of the frame the straps touch nothing on the car. My only complaint is that I have a hard time seeing the passenger side tire in my mirror when making right turns. The regular mirror is filled with a lot of white trailer and my spot is a bit small to see where exactly the wheel is. I'll just have to be extra careful on that one.

Jeff

 

[Jeff396]

<font color=blue>Jeff, tell ya what. For $10,000 I will drive down, pick the T-bird up and drive it back to my place. This will let you forget all about this trailering stuff. No more worrying. No anxious trip and 10 grand too. Whaddaya think?</font color=blue>

That offer is acceptable with the one minor change I have made. Let me know!/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Jeff

 

[Wingnut]

speaking of fires .... they had an article on the local news a couple of nights ago on Michigan and car fires. Seems like it's becoming the preferred route now-a-days for people who want out of leases .... insurance companies here are paying out so much that they're now actively investigating most car fires. The number of fires here in the last 2 years was absolutely astounding .... I'd always thought these people movers were a little bit more fire resistant /w3tcompact/icons/grin.gif

 

[Jeff396]

It is done./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif The trip went off without a hitch (no pun intended). I can't say enough about the Tekonsha Prodigy brake controller. My wife's parents used to pull large travel trailers and she remembers vividly the jerking when bring the rig to a stop. This thing makes it smooth!!!

Anyways, good riddens to Corvettedom. I'm glad I experienced it but I wouldn't do it again.

Thanks to everyone for all the trailering help!!!/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Jeff

 

[MikePA]

<font color=blue>Anyways, good riddens to Corvettedom. I'm glad I experienced it but I wouldn't do it again.</font color=blue>
Why? (just curious)

BTW, your counter offer of $10K for the T-Bird almost tempted me! If it was 12 - 18 months from now, when the tractor is almost paid off....

 

[snowman]

"When I was truck shopping, I thought I remembered something about the truck coming with a brake controller, but searching the ford vehicle & towing guide websites, I came up empty. Maybe it came wired for the controller."

Kind of late, but for what it's worth, my 99 Expedition manual says "an electrical connector is provided under the instrument panel for installing a customer supplied electric brake controller".

 

[Jeff396]

<font color=blue>Why? (just curious)</font color=blue>

Started to write a reply to this question a couple of times now. It's hard to explain but here goes.

1. We didn't seem to mesh too well with the Corvette club people. They are nice but most own newer cars which is a completely different mind set than when you own an older one. In our T-bird club there were no newer cars (until just recently) so everyone was trying to work out the same problems with their cars which made for a lot of fun.

2. The obsessive need to have correct dated and numbered parts took a lot of the fun out of it for me. Now you could just ignore that part of it but then you are driving the value of your car down. Recently when I swapped out the starter on the Vette I had to choose between one from Autozone ($30.00) or a correct date coded one through mailorder which I would have to wait 3 to 4 weeks for at $200.00. The cheaper one would be just fine but you'd also like to correct that one part when the need arises.

3. Since the value of these cars are so high when they are correct there is an extremely high number of fraudulant cars out there. When I was selling my car a man from California who was big into NCRS (National Corvette Restorers Society) said that there was an owner survey out there from the early 80's that claims my car was originally maroon with a black vinyl interior. Now I have no way to verify or disprove this info but in light of that the car will never be an NCRS candidate. In order to pull this off, the restoring company would have had to forge the trim plate in the car and the protecto plate in the warranty book. As luck would have it, this didn't hurt me too much because I ended up selling it back to the place I got it from for about what I paid for it. The guy from California was so serious about the car he was having a guy from Iowa fly out to look at it before he got on a plane. After discovering my cars problem the guy from Iowa tells me about his '63 tanker coupe that he got a while back for a good sum of money. Tankers were Vettes that came with a 36 gallon fuel tank specifically for racing and are pretty rare. He said that only 4 months ago he found out that it was a "created" car. This kind of thing is all too common with the Corvettes. I know this happens to a degree with other cars but the Corvette group seem to have perfected it. For instance, I'm told there are a mysteriously high number of Pontiac GTO's out there while there are only e few Lemans in existance. Of course most of those GTO's are fakes created from Lemans.

4. It's only a two seater. In the six years I owned the car I had only put about 6000 miles on it. I think in that time my wife has only been in the car 6 or 8 times. It's really no better than our Harleys were when you have a family of 4.

I guess that about sums it up. I really liked the car itself as I think it's one of the best cars from a styling standpoint to come out of the 60's. The only car from that era I think is better looking is the Jaguar XKE.......but that's British.

Jeff

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

<font color=blue>"Recently when I swapped out the starter on the Vette I had to choose between one from Autozone ($30.00) or a correct date coded one through mailorder which I would have to wait 3 to 4 weeks for at $200.00. The cheaper one would be just fine but you'd also like to correct that one part when the need arises."</font color=blue>

Around here I'd have gone ahead and just had the original starter rebuilt at one of the local starter/alternator rebuild shops. They'd have it done and back to me in under a week for about the same money as you'd pay for the AutoZone starter and you'd have the right numbers and a working starter. Just a thought... /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Jeff396]

Whether the starter in the car was the correct one was the first thing I checked once I removed it. If it had been I also would have had it rebuilt but it wasn't. So, I went of the Autozone starter since I was going to sell it anyway.

A while back I was having trouble with the cars voltage regulator. This time I decided to spend the buck and get a date stamped correct replacement for about $80.00. Well, this thing never did work right no matter how I adjusted it. I ended up getting so frustrated that I went to the local auto parts and bought one for about $20.00 and put it in. This thing worked right without any adjustment. It kinda dimmed my spirits for getting "correct" parts.

Jeff

 

[Gary_in_Indiana]

That's more my mentality. I'm not going to buy a vehicle for an investment. I deal with vehicles all day every day so it's not my idea of a great hobby. If I buy another Corvette I'll buy one without matching numbers and sell it without matching numbers. The dollars, while lower at the sale, will be commensurately lower on the purchase as well.

Another advantage of this is that, as you said, you can get yourself parts for your car that work best without concern for matching numbers, etc. I don't want one with perfect paint, either. I want one I can drive without worrying about it. Having a car like a Corvette should be fun, not a job. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

 

[Jeff396]

Unfortunately a lesson I had to learn the hard way. New rule of thumb....Never buy a car that I wouldn't feel comfortable sitting on its hood./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Like my Bird.

Jeff