Bob Hill wrote:
> First of all, I would NEVER pull a trailer that did not have brakes. When
> you consider that fact that even if you attach an open trailer with a car
> on it you have just added about 3500 pounds behind your vehicle, that is a
> tremendous burden on the braking system of your vehicle. Granted under
> normal conditions your vehicle will stop you but what about the sudden
> stop? Not only do you have the daadditional weigh to stop, you have a
> trailer behind you that has no resistance excepot the vehicle in front of
> you. Also, I would never load a car on a single axle trailer. One of the
> advantages of the double axle is weigh distribution and load capacity.
> Nothing is worse that overloading the vehicle OR the trailer when towing.
If you are adding 3500 pounds behind the car, you either:
Don't have a single axle trailer
You have a very poorly designed single axle trailer
You are not towing an LBC
Some combination of the above.
I estimate the towing weight of my Spit and trailer at somewhere around
2000 lb.. That is not a significant addition to the weight of the
vehicle.
>
> There is much discussion on whether or not a vehicle will tow a certain
> trailer or not. The issue is not whether it will tow it, it is whether it
> will tow it safely. IMHO, towing with a light duty SUV can be a disaster
> wating to happen if ever in a panic situation. Back in February of this
> year, while coming out of Florida, the lady beside me lost control of her
> vehicle. After spinning a time or two, she hit my trailer which caused it
> to flip immediately. So at 65 MOH, I was "trying" to steer a truck with a
> trailer on it's side. Needless to say, the trailer steered me - down an
> embankment to a clove of trees at which point he truck stopped and the
> trailer kept coming - right on top if the truck. The point of the story
> (other than the good Lord was surely watching out for me that day)
> is that if my truck had not been heavy enough for hte trailer, it woudl
> have probably flipped it as well. ( I always pull with a Dually - it was
> a 99 Dodge Club Cab Diesel - totaled with 2500 miles on it now). Would a
> smaller truck had pulled my trailer? Absolutely! As safely? Not sure but
> as I was riding down the embankment, I sure was glad I was not on my side
> as I was doing it!
While your point is well taken, you can get into bad situations whether
you are towing a tandem trailer with brakes or no trailer at all. Care
is indeed the watchword. Most of us can't afford the extremes that it
takes to rid oneself of all possibilities, but if you exercise extreme
care when pulling even a light trailer without brakes, there's no reason
to think that it can be done safely.
Regards,
Joe Curry
--
"If you can't excel with talent, triumph with effort."
-- Dave Weinbaum in National Enquirer
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