Why do tow vehicles "sag" in the rear, under a load they were designed to accommodate
09-04-2015, 06:37 AM
#31
Registered
Here's the thing, the majority of guys buying 3/4 and 1 ton trucks these days are not towing full time. That means the manufacturers are softening the ride as much as possible. If they made a truck stiff enough that you could put 16k on a trailer and see no squat, unloaded the truck would be so stiff, no one would buy it. Also, a lot of people don't know how to balance a load on a trailer. Good to hear you have a weight distribution hitch, I'm sure that helps.
Case in point: the farmer across the road from my parents bought a Ford 1-ton dually chassis cab to pull their new 5th wheel. His wife (who has never done anything on their farm) complained about the ride constantly for the couple months they owned it and he lost his a$$ trading it in on a Ford 3/4 ton crew cab long bed. He is in his 70's and thought the 1-ton chassis cab rode just fine. Plus he liked the 1-ton better for use on the farm (tighter turning radius).
You shouldnt need a weight distributing hitch. You need to get an accurate tongue weight of the trailer. The bulk of the weight should be on the trailers axles. If your front end of the truck is light you have too much tongue weight. Find a truck scale and weigh get your tongue weight by unhitching the truck from the trailer so only the trailer jack is on the scale. Once you have that adjust the boat on the trailer and weigh it again. 5-600 lbs should work and then go road test it. You want just enough tongue weight to keep the hitch from becoming unweighted on a bump but not so much that it lightens the front end. Short wheelbase trucks such as an avalanche are trickier than a crew cab full size because the longer truck is an effectively a longer lever against the tongue weight that is using the rear axles as a fulcrum to lift the front of the truck.
