Trailer hitch connection?

[Willman]

speeking from experiance I would much rather have the trailer roll and save the truck then risk rolling the trailer and truck or damaging the truck. Both trailer and tent only took minor damage.

....sorry to their about your trailer!!!

That has been running through my mind about roll over......TACODOC has a great idea here:

He has made a cannoe rack that i was also going to put on my trailer to also protect incase of roll over for the tent.....

:jumping:

 

[RunninRubicon]

Neat idea. A roll-cage for your car-top-tent! Has merit.

 

[ntsqd]

On my trailer I designed a simple 360 degree lunette on a .75" shaft that fits through a 3/4" hole in an end plate bolted to a plate welded to a 5' section of 2" square tubing with 1/4" wall. The shaft carries a flat bushing and spring with a double nut to hold it in place inside the tube. The tube fits into the trailer frame which has a receiver at the front of the frame. The lunette fts a standard pintle hook hitch on the Kaymar bumper.

The 'low tech' result is a strong, 360 degree hitch that is adjustable from 18" to 48" in length. Useful on road and off.

Mike S

Absent a picture, something like this?

I personally like the spring, not so much from a cushioning point of view, but from a rotational damping point of view. It allows the trailer to rotate relative to the tow vehicle while also providing some damping. Sort of an old friction type shock absorber for this motion freedom.

The Engineer in me does worry that the length of the bushing is not long enough to provide long term rigidity, but if this is the lay-out you have and the various parts aren't showing objectionable wear I certainly wouldn't change the design.

 

[FEF]

Many years ago, ntsqd gave me drawings for a sweet hitch. I made it real. It took quite a few hours, and was difficult to make.

In the end, after playing with all the custom hitch stuff, I came to a conclucion. To date, as I'm still playing with the modified 5th wheel hitch idea, the rotating (springed) pintle hitch is the best hitch for nasty trails. It's easy. It's simple. You can find parts anywhere. It works.

On a side note, the spring does, in fact, have 2 finctions it provides roll resistance, and it absorbs some shock. As I found out, it won't prevent a roll over, but it will slow the rolling process down. And yes, the down side is that if the trailer goes, the vehicle goes too. It's helpfull, with this type of hitch, not to think of it as vehicle and trailer, but to think of it as an articulated vehilce. Though, there were a few times when I had to jack up the trailer, and push it over. But that's for another thread.

A hitch like this:
http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200328809_200328809

A ring like this, though I don't know it's vertical load rating.
http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_6970_200247824_200247824


IMHO

 

[Mike S]

Absent a picture, something like this?

That's it. Used two nuts to lock the shaft. The 'tongue' is adjustable for distance from vehicle to the trailer.

M

 

[ntsqd]

Many years ago, ntsqd gave me drawings for a sweet hitch. I made it real. It took quite a few hours, and was difficult to make.

The worst part had to be the 3 pieces of the 'wrist' feature (axis of rotation parallel to the CL of the vehicles). Somewhere in my several hd crashes over the years I've lost those dwgs. I'd still like to make one for myself, if only just because I can. I still like the original design, but I've a couple improvement ideas that might work. Maybe someday I'll re-create them in SolidWorks & do the full Engineering work-up.....


MikeS, There are two nuts in there, the way they are oriented is one has 2 horiz flats & one has 2 vert flats. They way the section function works they're not all that easy to ID. I took the liberty of adding a cotter pin hole too. The 2" tube started out as a 5' long section, but I shortened it for clarity. Have you by chance reached a maintenence milestone on the coupler? I'm curious how that bushing is holding up. Always good to check intuition against reality as reality has a way of not being quite what you thot it would be.

It's kind of fun seeing if I can model these ideas accurately based solely on a written description. It only looks like showing off.

 

[Willman]

What kind of program does this type of drawing??? AutoCad????

:chowtime:

 

[ntsqd]

What kind of program does this type of drawing??? AutoCad????

:chowtime:

[hijack]AutoCAD wishes it could do 3D so easily, I started there in Release 11 during the last epoch.
It is SolidWorks. In SW I can do a "save as" & select ".jpg" which gives me a pic file of what ever the current view is.
It would be cool if the board could support eDrawings b/c then anyone looking at the thread could move the view point around and section it as desired. I can send (& maybe attach?) the eDrawings files and the stand-lone viewer is a free d/l.
If you want to see the really powerful stuff check out the program Bob Sheaves has posted images from, Catia[/hijack]

 

[Mike S]

MikeS, There are two nuts in there, the way they are oriented is one has 2 horiz flats & one has 2 vert flats. They way the section function works they're not all that easy to ID. I took the liberty of adding a cotter pin hole too. The 2" tube started out as a 5' long section, but I shortened it for clarity. Have you by chance reached a maintenence milestone on the coupler? I'm curious how that bushing is holding up. Always good to check intuition against reality as reality has a way of not being quite what you thot it would be.

It's kind of fun seeing if I can model these ideas accurately based solely on a written description. It only looks like showing off.

Your drawing is better than my description! Nice drawing.

I have had this trailer for about 5 years and dragged it all over the West. Last year I pulled the mechanism out of the tube and lubbed it with lithium based grease. No rust or dirt in there at all. But if you're going to be doing river crossings, it might be wise to add a rubber gasket between the two plates and keep it well lubed. You might figure out a workable location for a zerk fitting that would make lube a no-brainer.

Mike

 

[Rezarf <><]

Very cool Mike!

Drew

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Mine is a Canadian military unit, where the pintle rotates 360* rather than the lunette (hard mounted to my trailer).

Can be locked into position for highway driving if desired (though I rarely do).

The single drawback IMHO over any of the other units is the "clank", though when loaded it is rarely an annoyance.

 

[Willman]

Well i got my hitch:

For around $178 wasn't that bad from the Lock N' Roll web site. Quick shipping and good customer service!

I would have made it myself but did have the time.

I'll keep ya posted on the install coming soon!

:jumping:

 

[LJRockstar]

Aside from the occasional "klunk" from the origonal setup on my M416, Do they have any issues? Seems to me it's a very stout design. I have more or less eliminated the klunk by installing electric brakes controlled by a Tekonsha Prodigy. It is one of the best brake controllers I have ever used.

 

[ntsqd]

Note that the Lock-N-Roll's that come set up to slide into the trailer tongue have the 2" tube bulged at the end to give clearance to the 'rivet head'. If your attachment point has a larger opening than what the 2" x .250 wall tube offers it shouldn't be any trouble.

 

[Willman]

Note that the Lock-N-Roll's that come set up to slide into the trailer tongue have the 2" tube bulged at the end to give clearance to the 'rivet head'. If your attachment point has a larger opening than what the 2" x .250 wall tube offers it shouldn't be any trouble.

Ten four on that one!!! I'm using 3x3 tube with 3/16 wall for a tonge. That 3x3 plate should weld on their very nice....

:costumed-smiley-007