Sway when towing TT

[DJ Underwood]

First of all, Thanks to everyone! I learned a bunch of new stuff in the thread. I will be getting my trailer out for some maintenance before camping season and I will update you all once I get some numbers and weights.
As far as tires go, I am 90% sure they are 75mph rated, but I have to replace one before getting it due to a blow out (they are total POS tires, and a blow out on the 1st trip AND the company refused to warranty it), mind you it was 121 degrees F that day (I am not exaggerating) so that doesn't help.
I am going to take it to a scale if I can find one nearby enough and try to get some weights, there are some rock yards that are close by and might let me borrow one for a few min.
As far as severity, its not crazy at all, I can manage and I do expect some with the brick this large in the wind. It only gets a bit sketchy when I have gotten passed by a big rig and feel him "pulling" me in close, and it gets really close.
That being said, I do believe how tall and light these are, it make sense to me that this behavior is expected, it was just a bit drastic from my last setup.
I will also be doing some changes to the pitch and height of the hitch and see what that does, I will report back my findings, thanks again everyone!

 

[LossPrev]

You already got tons of great advice but I'll mention that I have almost no sway and have a similar sized trailer, actually taller and a bit heavier. Going through Indiana last year on one of our trips and we had sustained side winds of about 25mph with some good gusts. I would take my hands off the wheel and tell my wife "oh my God is this so much better than towing with our 1500 last year" while the truck/trailer tracked perfectly straight. She got annoyed after about the seventh time (I let go but kept my hands about 0.1" off it for any tow police reading this)

Every truck/trailer combo is different but I guess my point is after getting the WD dialed in you should be super happy with the tow experience. I might also recommend getting a hitch with stronger sway control? I know the one you have is pretty popular but I think something like my Husky Centerline or 'Equal-i-zer' one might be stronger.

 

[DJ Underwood]

Just an update for all those that helped, towed this up north a couple months ago (end of April), made some adjustments to the hitch as discussed, and though my route didn't have a lot of traffic it still towed like a dream. Also, I checked the tires prior to heading up north, they are rated for 87mph, not that I drove that fast, but that was a discussion before. Also, for anyone interested, the cruise control with tow/haul mode will downshift to attempt to hold speed when on a steep decent, really decreases braking, it was quite impressive. The cruise control on my old truck was only for speed, but didn't do anything for deceleration, so I found it quite interesting.

 

[gimmie11s]

Looks great.. where is that camping location?

 

[DJ Underwood]

Looks great.. where is that camping location?

Just outside of Show Low, AZ on the white river reservation

 

[g00fy]

It seems you got things straightened out, but I just wanted to mention. I had the same issues as you with my Forester River Greywolf 27RR (roughly the same weight and a bit shorter) and my 2019 2500 6.7. I felt like i was never really getting much sway control and was getting a lot of squat even though the trailer was level. Turns out I had the "L" Brackets on the trailer from 1 hole too low. And it's hard to see from your Initial picture but it looks like your bars were at the exact same position mine were at.

My last trip out with the Toy hauler a man pulled in next to me with a similar sized toy hauler on the back of his F-150 and i noticed his "L" Brackets were much higher than mine (too high if you ask me) and it made me decide to adjust my brackets.

I raised my "L" brackets 1 hole, and it made a world of difference, hardly any squat now and there's definitely more tension on the bars giving me more weight distribution and sway control. The arrow is pointing to the hole the top bolt used to be in.

 

[DJ Underwood]

It seems you got things straightened out, but I just wanted to mention. I had the same issues as you with my Forester River Greywolf 27RR (roughly the same weight and a bit shorter) and my 2019 2500 6.7. I felt like i was never really getting much sway control an and was getting a lot of squat even though the trailer was level. Turns out I had the "L" Brackets on the trailer from 1 hole too low. And it's hard to see from your Initial picture but it looks like your bars were at the exact same position mine were at.

My last trip out with the Toy hauler a man pulled in next to me with a similar sized toy hauler on the back of his F-150 and i noticed his "L" Brackets were much higher than mine (too high if you ask me) and it made me decide to adjust my brackets.

I raised my "L" brackets 1 hole, and it made a world of difference, hardly any squat now and there's definitely more tension on the bars giving me more weight distribution and sway control. The arrow is pointing to the hole the top bolt used to be in.

I think I will try this, I will likely have to through bolt like you did, but I bet that will also help. Thanks!

 

[g00fy]

I think I will try this, I will likely have to through bolt like you did, but I bet that will also help. Thanks!

Yea give it a shot, it's a 5 minute job to remove the nuts from the studs and bump it up a notch. I made the adjustment the day before I had to drive home 10 hours through the mountains of WV. I figured it was easy enough to make the adjustment that if it drove worse, I could pull over in a rest stop or parking lot and put it back the way it was and be on the road again in 20 minutes. Needless to say I didn't have to do that because it made things better. The only issue is now the trailer is slightly nose high.

 

[Phil T]

It should not be nose high at all. A little lower is better. I have seen many travel trailers on the road that were outrageous in the way they were sitting. Quite alarming actually.

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