Fishtailing tow vehicle?

Load towards the front so the tongue has some weight on it, more weight than is behind the trailer axle. Tire pressure should be checked as well.

Had this happen to me in the 60's pulling a car trailer. About the scariest ride I ever had. The trailer was making "S" skid marks and I about lost it more than once. In my case it was a loose front end in the truck. I replaced all the bad parts and had the front end aligned. Never a problem after that. When it happened we tried to add weight to the truck by moving the car forward on the trailer, then we unloaded the car and turned it around and tied it as far back as we could. Must have mover that car 20 times, nothing helped. The only way to stop the weaving was to stand on the gas. Going down hills was murder.

About 10 years ago I saw this happen to a guy in a Wagoneer pulling a camping trailer. He stopped and I offered to pull it with my truck. Hooked it up and it was a solid as if it was on railroad tracks. I pulled it about

40 miles and then we hit I-10 and went different directions.

Al

Improper weight distribution. You should have about 10% of the weight on the tongue. What that means is if the trailer and cargo weigh 2,000#, then the tongue weight should be 200#. With the kind of hauling you're doing, that's pretty tough to measure or estimate. So do this. With the truck on an even keel, measure the height of the bumper. Now find somebody who weighs about 200#, and have them stand on the trailer hitch ball. Now measure the height of the bumper. That's how much the the rear end sags with a 200 pound tongue weight (On my truck it's about 1.5"). Now you can guestimate tongue weight by measuring the bumper.

I do not think that will fix it, too much load and too little tow vehicle. Try running trailer and rear truck tires at max rated cold pressure. Low pressure car type tires lack in side/sway stability control. Is it a tandum or single axle trailer? If it was a single axle trailer, you were clearly overloaded for the trailer and truck.

The scariest tow I ever made was towing a 68 AMC fullsize wagon (engine trouble) with a 54 Chevy for my older brother.

70 series radial tires on the wagon, a short tow bar and 6.70 X 15 bias-ply tires on the Chevy.

At the first turn, a 5 mph street corner, the wagon tried to push the Chevy sideways. and that was to be the norm for the 60 mile haul back home on all but the slightest curves.

Yes, the steering wheel was free to turn in the wagon.

Budd

Big Al wrote:

Ya know, I'm not really sure where in the hell you get your info. The OP never mentioned any details as to how much wood he had on the trailer. As such, its hard to figure it was overloaded for sure.

But lets assume it was. IF it was overloaded, it would drag like it was in mud, and getting to 55MPH would be the issue, not towing in a straight line.

"I was towing a trailer with 2 ric of firewood home the other day, and I couldn't go above 55 miles per hour, the trailer was weaving back and forth so much..."

that's a good amount of information. "you ant from around here are you boy?"

A "ric" equals how many pounds?

"the trailer" equals how long, what weight capacity, and what gross weight allowed?

You ain't got any more clue than I do, do ya? At least I know what I'm looking for.....Facts.

The worst I've seen was as a police officer a few years ago. A guy was going on vacation driving a brand new Dodge Ram pulling a popup camper pulling a boat behind it. Well the boat trailer started to fishtail and that's all she wrote. Highway was shut down for hours while I worked this wreck. His beautiful new boat and camper were ruined as well as his brand new Ram. I felt so sorry for the guy.

Bob

I've often seen these rigs and wondered about the wisdom of them. Impossible to back up, certainly, but to be on the dog end when the tails wags the dog would be a bit much to take.

Budd

Bob M wrote:

Two rics make a cord and depending on wood type and moisture content the wood could weigh 3000 to 4000lb or more and through in trailer weight and you are at two tons or better. You should think before you comment because you are the one that is really clueless here and should not be giving advise.

Max Dodge wrote:

I was wondering too how a "ric" weights too??? Did a Google search and found nothing that I would share on here :-)

Yeah, so you have trailer weight narrowed down to.... a half ton either way. Yup, thats accurate.

BTW, speaking of not commenting before knowing what you are talking about: You should be aware that even with the huge range in weight you guess the trailer could be, its STILL within towing capacity of the vehicle you earlier claimed was too small.

Another note, having done considerable firewood gathering, a cord weighs no where near 4000lbs (I doubt over 3000lbs either), as the dimensions are

4x4x8 feet.

Far more so than you Maxi.

But could be loaded completely wrong.

And once again, you would be wrong.

at the chart, Red oak wet is 4888 and white oak (what a waste forfirewood) is 5573 wet and 4200 dry. Not even close huh??

Not enough weight on the hitch - your load was too far back on the trailer. At least that's the MOST COMMON cause.

Given that the Dak he was driving is rated to tow just over 6,000lbs.... now - let's say he was hauling 3,500lbs. of wood. A 5x10 flatbed trailer is usually a single-axle, and usually weighs in under 1,000lbs. (750lbs. is closer). He probably was a little over on the trailer, (again, assuming a single axle, 3,500lb. rating - pretty typical), but he's still nowhere near the towing capacity of his truck.

But - it's very possible the trailer wasn't loaded properly, resulting in too little tongue weight, causing the instability. I think I read that posted here already....

A full cord of firewood is 128 cubic feet - 4X4X8, but actually contains only roughly 100 cubic feet of wood. Well seasoned hardwood should come in just under 4000 lbs. Spring cut maple could be over

6000 lbs. Dry white oak is about 4200 lbs, Dry basswood is about 1900. Dry Maple is about 3600, unless it's silver maple, at about 2700, more or less.

A properly loaded trailer of any weight will follow calmly behind just about any vehicle capable of pulling it. Conversely, a trailer with only 600 lbs on it can get VERY hairy if the load is on the very back, making the hitch "light".

That's why they are outlawed in Ontario, most of the rest of Canada, and I'm sure half the states.

If two rics equal a cord, then the trailer was first of all, grossly overloaded based upon the tire size. Assuming a cord is 128 cubic feet and allowing for air space lets say that cuts it down to 100 cuubic feet of actual wood. The density of oak/hickory varies from 40-55 lbs/cubic foot, so for the sake of argument lets say the average would be 45 lbs/cu ft. Therefore the weight of the load would be 4500lbs, plus the weight of the trailer depending on construction would be ~400 lbs for a total combined weight of 4900 lbs. The highest rating for a 13" tire that I can find in a load/inflation chart is 1620 lbs x 2 for a max load of 3240 lbs.

Assuming the trailer is commercialy manufactured, the axle rating is probably not much more that the tire rating especially since it was designed for 13" wheels.

A lot of factors to consider but without having all the facts, I'd say tongue weight is probably numero uno for the squirrelyness closely followed by tire overloading and in this extreme example frame flexing is not out of the question.

The truck is capable of towing the load, but the trailer is simply not up to snuff.

Mike