Real world load weight, how much are you towing?

First off I have never towed anything heavy, only fishing boats or 5x8 utility trailers.
Soon I will be getting a trailer to tow my heavyass K5 around the west coast and beond. I have never weighed my K5 but I'm gonna guess 6K, with 454/465/205, D44front, D60rear, 6pt cage,37gallon tank and homemade skid, rocksliders, front winch bumper w/winch, rear 3"x8"x6' bumper w/homemade swing out tire carrier made out of 2x2 square tubing I figure I must be around 6K by now.

When the Rubicon killed my K5 (lost rear drivline and front axel Ujoint all at once) my buddy Chris (Frizzelfry) let me put my K5 on his trailer while I drove his wheeler all the way back to my house. This was the first and last time my K5 has ever been on a trailer. Now when we first loaded it up and started down the Hwy the trailer began to sway perrty bad. We pulled off the hwy and moved the K5 forward for more tounge weight. This worked and no more sway.

So do you guys that are towing now mark your trailer's floor were your front tire should be everytime you load it or do you just guess?
When you first started towing did you have to 'find the sweet spot' for your trail rig to sit on the trailer?
How much weight are you towing? Trailer and trail rig?
I guess I'm searching for more info as I am getting closer to buying a trailer and I value you all's real world opinions to help guide me into tow land. So any GREENHORN info you could provide would be greatwaytogo

 

I haven't towed my K5 yet but I did tow a 1979 F150 4x4 Ford on a tandem axle trailer with my K5. I just kept nudging it forward until I could see that the motor was past the front axle on the trailer. ALso with my blazer being only a 5/8 ton (I've got an add-a-leaf in there) I could also tell the further it went forward the further my K5 sagged. rotfl It pulled great down highway 12 through the rolling hills at 65mph.

Depending on the trailer that you get but I would imagine you plan on a smaller tandem flatbed, not a big gooseneck. When you load up the k5 just make sure your front tires are plenty far forward and when you stand back you can see that the engine is just past the front trailer axle. With your K5 in mind I would bet you should have plenty of weight on the tongue with the motor past the axle, especially with a 454. imp:

 

Once I get my trailer I plan on going to weigh my tow rig, then I'll go back to house, get the trailer and go weigh the rig and trailer, and the trailer alone (while still attached to the truck). That should let me figure out the exact weight of the trailer and my GCWR. Then I can figure out where to place the truck so I have 10-15% of the weight on the tongue using the bathroom scale method. Once I have that figured out I'll tow it down the freeway to make sure everything is kosher, then go weigh it one last time to make sure that it worked out the way that I planned. Doing all of this will also tell me how much weight capacity I have available for the slide-in camper.waytogo

 

Once you've got the right spot figured out you could bolt a 4”x4” across the trailer as a stop block. Then every time you load the K5 just run it up to that block and you’re there. This would also help to keep it from moving forward under hard braking. waytogo imp:

 

Ya I was thinking along thoes line too, I am getting a wood deck for surewaytogo

 

Can you do that with my stuff too and then just fill me in on the details when you get back? hehehehehehe


Ya that is a good plan Shagg. Do you know how much your trail rig weighs yet?

 

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I use a 2x4 as it is more easily screwed to the deck, and be removed fast too. Works fine for me, and if I happen to have something different on the trailer, the 2x4 is low enough not to be in the way.

John.

 

A crapload I'm sure. My driveway supports it real nice, I can tell you that.rotfl

 

If you have to weld tie down rings on the trailer then weld a set of brackets at the same time for the 4x4 to drop into. A couple pieces of chanel on the outside of the rails would work.

 

My Opinion is that you guys are going way overboard with this.

That said, Yes I did have to find the "Sweet" spot on the trailer for the buggy. But I also found that there is a good amount of wiggle room for my setup. A little to far forward or backward only brings out a thought of loading a little different the next time.

I think with the newer longer trucks you will find them quite forgiving to mis loaded trailers. I have had to stop before and move a load around some. Most of the time it is for my personal comfort not that I feel it was that unsafe.

Thats Just my .02

 

Thanks Guys, I think I will just 'learn on the fly', being that I have never towed a real load I was just getting an empty feeling in my brain

 

Ok,

I'm going to go a little bit overboard here. Since I tow a little bigger setup than some of you. I went way overboard on this towing weight thing.

I have spent many and I mean many hours on DTR & TDR, in the towing sections, and the Overload police are all over these boards. When I first got the Dodge, and the gooseneck, the ride was flat out $hitty, bounced, bucked, drove me crazy. I was really disapointed in the overall experience.

So I stared doing some adjustement to get the ride better. This in turn lead to many hours on the internet finding out what others were doing and what was considered a decent ride.

This is what my end result was. I ended first having to do a sping over on the trailer. To get the clearanced right, the rear end of the Dodge 4x4's sit a little high, I put 2 shocks on each axle on the trailer, leftovers from Desert Rat/takeoffs (this made a huge diffrence), the I stared screwing around with toung weights, in turn I ended up writing a Excel spreadsheet to calculate the tounge weights and the correct tire pressures.

Don't laugh, it's not fancy at all, but it works and it helped solve my tounge weight issues along with a decent ride air pressure for the tires. I have used this to totally fine tune my trailering ride, and once I got it fine tuned, I screwed blocks down on the trailer bed and each time it's the exact ride.

I have even messed with the air shocks and air bags and know the exact setting for a smooth ride.

The spreadsheet is crude but it works.

Here is the link to it. Feel free to destroy, modify or whatever, but don't laugh, it helped me solve the bad ride issues.

Well I tried the link, could not get it to work. Maybe Russ or Steve can post is somewhere and like to it. I can't get my Cox personal space to link.

So for now, I will email it to you.

Rob

 

I'm proably going to get bashed on this one, but I regularly tow

-john deere 4240 #12000
-john deere 4440 #14000
-john deere 4455 #15500
-john deere 210c #13500
-17 round bales hay #17000

This is all on a 32' dual tandem trailer. I don't know the combine weight of the whole rig but I do know what the equipment weights.

With that load of hay my truck will run 60-65 mph and it handles good.
So if I was just hauling the k-10, to me it would be a walk in the park.

This is why I have a manual trans I doubt an automatic would live very long under this much stress.

 

My trail rig with my wife and I in it (300lbs combined) is 5500lbs. My tow rig + empty trailer with my wife and I combined is 8100lbs. Take 300 out for the double weighing of my wife and I and you get 13,300 GCVW with my wife and I sitting in it; w/out tools, spare tires & parts, gear, etc.

-Mike

 

Fully loaded I normally run between 79,000 and 80,000 gross. One time I pulled on the scales at the dump with a load of broken asphault, wet sub-baserock, and some mud. When the scale settled down I was at 100,560. I've installed onboard scales because of that time

 

How much did that cost you?

 

Nothing I made it to the dump without getting caught. It didn't feel as heavy as it was. So I've added onboard scales to my truck and trailer so I have a good idea how much they're loading me with at job sites. One other time when working as a ten wheeler dumptruck I was loaded to 57,890 gross when 49,500 is a max load on my TWer. Didn't get caught that time either.

 

We're currently hauling a lot of Carrots out of Arizona and our guys are going down to a local scale after leaving the field to get a weight. Just the other day we had one of our trucks tip in at 95K, we sent him back to the field to get some weight off.