Towing help please
5 Year Member
Joined: Aug 2010
Posts: 750
Likes: 111
From: South Dakota
The Husky is fine.
Sway is caused by one thing. BALANCE. You have a balance problem. Also in the RV world defined as weight distribution.
Never saw this question asked. Are your airbags auto leveling>? If so shut that s**t off. As you drive the bags try to auto level which is throwing off your whole system. As recommended, set them manually at minimal psi. Then go out and find a level, or as flat as you can get, surface and re-measure everything. Start over with setting the hitch. This needs to be done every time you get a different TV. Trailer should be level or just slightly nose down at full hitch.
Once you have this set then you go to the scale. Full tank of gas and only you in the truck. Weigh the truck. Then load up everybody and whatever you normally put in the truck and weigh the truck again.
Then fully hitch the trailer and weigh the whole rig. Subtract the truck will give you the trailer. better if you can weigh trailer separately.
Now look at your numbers, factor your hitch weight. Often sway is caused by not enough weight on the hitch or too much weight behind axle. My old TT was 38' ball to spare. Had 4 tanks, 1 fresh, 2 grey, 1 black. If you towed that pig without draining the tanks it was really unbalanced.
It was mentioned but uneven tire pressure can do it too. As in one side considerably lower than the other.
I am still mostly curious about your airbag setup though. They guy that bought my trailer when I sold it had a self leveling dodge. He said just him completely empty was fine but loaded for camping the auto level really messed with it and he had to turn that off.
Sway is caused by one thing. BALANCE. You have a balance problem. Also in the RV world defined as weight distribution.
Never saw this question asked. Are your airbags auto leveling>? If so shut that s**t off. As you drive the bags try to auto level which is throwing off your whole system. As recommended, set them manually at minimal psi. Then go out and find a level, or as flat as you can get, surface and re-measure everything. Start over with setting the hitch. This needs to be done every time you get a different TV. Trailer should be level or just slightly nose down at full hitch.
Once you have this set then you go to the scale. Full tank of gas and only you in the truck. Weigh the truck. Then load up everybody and whatever you normally put in the truck and weigh the truck again.
Then fully hitch the trailer and weigh the whole rig. Subtract the truck will give you the trailer. better if you can weigh trailer separately.
Now look at your numbers, factor your hitch weight. Often sway is caused by not enough weight on the hitch or too much weight behind axle. My old TT was 38' ball to spare. Had 4 tanks, 1 fresh, 2 grey, 1 black. If you towed that pig without draining the tanks it was really unbalanced.
It was mentioned but uneven tire pressure can do it too. As in one side considerably lower than the other.
I am still mostly curious about your airbag setup though. They guy that bought my trailer when I sold it had a self leveling dodge. He said just him completely empty was fine but loaded for camping the auto level really messed with it and he had to turn that off.
Thread Starter
Senior Member
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 142
Likes: 7
The Husky is fine.
Sway is caused by one thing. BALANCE. You have a balance problem. Also in the RV world defined as weight distribution.
Never saw this question asked. Are your airbags auto leveling>? If so shut that s**t off. As you drive the bags try to auto level which is throwing off your whole system. As recommended, set them manually at minimal psi. Then go out and find a level, or as flat as you can get, surface and re-measure everything. Start over with setting the hitch. This needs to be done every time you get a different TV. Trailer should be level or just slightly nose down at full hitch.
Once you have this set then you go to the scale. Full tank of gas and only you in the truck. Weigh the truck. Then load up everybody and whatever you normally put in the truck and weigh the truck again.
Then fully hitch the trailer and weigh the whole rig. Subtract the truck will give you the trailer. better if you can weigh trailer separately.
Now look at your numbers, factor your hitch weight. Often sway is caused by not enough weight on the hitch or too much weight behind axle. My old TT was 38' ball to spare. Had 4 tanks, 1 fresh, 2 grey, 1 black. If you towed that pig without draining the tanks it was really unbalanced.
It was mentioned but uneven tire pressure can do it too. As in one side considerably lower than the other.
I am still mostly curious about your airbag setup though. They guy that bought my trailer when I sold it had a self leveling dodge. He said just him completely empty was fine but loaded for camping the auto level really messed with it and he had to turn that off.
Sway is caused by one thing. BALANCE. You have a balance problem. Also in the RV world defined as weight distribution.
Never saw this question asked. Are your airbags auto leveling>? If so shut that s**t off. As you drive the bags try to auto level which is throwing off your whole system. As recommended, set them manually at minimal psi. Then go out and find a level, or as flat as you can get, surface and re-measure everything. Start over with setting the hitch. This needs to be done every time you get a different TV. Trailer should be level or just slightly nose down at full hitch.
Once you have this set then you go to the scale. Full tank of gas and only you in the truck. Weigh the truck. Then load up everybody and whatever you normally put in the truck and weigh the truck again.
Then fully hitch the trailer and weigh the whole rig. Subtract the truck will give you the trailer. better if you can weigh trailer separately.
Now look at your numbers, factor your hitch weight. Often sway is caused by not enough weight on the hitch or too much weight behind axle. My old TT was 38' ball to spare. Had 4 tanks, 1 fresh, 2 grey, 1 black. If you towed that pig without draining the tanks it was really unbalanced.
It was mentioned but uneven tire pressure can do it too. As in one side considerably lower than the other.
I am still mostly curious about your airbag setup though. They guy that bought my trailer when I sold it had a self leveling dodge. He said just him completely empty was fine but loaded for camping the auto level really messed with it and he had to turn that off.
I towed a lot of years ago with my previous job and do understand trailer sway to a certain degree however when you add WD hitch, airbags, etc things get confusing.
I did however inflate the bags to 30-40 lbs before attempting to level the rig. It has been suggested to run them at minimum and I will be trying this when I get the chance. I plan on going through the entire set up process again first.
Also the only scale in the city is at the waste transfer station. They will let me weigh the truck alone and then with the trailer attached but not just the trailer as I can’t tie up the scale so not sure how I can get an accurate number for tongue weight.
5 Year Member
Joined: Feb 2012
Posts: 13,851
Likes: 2,739
I do not have self leveling airbags, I manually inflate them. When I changed trucks I went through the set up again but just haven’t managed to get it dialed in.
I towed a lot of years ago with my previous job and do understand trailer sway to a certain degree however when you add WD hitch, airbags, etc things get confusing.
I did however inflate the bags to 30-40 lbs before attempting to level the rig. It has been suggested to run them at minimum and I will be trying this when I get the chance. I plan on going through the entire set up process again first.
Also the only scale in the city is at the waste transfer station. They will let me weigh the truck alone and then with the trailer attached but not just the trailer as I can’t tie up the scale so not sure how I can get an accurate number for tongue weight.
I towed a lot of years ago with my previous job and do understand trailer sway to a certain degree however when you add WD hitch, airbags, etc things get confusing.
I did however inflate the bags to 30-40 lbs before attempting to level the rig. It has been suggested to run them at minimum and I will be trying this when I get the chance. I plan on going through the entire set up process again first.
Also the only scale in the city is at the waste transfer station. They will let me weigh the truck alone and then with the trailer attached but not just the trailer as I can’t tie up the scale so not sure how I can get an accurate number for tongue weight.
Get a couple 2x4's and a bathroom scale to get the TW. https://www.etrailer.com/faq-how-to-...ue-weight.aspx Scroll down a bit for it.
The issue I had with the Husky, which is probably the same as yours, is that the bars were not heavy enough for the trailer. They are 800 pound and the trailer needed at least 1000 pound bars. Makes a huge difference. Heres the manual, http://www.hitchpro.com/Application/...ons/N49903.pdf they may look a bit different, but are basically identical in setup. The weight is stamped on the bar somewhere.
5 Year Member
Joined: May 2018
Posts: 251
Likes: 67
From: Cypress, TX
What is your tongue weight fully loaded? When I tow, I always measure. Even if I don’t have a scale, I can always measure deflection at the rear receiver compared to the ground with two-three people standing on the rear bumper and compare that with the trailer attached. I can usually get it really close by balancing my load.
Thread Starter
Senior Member
Joined: Apr 2010
Posts: 142
Likes: 7
I really have no idea what the tongue weight is. I’m not sure I understand the two or three people on the bumper for deflection and I have tried to balance the load as much as possible but it’s difficult when you don’t know tongue weight and there’s only so much you can move around inside a camper.
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
Senior Member
Joined: Aug 2018
Posts: 303
Likes: 110
I really have no idea what the tongue weight is. I’m not sure I understand the two or three people on the bumper for deflection and I have tried to balance the load as much as possible but it’s difficult when you don’t know tongue weight and there’s only so much you can move around inside a camper.
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
5 Year Member
Joined: May 2018
Posts: 251
Likes: 67
From: Cypress, TX
I really have no idea what the tongue weight is. I’m not sure I understand the two or three people on the bumper for deflection and I have tried to balance the load as much as possible but it’s difficult when you don’t know tongue weight and there’s only so much you can move around inside a camper.
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
my plan for now is to go through the hitch measurements and run with minimum pressure in airbags and see how it is. I have found that running with a full fresh water tank seems to help sometimes so hopefully that with no pressure in airbags will help significantly. Kinda disappointing that I installed the bags for the trailer but....I’ll post when I have some results.
Thanks for the suggestions guys
If you don’t have a scale handy, measure the distance of the hitch receiver to the ground when you load the bumper with about 500 lbs. (three guys). Then hook up the trailer to the the truck and remeasure in the same spot. You should be at around the same height. You’ll get a lot of sway if you don’t have enough tongue weight.
Hope this helps.