I am asking for help for a friend of mine. I am trying to find something like a tag a long (if that is the right term) for supporting the tongue weight of a pull behind trailer (not gooseneck or 5'r). I'm thinking of something similar to semi's that pull doubles and triples where the extra trailers are supported by the tag a long. I have been scouring over this site as well as several others and even Yahoo searching....but I'm not finding anything.

My buddy has a 2004 GMC D/A that is lifted 6" and is running about 35" tires. The truck does have airbags on the rear axle for extra support. The truck hasn't been regeared, but we only use it for a couple months each year for our snowmobile racing team. The trailer is a 30' stacker with triple axles. There is a weight distributing hitch that we use now.

Now, I know normally the tongue weight should balance somewhat well by the trailer design and placement of the load in the trailer. My buddy just feels that the tongue load is too much and would like to see what options exist. He has looked at one option that used a set of tires on a big spring that is welded under the tongue area of the trailer. This reduces the tongue weight on the towing truck to something like 300 pounds. Unfortunately, the bracing for the trailer is in the way and cutting it out won't work well.

Does anyone know of something like what I'm describing? It sure would be great to use this "tag a long" for supporting the trailer weight and use the truck for just pulling the weight around.

I doubt you will find such a thing for a bumper hitch trailer. For 1, not many states (if any) allow pulling tandem with 2 balls. Some allow tandem as long as the front hitch is a dual locking fifth wheel hitch.

The second thing is it would be impossible to backup.

All in all, even if he could find such a thing it is not practical. I would think it would be pretty dangerous as well. His truck should handle the load just fine as it is. He is just looking for more trouble IMO.

Max,

I'm not sure he's looking for info on a two-trailer setup. It sounds like he just wants to get a pivoting axle (so he could turn) for the front of his trailer. This axle would connect to the hitch ball with a boat trailer coupling (tri-beam A frame) type-thing directly connected to the axle.

If I understand this right, he wants to add this axle to help reduce the tongue weight of the trailer.

Max and Gruffid,

Thanks for the help so far. For clarification, I would be interested in finding either a seperate trailer (two-trailer) setup where the truck pulls a little trailer that is actually supporting the main trailer. I can see your points about backing up being next to impossible. We usually have plenty of room to just drive forward and swing big circles. I will have to check into the legality of pulling two trailers with balls.

I am also interested in a rigid mounting axle/wheel that swivels. This would mount to the front of the trailer frame near the trailer jack. This is along the lines of what Gruffid said. My buddy had found one (I don't know the brand) but it wouldn't work because this trailer has the two main A-frame beams plus a center beam. The center beam was in the way for the swivel wheel setup he found.

Either of you know brands or where to look for a rigid mounting swivel wheel setup? Thanks for the help.

What kind of tongue weight does the trailer have?
You want more than 300# of tongue weight on a heavy trailer.
Should have 10% tongue weight.
Since it has 3 axles in only 30' trailer it shouldn't be toooo tongue heavy.
Can u move the weight back to lighten the TW?

What about cutting tongue off and putting on a 5th wheel hitch?

DMAX Tim,

Thanks for your info. I will see about measuring the tongue weight on the trailer as it stands today. Since it is unloaded, I might have to wait until next weekend (which is a race) for the trailer to be fully loaded.

I agree with you on the 10% part for tongue weight. I don't know that my buddy has ever weighed the trailer fully loaded with the 6 snowmobiles, pit cart, quad, and all other gear. I know we put all the sleds and quad towards the back as far as possible and the lifting hoist for the stacker is of course in the back.

There is a generator and some other stuff stuck up on the tongue. It is permanently fixed in cabinets at the front of the trailer...so it is not moving. I am really surprised that he has ever had a problem since it is rather short for being a triple (but it is a stacker and hence the weight is a bit high). The airbags on the truck keep everything level while towing.

I know he doesn't like the jouncing when hitting bumps in the road. Maybe he is just concerned about that and figures he'll try to find something to help support the weight. I told him I'd ask around and this site seems to be full of knowledgable people. I appreciate everyone's help!

Is this what your looking for? Usually used by motorhomes to tow trailers. I have no experience with them, but have seen the ads around.

https://shogunindustries.com/cgi-bin/Web_store/ws400CS.cgi?cart_id=&page=tufftowindex.html

If he's getting a lot of bounce/jounce maybe he needs better shocks or dual shocks for his lifted truck.
A set of adjustable shocks may help.

Some of the bounce maybe the airbags too.

David,

What Jeff-MN listed in his reply is what my brother used on his 28' enclosed race trailer. I think that is exactly what you are looking for. I can't tell you the price but it does just what you looking for. Yes, it's used mostly by racers pulling their haulers with motor homes, but I see not reason why it would not work for any tow vehicle.

My brother did tell me it takes a little bit of time to set up the proper tongue weight. You don't dare unload the tongue too much or the trailer will fishtail on you. The Tuff tow is capable of unloading all of the tongue weight off of the tow vehicle, so you have to be careful.

As far as reliability goes, he had the trailer for 5 years and did not have any problems with it at all.

He also told me it's great for moving the trailer with a garden tractor as the weight of the trailer won't crush the tractor with the tuff tow on.

Hope that helps.

Thanks everyone....Jeff-MN, you hit it on the head. I just found out today that my buddy has looked at the Tuff Tow unit. Unfortunately that particular unit won't work on the trailer because is has a third beam that runs directly down the center of the front A-frame part of the hitch.

Dmax Tim, I will see what we could possibly do about the adjustable shocks. I'm sure he just used the Fabtech shocks that came with the lift kit. I don't remember seeing any other brand of shock on there and I'm pretty sure there is only one shock at each corner.

Glad to hear that the Tuff Tow unit has worked well for your brother, DavesDmax. It certainly looks capable and is completely what we need. Does anyone know of another kit that maybe mounts on the bottom side of the frame rails so that the third beam down the center of our trailer won't interfere?? I guess our other option would be to cut out part of the third beam and weld a cross brace in order to tie in the remaining portion of the third beam. I'm kinda skeptical about hacking up a trailer frame on a 1 year old trailer.....

I really appreciate the help and now I have more clues to search against.

When I looked at the pictures on their site I came away with the impression that you did not modifiy your A-Frame hitch setup. It looked to me like you purchased the whole assembly and just attatched it to the front of your trailer as a replacement unit. If thats the case you would remove the whole thing and wield on their replacement unit...
They said on the site that it took them a long time to get everything lined up and working well so I figured that the best way to make sure those measurements were correct would be to sell the complete unit......

But I have been wrong before :)

Swatkins,

You are right in that you don't modify the a-frame setup on most trailers for use with the Tuff Tow. I might not have been clear in describing the front of our trailer. We have 3 beams leading to the hitch whereas most trailers have only two beams leading to the hitch. If you were looking down on the trailer from the top, it looks like

|\
|..\
|... \
|----O
|... /
|../
|/

Hopefully that sketched turns out ok to look at. The dashes represent the beams on the trailer. I had to use periods to get some of the symbols in the right place. So, the center (third) beam is right where the spring and tire need to go.

I understand what going on,, that might be the first time in history :) I was digging a little more and I might be wrong on the A frame being a factory unit.. There was another part of their website that showed different pictures and from them it looked like you could also retrofit the wheel system into your exsisting A frame... It gave the measurments for the mounting point of their system also.

If your existing A frame is large enough I see no reason that it could not be modified for the wheel... You could stop the "third rail" at the fron of the trailer and connect it to the A frame with a cross beam to the other base of the A frame...

I think I would give the people a call and see what they say :)
Steve

Swatkins,

Thanks for looking at it some more and confirming some of what I thought. I do believe the Tuff Tow kit is the mounting part and the wheel and you weld it to your existing trailer A-frame. We will talk to the trailer manufacturer and see what they think about cutting the center frame and boxing it back in with the A-frame rails.

As mentioned by another poster, I'm also going to see what we can do about shocks. Maybe the "white" shocks that came with the Fabtech lift kit could be improved upon with some Bilsteins or such. This should help control the bouncing that occurs with such a heavy tongue load.

I was kinda hoping there would be some other kits out there like the Tuff Tow that maybe mounted differently. I'll keep looking but I really appreciate the help I've gotten here.

Here is another option. http://www.hitch-buddy.com/ It's a mounted dolly that can pull a bumper mount, 5th wheel or goose neck type trailer and gives you another set of beakes.