Excellent discussion- How a WD hitch works
05-09-2016, 11:17 AM
#51
Senior Member
Thread Starter
My final spreadsheet for WD Hitch
I have arrived at my final version of the spreadsheet created by Montol. I've tidied things up some, found and corrected a few discrepancies, and I don't think I can make it any more accurate.
I will attach it here. All cells except user input cells (Yellow color) are protected and cannot be changed.
When you first open it, you will see my own numbers. My tongue weight is accurate, using a Shoreline, but my scale weights are somewhat in question, as I used a non-CAT truck scale which I have seen to be off by 150 lbs. once.
My base curb weights look odd (how do you get 3099 lbs on a truck scale???) This is because I had certain cargo aboard when I weighed, which I later removed by using the spreadsheet to see how that weight would be distributed to axles and tongue, then subtracting those weights.
Everything that would be onboard for a trip, and not variable, such as batteries, was part of curb weight.
The 50 lbs of cargo in the truck bed is the trailer spare tire, which I will have to carry in the truck to keep my TW down.
When you open the sheet, be sure that you can see the 3 tabs at the bottom. Clicking on those will take you to different sections of the sheet.
As you will see, my predicted axle weights are off by as much as 115LBS. Don't know exactly why, but I can live with that.
It will be necessary to vary the amount of force exerted by the bars to where you have the least amount of error in the last section.
When you do your initial weigh, you should get weights with your hitch tensioned at different amounts, such as different links on the chains.
True, this is a lot of work to set up...a lot of measurements to take... but once done, you only need to plug in a few things when loading up for each trip.
Updated spreadsheet has been posted in #54 below
I will attach it here. All cells except user input cells (Yellow color) are protected and cannot be changed.
When you first open it, you will see my own numbers. My tongue weight is accurate, using a Shoreline, but my scale weights are somewhat in question, as I used a non-CAT truck scale which I have seen to be off by 150 lbs. once.
My base curb weights look odd (how do you get 3099 lbs on a truck scale???) This is because I had certain cargo aboard when I weighed, which I later removed by using the spreadsheet to see how that weight would be distributed to axles and tongue, then subtracting those weights.
Everything that would be onboard for a trip, and not variable, such as batteries, was part of curb weight.
The 50 lbs of cargo in the truck bed is the trailer spare tire, which I will have to carry in the truck to keep my TW down.
When you open the sheet, be sure that you can see the 3 tabs at the bottom. Clicking on those will take you to different sections of the sheet.
As you will see, my predicted axle weights are off by as much as 115LBS. Don't know exactly why, but I can live with that.
It will be necessary to vary the amount of force exerted by the bars to where you have the least amount of error in the last section.
When you do your initial weigh, you should get weights with your hitch tensioned at different amounts, such as different links on the chains.
True, this is a lot of work to set up...a lot of measurements to take... but once done, you only need to plug in a few things when loading up for each trip.
Updated spreadsheet has been posted in #54 below
Last edited by ColbyL; 05-10-2016 at 10:57 AM. Reason: to correct information
05-09-2016, 05:49 PM
#53
Hah, I'm just glad you took it and finished the refinements! This should be as close as anyone reasonably needs to check their weight distribution and hitch safety before either buying a tow vehicle, a trailer, a WDH system, or before finally loading up and going to the scale to get a verifiable number for road safety.
